Chapter 4
Dad turned toward Grandma.
“What is he talking about?”
Grandma did not answer.
Not right away.
She looked older suddenly.
Like a door from the past had opened and cold air had rushed in.
“Mom,” Dad said. “What did Lily tell you?”
Grandma sat down slowly.
I clutched the quilt tighter.
Mom’s name always made the room feel different.
Soft and sad.
But now it felt scary.
Grandma folded her hands.
“Lily was afraid before she died.”
Dad’s face changed.
“Afraid of what?”
“Not what. Who.”
Dad stepped back.
“No.”
Grandma’s eyes filled.
“She thought someone had been following her.”
Dad shook his head.
“She had pneumonia complications. The doctors said—”
“I know what the doctors said.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me?”
Grandma looked at me.
Then at Dad.
“Because Lily made me promise not to unless Mason was in danger.”
I whispered, “I’m in danger.”
Grandma closed her eyes.
“Yes, baby. You are.”
Dad sat down like his legs stopped working.
Grandma told us Mom had come to her two weeks before she died.
She said Karen had started showing up near Dad’s work.
Back then, Karen was not his wife.
She was just a woman from his company’s office.
A woman who smiled too much at a married man.
Mom said Karen had sent her messages.
Not direct threats.
Little things.
Pictures of Dad’s truck.
A photo of me at preschool.
A message that said, Some families are meant to be replaced.
Dad covered his mouth.
“I never knew.”
“She didn’t want you to think she was jealous,” Grandma said. “She was sick. She thought you would believe stress was making her paranoid.”
Dad shook his head harder.
“I would have believed her.”
Grandma’s face softened with pain.
“Would you?”
He looked like that hurt.
Because maybe he did not know.
Maybe Mom had not known either.
Grandma continued.
“The night before Lily went to the hospital, she gave Mason the phone. She said if anything ever happened and he was scared, he should call me.”
I touched the old phone in my lap.
Mom had known.
Maybe not everything.
But enough.
Dad whispered, “Karen was near us before Lily died.”
“Yes.”
“And then after the funeral, she comforted me.”
Grandma’s voice hardened.
“She moved in like smoke.”
Dad cried then.
Quietly.
I had never seen him look so lost.
I crawled off the couch and went to him.
He looked surprised.
“Can I hug you?” I asked.
His face broke.
“Yes.”
I hugged him.
For a moment, he was not just my dad.
He was someone Mom had loved.
Someone Karen had tricked too.
The police traced Vince’s call to a motel two towns away.
By the time officers arrived, he was gone.
But they found something in the room trash.
Photos.
Me at school.
Dad at work.
Grandma’s house.
And one old photo of Mom.
Taken through a window while she held me as a baby.
On the back, someone had written:
First wife. First obstacle.
When Dad saw it, he threw up in Grandma’s sink.
The investigation grew.
Detective Harris said Karen might have targeted Dad before Mom died.
Maybe emotionally.
Maybe financially.
Maybe worse.
But proving anything about Mom would be hard.
She had been gone three years.
I only had memories.
Her hands.
Her songs.
Her phone.
Her smell on the quilt.
That night, I slept in Grandma’s room because I was afraid Karen would find the window.
At 2 a.m., I woke to voices downstairs.
Dad and Detective Harris.
“We found Karen’s bank records,” the detective said.
Dad’s voice was raw.
“And?”
“She received a large cash deposit two days after Lily died.”
Silence.
Then Dad asked, “From who?”
May you like
Detective Harris answered.
“Vince.”
