Chapter 6 - THE SILVER LOCKET
I couldn’t breathe. I grabbed the collar of my shirt, pulling up the silver chain I wore every single day.
The heavy, antique locket rested in my palm. It was tarnished in the corners, engraved with intricate ivy leaves. My mother had fastened it around my neck hours before I walked down the aisle to marry Christopher, whispering, "This protects the women in our family."
But the photograph didn’t lie. Teenage Vanessa had worn it first.
I sat in my car, trembling, watching Vanessa load little Leo into the back of her SUV and drive away from my childhood home.
As soon as her car turned the corner, I got out.
I walked up the cracked sidewalk, up the steps, and stood before the blue door. I still had my original key on my ring. Christopher had told me he changed the locks, but I had to try.
I slid the key in. It turned smoothly. He hadn’t changed them. He’d just assumed I’d never come back.
I pushed the door open and stepped inside.
The smell of cinnamon and old wood was gone, replaced by expensive lavender diffusers. The furniture was modern and sleek, completely erasing my mother’s cozy, cluttered warmth.
But the old upright piano was still in the corner.
I walked over to it, trailing my fingers over the keys. This was where my mother had taught Vanessa. This was where she had taught Ethan.
I looked around the living room. On the mantel, where my graduation photos used to sit, there were framed pictures of Vanessa, Leo, and Christopher. Family vacations. Birthdays. They looked so perfectly happy.
My stomach violently rejected the sight.
I needed to find the original deed to this house and the foundation papers. If Christopher had taken them from the safety deposit box, they were either at his corporate office, or he had hidden them here, with his secret second family.
I ran upstairs to my mother’s old bedroom.
It was now Vanessa’s. Christopher’s suits were hanging in the closet next to her dresses.
I started opening drawers, tearing through nightstands and shoeboxes. I felt manic, driven by a primal need to protect my son from this monster.
Underneath a stack of winter sweaters in the bottom drawer, my hand hit something hard.
A wooden cigar box.
I pulled it out and forced the latch open.
Inside wasn't the deed to the house.
It was a stack of carefully preserved letters.
The handwriting on the envelopes made me freeze. It wasn’t Christopher’s. It wasn’t my mother’s.
It was my father’s handwriting.
My father, who had died when I was only three years old. My father, who my mother never spoke about because the grief was too heavy.
I opened the first letter, dated twenty-five years ago.
Margaret, I sent the money for Vanessa’s tuition. I know I lost the right to ask for your forgiveness when I chose her mother over you, but please, let Vanessa keep the locket. It’s all I have to give her.
The letter dropped from my shaking hands.
May you like
Vanessa wasn’t just a charity student.
She was my father’s daughter. She was my half-sister.
