Chapter 9
David stepped forward. He didn’t yell. He didn’t raise his hands. He simply looked at the woman who gave him life with an expression of profound, chilling emptiness.
“You are dead to me,” David whispered.
Eleanor froze. The words hung in the air, heavy and irrevocable.
“David, don’t be dramatic,” she scoffed, though her voice trembled. “I’m your mother.”
“Not anymore,” David replied, turning his back on her. He bent down, scooped Lily up into his arms, and looked at me. “We’re leaving.”
We walked out of the private dining room, leaving behind a shattered family dynamic and an eerie, breathless silence. But as the heavy oak doors swung shut behind us, I heard Eleanor’s voice, shrill and desperate, echoing into the corridor.
“You’ll be back, David! You always come crawling back!”
May you like
We didn’t look back. But as we stepped out into the cold night air, my phone buzzed in my pocket. A text message from an unknown number.
You think you’ve won, Emily. But you don’t know the half of it.
