Chapter 2: The Man Who Was Supposed to Be Grieving
The door swung open before I could move.
An old man stepped inside.
Tall.
Slow.
His eyes went straight to Lily, and he stopped walking the moment he saw her standing in my kitchen.
It was my father.
Lily made a sound I had never heard from another person — somewhere between a cry and a gasp — and pressed herself behind me.
Her whole body was shaking.
"You told me she was gone," I said.
He didn't answer.
He looked at Clara instead.
"You were supposed to keep this contained," he said quietly.
Clara's voice cracked.
"I tried.
For years I tried."
I stepped toward him.
"Contained?
She's your daughter.
She's been living under my floor."
He finally looked at me, and what I saw in his face was not guilt.
It was calculation.
The same look I had seen my entire childhood whenever something threatened what he wanted to protect.
"You don't know what she found," he said.
"You don't know what she would have done with it."
Lily grabbed my arm.
"William.
The tape.
Play the tape right now.
Before he touches that box."
My father's eyes dropped to the cassette in my hand, and for the first time that night, I saw something in him that I had never seen before.
Fear.
---
May you like
What Lily discovered eighteen years ago was buried for a reason — and William is seconds away from hearing all of it.
Click the link below to read the full story.
