Chapter 4 - THE PHOTOGRAPH
Julian’s face changed.
Not guilt.
Fear.
That frightened me more.
“What brakes?” he asked.
I laughed weakly and touched my temple.
“I don’t know. Mara must be confused.”
He took one step closer.
“Jessi.”
I looked at him innocently.
“Yes, brother?”
Something flickered behind his eyes.
Then disappeared.
He left after telling me to rest.
Ten minutes later, I followed him.
Julian drove directly to the hospital.
I took a rideshare and arrived eight minutes behind him.
From the hallway outside Clara’s room, I heard them arguing.
“You told me she was safe,” Clara whispered.
“I thought she was.”
“And now?”
“I don’t know.”
Clara began coughing.
Julian lowered his voice.
“If she remembers the crash, Victor will know.”
Victor.
I had never heard that name.
After Julian left, I walked inside.
Clara looked startled.
I closed the door.
Then I placed the courthouse photograph on her blanket.
Her face went white.
“I remember everything,” I said.
She stared at me.
“You were never amnesiac?”
“No.”
For several seconds, she looked almost relieved.
Then tears filled her eyes.
“Thank God.”
That wasn’t the reaction I expected.
I demanded the truth.
Clara told me she and Julian had legally married eleven years earlier.
But it hadn’t been a love story.
Her father, Arthur Hale, had arranged it.
Six months later, the marriage had supposedly been annulled.
“Supposedly?”
Clara looked toward the doorway.
“My father controlled everything.”
“Why?”
“Money.”
“How much?”
She swallowed.
“Thirty-eight million dollars.”
Then she grabbed my wrist.
“But forget the money, Jessi.”
Her frightened eyes locked onto mine.
May you like
“Because your crash was not meant to scare you.”
“It was meant to kill you.”
