“Then why aren’t you eating?”
The twins exchanged a long look before Emma whispered something so heartbreaking it nearly stopped my breathing.
“Mom said we have to save it.”
“Save it for what?” I asked.
Neither girl answered.
Instead, both slowly turned their heads toward the woods behind the cottage.
Toward the narrow trail hidden between the trees.
The exact trail Olivia used to walk every evening before sunset.
Nobody else knew about that path.
Nobody.
A chill crawled up my spine.
Then Ella finally looked back at me.
And in a trembling voice, she whispered the words that made my blood run cold.
“Olivia said you would come.”
My heart nearly stopped.
Because there was absolutely no way these girls should have known my wife’s name.
And deep in the dark woods behind the house, something suddenly moved between the trees.
PART 2
The shadow between the trees dissolved back into the heavy evening mist before my brain could even process what it was. A deer. A bear. A trick of the fading light.
I wanted it to be anything other than what my chest was telling me.
“What did you just say?” My voice cracked, the sound harsh against the quiet of the mountain. I reached out, my hands trembling, but I stopped myself before I touched Ella’s shoulder. They were already terrified. I didn’t need to look like a madman. “How do you know that name? Who told you about Olivia?”
Ella didn’t answer. She just looked down at her bare, mud-caked feet, her small shoulders shaking. Beside her, Emma stepped closer, their shoulders locking together as if they were a single organism trying to shield itself from a storm.
“She said it,” Emma whispered, her voice barely louder than the rustle of the dry leaves. “The lady in the picture inside the house. She told us Ethan would come when the leaves started to fall. She said you have the keys.”
A cold sweat broke out across my neck. The picture inside the house.
I stood up so fast my vision blurred. I didn’t wait for them. I strode up the creaking wooden steps of the porch, my boots heavy against the wood, and pushed the front door open. It wasn’t locked. It hadn’t been locked in three years, not since the day the paramedics wheeled Olivia out on a stretcher, and I had followed them in a trance, leaving the world behind.
The air inside was thick with the scent of pine, dust, and old paper. The dust motes danced in the pale shafts of twilight cutting through the windows. Everything was exactly where it belonged—the plaid throw blanket over the armchair, the half-empty mug of chamomile tea Olivia had left on the side table, now dried into a dark, cracked crust.
And there, on the mantelpiece above the cold fireplace, was the photograph.
Olivia, laughing, her dark hair blowing across her face, holding a basket of wild blackberries.
I walked over and picked it up. The glass was covered in a layer of dust, except for two clean streaks right across the middle. Someone had wiped it. Someone had held it. Very recently.
“We came inside when it rained,” a tiny voice said from the doorway.
