PART 2: AFTER MY HUSBAND DIED, MY DAUGHTER-IN-LAW FORCED ME TO SCRUB THE FLOOR ON HIS FUNERAL MORNING

PART 2 — THE LETTER ARTHUR LEFT BEHIND

“Your brother?” Jessica finally managed to say.

“That is impossible. Arthur never mentioned having a brother.”

William pulled out his phone and dialed.

“Lopez,” he said. “Cancel all my meetings for the day. I need you at this address with the legal team. Now.”

He ended the call and looked at Jessica with contempt.

“We were separated as children,” he said. “Different adoptions. Different cities. I spent years looking for him. Years. When I finally found him six months ago, he asked me not to introduce myself to the family yet. He wanted to wait for the right moment. He wanted it to be special.”

I covered my mouth with both hands.

Arthur had a brother.

Arthur had found him.

Why had he never told me?

William’s voice hardened.

“We spoke on the phone every week. He told me about his life. About Margaret. About how proud he was to have loved her. About how happy he

was by her side.”

His voice broke slightly.

Then he looked back at Jessica.

“He also told me about his daughter-in-law. About how she had changed in the last few months. About how she pressured him for money. About how she treated his wife when he was not around.”

“That is a lie,” Jessica snapped. “I treated everyone well.”

William took one step toward her.

“Then explain why my brother called me a week ago terrified, saying you had asked him to put the house in your name. Explain why you told him it was to protect the family from taxes. Explain why you cried and pushed and manipulated until he almost gave in.”

I felt the floor tilt beneath me.

Arthur had never told me that.

Jessica reached for her purse.

“Mr. William, this is clearly a misunderstanding. I have to go to the funeral. We can talk later.”

“You are not going anywhere,” William said.

He blocked her path without raising his voice.

“You are going to sit right there and wait. I am going to take Margaret to my brother’s funeral. When we return, you and I will have a very long conversation about your future, or rather the lack of one.”

He turned to me, and his expression softened.

“Margaret, may I drive you?”

I nodded, unable to speak.

The tears were still falling, but they were different now.

There was something beneath the pain.

Hope.

Justice beginning to show its face.

Before we left, William turned once more to Jessica.

“Oh, and one other thing. As of this moment, you are suspended from your position at my company without pay while we investigate certain financial irregularities that have come to my attention. What a coincidence that they began exactly when you started working for us

last year.”

Jessica collapsed onto the sofa.

All her arrogance disappeared.

We left the house.

As William guided me toward his elegant black car parked by the curb, one question kept spinning in my mind.

What else had Arthur hidden from me during the last months of his life?

And what was I about to discover now?

William’s car smelled of fine leather and polished wood. The seats were cream-colored and impossibly soft. I had never been inside a vehicle like that. As he drove toward the cemetery, I stared out the window at the familiar streets, but I was not really seeing them.

My mind had gone back three months.

Everything had started to change when Jessica got that job at the technology company.

The same company, I now understood, that William owned.

Three months earlier, I had been in the kitchen making lunch when Arthur came home with a strange expression. Worried. Tired. Older somehow.

He sat at the table without speaking.

“What happened, honey?” I asked, drying my hands on my apron.

“It’s Jessica,” he said at last. “She came over today. She needs us to lend her twenty thousand dollars. She says it is urgent. If she doesn’t pay a debt, they are going to repossess everything.”

“Twenty thousand dollars?”

I nearly dropped the plate in my hands.

“What does she need that much money for?”

Arthur rubbed his forehead.

“She would not tell me. She just cried and cried. She said we were her only hope. She said if we did not help her, her life would be ruined.”

“And you gave it to her?”

He looked ashamed.

“What else could I do? She is Michael’s wife. She is family.”

Family.

That word had trapped us more than once.

We took the money from the emergency savings account, the one Arthur had built dollar by dollar over years. Jessica promised she would pay it back within three months.

She never did.

Two weeks later, she returned.

This time, she needed fifteen thousand more.

Then ten thousand.

Then eight.

Always with tears.

Always with dramatic stories.

Always with promises that the next payment, the next deal, the next client would fix everything.

Arthur began to look ill.

He lost weight.

He slept poorly.

One night, I found him in his study with his head in his hands, papers spread across the desk.

“We don’t have anything left, Margaret,” he said, his voice broken. “The savings are gone. The retirement account is empty. And Jessica says she needs us to put the house up as collateral for a loan.”

“The house?”

I felt fear run down my spine.

“What business does she even have?”

“I don’t know. She won’t give me details. She just cries and makes me feel like the worst father-in-law alive if I don’t help her.”

I tried to talk to Jessica myself.

I went to her apartment one afternoon when I knew she would be alone. She opened the door holding a glass of wine. Her makeup was perfect. Her dress looked expensive. She did not look like someone drowning in financial disaster.

“Margaret,” she said, without inviting me inside. “What a surprise.”

“We need to talk about the money. Arthur is stressed. We have already given you more than fifty thousand dollars. When are you going to pay it back?”

Her expression changed.

The sweet daughter-in-law vanished.

“Pay it back?” she said.

Then she laughed.

“That money was an investment in the future of this family. You two are old. What were you going to do with it? Take it with you? At least I am using it for something productive.”

I froze.

“Investment? Is that what you call taking our life savings?”

She looked at her nails with bored indifference.

“Besides, technically, that house belongs as much to my husband as it does to you. When Arthur is gone, who do you think will keep everything? Stop bothering me with nonsense about money. Consider it an advance on the inheritance.”

Then she slammed the door in my face.

I stood there shaking with anger and fear.

When I told Arthur what she had said, he went pale.

“She cannot be that cruel,” he whispered. “She is the mother of our grandchildren. She is family.”

But I had seen the truth.

Jessica was not family.

She was a predator.

And we were her prey.

In the following weeks, Arthur got worse. He had headaches, dizziness, nausea. I took him to the doctor three times. Each time, they said the same thing.

Stress.

High blood pressure.

Rest.

Jessica kept coming.

Kept asking.

Kept pressuring.

One day, she arrived with papers.

“I need you both to sign this,” she said. “It is just a formality. A life insurance policy. I would be the beneficiary just in case something happens, so I can take care of everything.”

Arthur, weak and exhausted, almost signed.

I snatched the paper from his hand.

“We are not signing anything,” I said. “Not anymore.”

Jessica smiled.

That smile still haunts me.

“Fine,” she said. “Don’t sign. But when Arthur has a health crisis and needs expensive treatment, don’t come crying to me. I won’t be there.”

She left, slamming the door.

That night, Arthur could not sleep.

He was cold and sweating.

“Margaret,” he whispered in the dark, “I’m scared. I feel like something bad is going to happen. I feel like Jessica is planning something.”

I squeezed his hand.

“We will not let her do anything to us. Tomorrow, we will talk to a lawyer. We will protect what is ours.”

But tomorrow never came.

The next morning, Arthur took his medications.

The ones for his blood pressure.

The ones for his cholesterol.

Jessica had insisted on buying them for the last month. She said she wanted to help, that she felt guilty for all the stress she had caused.

Why did I not check them?

Why did I not suspect anything?

Half an hour later, Arthur collapsed in the kitchen.

One second he was standing by the sink.

The next he was on the floor.

I called the ambulance, screaming and crying.

The paramedics arrived in fifteen minutes.

Fifteen minutes that felt like a lifetime.

Fifteen minutes holding my husband in my arms, begging him not to leave me.

At the hospital, doctors tried everything.

I waited in a cold hallway under fluorescent lights, shaking so hard that a nurse wrapped a blanket around my shoulders.

When the doctor came out with that expression on his face, I knew.

“I am so sorry, ma’am,” he said. “We did everything possible. It was a massive cardiac arrest. Sometimes it happens without warning.”

Without warning.

Arthur was sixty-eight, but he had been active, steady, strong. How could his heart simply stop?

Jessica arrived thirty minutes later.

Her eyes were dry.

She sat beside me, took my hand, and put on a voice of soft concern.

“What a tragedy, Margaret. But don’t worry. I will take care of everything. The paperwork. The funeral. The house. You just rest. You are an elderly woman. Let me handle the important things.”

I should have shouted.

I should have thrown her hand away.

But I was in shock.

Broken.

Lost.

And she took advantage of every second.

The next three days were a nightmare.

Jessica took control of everything. She chose the cheapest coffin. She canceled the church service Arthur had wanted. She moved the burial to an inconvenient time. Then, on the morning of the funeral, she forbade me from going.

The car stopped.

We had arrived at the cemetery.

William turned off the engine and looked at me.

“Margaret,” he said, “I need to ask you something, and I need you to be completely honest. Do you believe my brother’s death was natural?”

The tears returned.

The question I had been asking myself silently for three days had finally been spoken aloud.

“No,” I whispered. “I don’t believe it. But I have no proof. Only this terrible feeling that Jessica did something.”

William nodded slowly.

“Then we will find proof. But first, we are going to say goodbye to Arthur as he deserves. Together. As family.”

We got out of the car.

In the distance, I could see the mourners gathered around an open grave. My heart broke all over again when I realized that the hole in the earth was where they would place the man who had been my life.

William offered me his arm.

I took it.

We walked together.

People turned to look at us. Some with curiosity. Some with pity. Some whispering because the widow had arrived late to her own husband’s funeral with a stranger no one recognized.

Jessica stood beside the coffin in a fitted black dress, dabbing fake tears from her eyes.

When she saw us, her face transformed.

Terror.

She stepped forward and blocked our path with both arms.

“You cannot be here,” she hissed. “This is a private moment for the family.”

William looked at her with icy calm.

“Move.”

One word.

Jessica stepped back.

The mourners fell silent.

I approached the coffin. It was closed. I would not even be able to see Arthur’s face one last time.

I placed my trembling hand on the smooth wood.

“Goodbye, my love,” I whispered. “Forgive me for not arriving sooner. Forgive me for not protecting you.”

The tears came uncontrollably.

William stood beside me without speaking.

After a few minutes, I felt a gentle hand on my shoulder.

I turned and saw an older woman around my age. Her gray hair was pulled into a bun. Her eyes were kind but sad.

“You must be Margaret,” she said softly. “Arthur spoke about you often. I’m Susan. I was his neighbor when he lived on Maple Street before he married you. I knew him more than forty years ago.”

I nodded, unable to speak.

“He was a good man,” Susan said. “Always helping people. Always smiling. It broke my heart to hear he passed so suddenly.”

She glanced toward Jessica, then lowered her voice.

“I came to speak with you, but that woman would not let me get close. She said you were too indisposed to receive visitors. That you did not want to be bothered. But I had to give you this.”

She pulled a yellowed envelope from her purse.

“It is a letter. Arthur came to see me two weeks ago. He looked worried. Nervous. He told me if anything happened to him, I had to give this to you. Only to you.”

My hands shook as I took the envelope.

My name was written on the front.

Margaret.

Arthur’s handwriting.

The same handwriting I had seen on grocery lists, birthday cards, and little notes left beside the coffee pot.

William looked at the envelope.

“What does it say?”

“I don’t know,” Susan said. “I did not open it. It was not for me. But whatever it is, Arthur thought it was important.”

Before I could open it, Jessica’s sharp voice cut through the silence.

“What is that? Let me see it.”

She came toward me quickly.

“If it belonged to Arthur, I have a right to know. I am family.”

She tried to grab the envelope.

William caught her wrist before she could touch it.

“You will not touch anything that does not belong to you. Understood?”

Jessica pulled away.

“You people do not know who you are dealing with. I have rights over everything Arthur owned. I am his son’s wife. I am the one who took care of him in his final days.”

“Took care of him?”

The words left me louder than I expected.

The mourners turned.

“You call draining every cent he had taking care of him? You call pressuring him until he became sick taking care of him? You call keeping me from his funeral taking care of him?”

The cemetery went silent.

Jessica turned red.

“She is delirious from grief,” she announced to the crowd. “The poor thing does not know what she is saying.”

Susan stepped forward.

“I know exactly what she is saying. And she is right.”

Jessica glared at her.

“You are a nosy old woman who knows nothing.”

“I know more than you think,” Susan replied. “Arthur told me about you. He told me how you manipulated him. How you took money from him with lies. How you threatened him when he refused you.”

The priest tried to regain control of the service, but no one listened.

Then a man in a gray suit approached, carrying a briefcase.

“That is a serious accusation,” he said.

He looked about fifty, with careful eyes and a lawyer’s posture.

“I am Robert Vance. I was Arthur Miller’s attorney. And I can confirm that Mr. Miller came to see me three weeks ago.”

William straightened.

“What did he want?”

Robert glanced at Jessica before answering.

“He wanted to change his will. He wanted to ensure that Margaret received everything. The house, the remaining savings, his belongings, all of it. And he specifically wanted it stated that his daughter-in-law, Jessica, would receive absolutely nothing.”

Jessica went pale.

“That is a lie. Arthur loved me. I was like a daughter to him.”

“A daughter?” Robert gave a dry laugh. “Mr. Miller told me, word for word, ‘That woman is a viper. She will try to take everything when I die. I cannot let Margaret be left on the street.’”

“Did he sign the will?” William asked.

Robert shook his head.

“We were supposed to sign it last week. He missed the appointment. When I called, his daughter-in-law answered and told me Arthur was busy, that he no longer needed my services, and that she would take care of everything.”

Jessica backed away.

“I was protecting him,” she stammered. “He was confused. He was senile.”

“Senile?” I cried. “Arthur was perfectly clear until you started destroying him.”

William turned slowly toward me.

“I do not like the word destroying,” he said. “But it is interesting you use it, Margaret, because I have also begun wondering what really happened.”

He took out his phone.

“Arthur’s medical records were sent to me this morning. His last blood tests showed abnormally high levels of certain medications. Medications that were not part of his original prescriptions.”

My heart stopped.

“What are you saying?”

“I am saying someone may have been giving my brother medicine he should not have taken. Medicine that, when combined with what he already used for blood pressure, could cause exactly what happened.”

Jessica turned and tried to leave.

William gave one small signal.

Two men in suits stepped forward and stopped her before she reached the path.

“Let me go!” she screamed. “I will call the police.”

“Please do,” William said calmly. “They are already on their way. I asked them to come. We have much to discuss regarding my brother’s suspicious death and the financial irregularities connected to your bank account.”

He looked at her with cold precision.

“Sixty-five thousand dollars deposited in the last three months. Amounts matching what you took from Arthur.”

Jessica stopped struggling.

“How do you know that?”

“I own a technology company, Jessica. Did you truly think I could not trace financial records? You are my employee. Your extra deposits do not match your salary. So where did that money come from?”

She said nothing.

She looked at the ground.

I opened Arthur’s envelope.

Inside was a letter written in his trembling hand.

My eyes filled as I read the first line.

My beloved Margaret, if you are reading this, something happened to me. And if something happened to me, it was because of Jessica. She has been giving me something slowly. I know it. I feel worse every day after taking the medicine she insists on bringing me.

My hands shook so violently the paper rattled.

Arthur knew.

He had known something was wrong.

The letter continued with dates, symptoms, suspicions, and then a revelation that stole the breath from my chest.

I found documents in her purse. Jessica has a life insurance policy in my name that I never signed. She forged my signature. The policy is for five hundred thousand dollars, and she is the beneficiary.

I looked up.

“Five hundred thousand dollars,” I whispered.

William took the letter gently and read it.

With every line, his face grew harder.

When he finished, he looked at Jessica with such controlled fury that she stepped back.

“Five hundred thousand dollars,” he said loudly enough for everyone to hear. “You forged a life insurance policy in my brother’s name. You arranged for him to decline, week by week, then came here to perform grief at his funeral while planning to collect the money.”

“It is not true!” Jessica screamed. “That letter is fake. Arthur was paranoid. He was sick.”

“Then explain this.”

William removed another envelope from his coat.

“This morning, while you were humiliating my sister-in-law, my legal team obtained access to your apartment. We found interesting items in your bedroom.”

He opened the envelope and pulled out papers.

A life insurance policy.

Receipts from an online pharmacy.

Bottles of medication with labels.

The crowd gasped.

Jessica shook her head wildly.

“Those are mine. I have anxiety.”

William’s smile held no humor.

“Your medical history says you have never been diagnosed with a heart condition. So why did you need those medications?”

Jessica opened her mouth.

No sound came out.

Then another voice rose from behind us.

“Oh my God, Jessica. What have you done?”

I turned.

A woman around forty approached, dyed blonde hair, heavy makeup, and an emerald dress far too bright for a funeral. I recognized her faintly. I had seen her visiting Jessica once or twice.

“Brenda,” Jessica said, eyes wide. “What are you doing here?”

Brenda pressed a hand to her chest.

“I came to pay my respects. Poor Arthur was such a good man.” Her voice dripped with false compassion. “Although I must admit, I am shocked by what I am hearing.”

Jessica hissed, “Shut up.”

But Brenda stepped forward.

“I am Brenda, Jessica’s sister-in-law. Her husband’s sister. And I must confess something that has been eating away at my conscience.”

Everyone turned to her.

Two months ago, Brenda said, Jessica had come to her crying. Jessica claimed Arthur had made her uncomfortable and that she needed protection.

“Protection?” I repeated, disgust rising in my throat.

Brenda nodded dramatically.

“I told her to go to the police. To speak to a lawyer. But she said no one would believe her because Arthur was so loved in the community. She said everyone would think she was lying for money.”

“That is an absolute lie,” I said. “Arthur would never do that. He avoided Jessica. He was afraid of her.”

Brenda looked at me with fake sympathy.

“I know that now, Margaret. I became suspicious. Jessica has always been ambitious. Manipulative. Capable of anything for money.”

Jessica lunged toward Brenda, but the men held her back.

“Traitor!” Jessica shouted.

Brenda stepped back as if frightened.

“See? This is who she is. Dangerous. That is why I investigated on my own.”

She held up her phone.

“I have messages from Jessica. Messages asking about medication interactions, forged documents, and how to make a death look natural. Everything is here.”

William took the phone and read.

His expression darkened.

“This is strong evidence,” he said. “With this and what we already have, Jessica will not walk away.”

But something felt wrong.

Brenda’s tears were too polished.

Her timing was too perfect.

I looked at her carefully.

“Why did you keep those messages?” I asked. “If you were afraid, why did you not go to the police before?”

Brenda blinked.

“I was afraid. Jessica is family. I did not want to ruin everything.”

“Liar,” Jessica spat. “Tell them the truth, Brenda. Tell them you gave me the idea. Tell them you got the medications. Tell them you forged the insurance policy because you work at the insurance company.”

Brenda’s face changed.

For one second, the mask fell.

Something cold and calculating appeared underneath.

“I don’t know what you are talking about,” Brenda said, but her voice was less steady.

“I have proof,” Jessica screamed. “I recorded our conversations. I saved emails. I knew someday you would betray me.”

Brenda went pale.

“You wouldn’t record that. You would be guilty too.”

Jessica laughed hysterically.

“Guilty? I was going to be rich. We were going to be rich. That was the plan, remember? Split the insurance money fifty-fifty. You helped me get Arthur out of the way, and I gave you half. Two hundred fifty thousand each.”

The mourners stood frozen.

A funeral had become a confession.

Jessica turned on Brenda with venom.

“Then you started getting nervous. Saying maybe we should stop. I knew you would leave me with all the blame while pretending to be the heroine.”

Brenda looked for an exit, but people had blocked the path.

William gave another signal.

A man and woman in formal clothes stepped forward. Badges hung from their belts.

Detectives.

“Ladies,” the female detective said, “you both need to come with us. We have many questions.”

Jessica began to cry for real.

“I did not want Arthur gone,” she sobbed. “I just wanted the money. I wanted what I deserved after putting up with that family.”

“Putting up with?” I walked toward her with my fists clenched. “Putting up with a man who treated you like a daughter? Who gave you everything you asked for?”

“He was an old fool,” Jessica spat. “Weak. Easy to manipulate.”

The words cut through me.

The female detective restrained Brenda when she tried to run. The other detective took Jessica. Both women shouted over each other, accusing, blaming, pleading.

The scene was surreal.

We were in a cemetery at my husband’s funeral, and two women were being arrested for the plot that had taken him from me.

Susan put her arms around me.

“Arthur knows justice is beginning,” she whispered.

But I did not feel peace.

I felt rage.

Pain.

Confusion.

How had this happened in my own home?

William placed a hand on my shoulder.

“It is not your fault, Margaret. They were predators. Arthur left enough clues for us to find the truth.”

The detectives took Jessica and Brenda away.

The priest, who had stood frozen through the chaos, cleared his throat.

“Can we continue the service?”

For a moment, no one moved.

Then someone gave a nervous laugh. Then another. It was the uncomfortable laughter people release after trauma, when the body does not know what else to do.

“Yes,” I said finally. “Please. Arthur deserves a dignified funeral.”

The service continued, but nothing felt normal.

The priest read prayers while people whispered about what had just happened. I stood beside the coffin with William on one side and Susan on the other.

When they lowered Arthur into the earth, I felt part of myself go with him.

Forty-three years of love had ended because greedy people saw money where they should have seen family.

After the burial, mourners came to offer condolences.

But their eyes had changed.

There was pity, yes.

But also respect.

An older woman named Barbara took my hands.

“I knew your husband from the market,” she said. “He helped older ladies carry groceries. He spoke about you all the time. Said you were the love of his life.”

My tears returned.

“Thank you.”

Barbara lowered her voice.

“I also saw Jessica at the downtown pharmacy about a month ago. She tried to buy medication without a prescription. When the pharmacist refused, she became angry. She said her father-in-law needed it urgently.”

William stepped closer.

“Do you remember what medication?”

Barbara nodded.

“Yes. I remember because my late husband used to take something similar for his heart.”

William wrote down her information for the detectives.

Then more people approached.

A neighbor had seen Jessica arguing with Arthur in the garden.

A store clerk had heard Jessica yelling at him on the phone, demanding money.

A friend had noticed Arthur losing weight and looking frightened.

Everyone had seen pieces.

No one had understood the whole picture.

When the cemetery finally emptied, only William, Susan, and I remained by the fresh grave.

William broke the silence.

“Margaret, we need to discuss practical matters. I know this is not the time, but some things cannot wait.”

I kept staring at the earth.

“The house,” he said. “Jessica has no right to it. Arthur left documents with me. The house is entirely in your name. It has been paid off for fifteen years.”

I looked at him.

“What?”

“There is no mortgage. Jessica lied to frighten you.”

Relief and anger moved through me at the same time.

“There is also an account Arthur opened years ago in his name only,” William continued. “It has thirty-two thousand dollars. He kept it hidden to protect you.”

“Thirty-two thousand?”

I had known nothing.

“And there is a real life insurance policy from his previous job. Two hundred thousand dollars. You are the legitimate beneficiary.”

I felt dizzy.

Jessica had made me believe I was about to be homeless.

But Arthur had protected me even while he was afraid.

“Jessica lied about everything,” William said. “She isolated you, frightened you, made you feel powerless. That is how people like her control others.”

He was right.

For three days, I had felt as if without Arthur I was nothing.

But that had never been true.

“What happens now?” I asked.

“With Jessica and Brenda?” William said. “With Arthur’s letter, the medications, the messages, and the witnesses, they will face serious charges. They may spend decades in prison.”

“Good,” I said.

The firmness in my own voice surprised me.

But William hesitated.

“There is something else. When we reviewed Jessica’s finances, we found she did not spend all the money she took from Arthur. She transferred about fifty thousand dollars to an offshore account.”

“Brenda?” Susan asked.

William shook his head.

“No. Someone else.”

He showed me the document on his phone.

The name on the account was Michael Miller.

My son.

My only child.

The world went silent.

“Michael?” I whispered.

Susan looked at me with compassion.

“He is Jessica’s husband. Arthur mentioned him to me once. Said he rarely visited. Always traveling for work.”

I had not seen Michael in six months.

He always had excuses.

Busy.

Out of town.

A work trip.

Could my own son have been involved?

The thought made me sick.

William’s expression was grave.

“We cannot conclude anything yet. But we need to find him.”

I told him Michael worked for an oil company and had last said he was somewhere in Texas.

William made calls.

Twenty minutes later, he returned.

“I found him. Houston. I told him he must come immediately because of his father’s funeral. He says he will take the first flight and arrive tomorrow morning.”

“And did he sound surprised?” I asked.

William paused.

“No. He sounded prepared.”

That night, William drove me home.

The house looked the same from the street.

White porch.

Oak tree in the yard.

Arthur’s rosebush near the back garden.

But the front door was ajar.

William told me to stay behind and entered first.

I followed anyway.

The living room had been destroyed.

Sofa cushions on the floor.

Drawers open.

Papers scattered everywhere.

Someone had searched the house.

My bedroom was worse. The mattress had been moved. The closet emptied. Jewelry Arthur had given me over the years was gone.

In Arthur’s study, filing cabinets hung open. The desk had been forced. The wall safe was empty.

“Jessica,” I whispered.

“No,” William said, examining the doorframe. “This is fresh. It happened while we were at the cemetery. Someone knew the house would be empty.”

My stomach turned.

I went to the kitchen to get water.

That was where I found the manila envelope on the table.

It had not been there that morning.

Inside were photographs of Arthur and me.

Someone had marked our faces.

A message was written in black marker.

This is just the beginning. Pay what you owe. The old man already paid. Now it is your turn.

I screamed.

William ran in and took the envelope.

His face darkened.

“This is bigger than Jessica and Brenda. Someone else is involved. Someone dangerous.”

To be continued… Click “PART 3” to read the final part: 👉 PART 3 👈