The air in the foyer felt like it had been sucked out of the room. My hand, still gripping the $50,000 Hermès bag, began to tremble. I crept toward the kitchen, the silence of the house now feeling like a predator waiting to strike.
“Your hands shake because you’re useless,” Elena’s voice hissed, devoid of the melody I’d fallen in love with. “I told Marcus his mother was in a private spa retreat in Arizona. If he finds out you’ve been scrubbing my floors like a common maid because you ‘lost’ the family inheritance, do you know what happens to you?”
“I didn’t lose it,” Mom whispered, a sob catching in her throat. “Elena, please… the bank documents… you know the truth.”
“I know what I want Marcus to believe,” Elena snapped. A sharp crack echoed—the sound of a palm hitting a face.
I rounded the corner. My mother was on her knees, a bucket of grey water beside her, a red bruise blossoming on her cheek. Elena stood over her, wearing a silk robe I’d bought her for our anniversary, looking like a goddess—and acting like a monster.
“Marcus!” Elena gasped, her face instantly shifting into a mask of pale horror. “You’re… you’re home early.”
I didn’t look at the bag. I didn’t look at the wife I thought I knew. I looked at my mother—the woman who supposedly sent me postcards from a luxury retreat for the last six months—kneeling in the dirt of my own home.
“Get up, Mom,” I said, my voice dangerously low.
“Marcus, don’t,” Mom pleaded, her eyes darting to a locked cabinet beneath the kitchen island. “She’ll ruin us. She has the Red Folder.”
Elena’s fear vanished, replaced by a cold, triumphant smirk. “Go ahead, Marcus. Take her side. But before you do, ask your ‘innocent’ mother why your father really died, and why my name is the only one on the deed to this entire estate.”
The Hermès bag hit the floor. The “gift” was worthless. My life was a lie built on a foundation of secrets I was only beginning to unearth.
What was in the Red Folder? And why did Marcus’s mother look more terrified of the truth than of Elena’s cruelty? The real nightmare was just beginning.
What do you think is the most likely secret hidden in that Red Folder—a financial crime, or something much darker involving Marcus’s father?