Chapter One- The Call
The rain had been falling all night, a cold, relentless tapping against the kitchen window as I stirred my tea without tasting it. I wasn’t expecting the call.
“Isabella Hayes?” The voice on the other end was male, clipped, formal.
“Yes?”
“This is Detective Marcus Reed with the Bayview Police Department. I’m… I’m afraid I have some difficult news. Your sister, Arabella Hayes—” He hesitated, like saying her name might make it more real. “There’s been an accident.”
The teaspoon slipped from my fingers, clinking against the porcelain.
“What kind of accident?”
“A car crash. Last night. I’m sorry… she didn’t make it.”
For a long moment, I just sat there, the rain hammering harder against the glass. Arabella. My twin. My other half—and my complete opposite. We hadn’t spoken in almost three years. Not since the fight. Not since I’d decided that loving her was like trying to hold fire in my bare hands.
“When’s the funeral?” I heard my own voice ask, flat, like the words weren’t mine.
“Friday. Your mother… she’s requested you come home.”
Home. Bayview. The place I had run from and sworn never to see again. But funerals have a way of pulling you back, no matter how many promises you’ve made to yourself.
Three days later, the town looked exactly the same—grey skies pressing low over the ocean, gulls circling lazily above the pier. The Hayes estate sat at the end of Cliffside Road, its stone walls rising out of the mist like a fortress.
My mother met me at the door, her perfume sharp and familiar. She looked me up and down the way she always had, as if cataloguing every imperfection.
“You cut your hair,” she said, not a hello.
I stepped inside, my eyes drawn to the grand staircase where, years ago, Arabella and I had raced up in matching dresses, our laughter echoing off the marble.
In the living room, the first of many strange moments happened.
“Oh—Arabella!” Mrs. Dean, one of my mother’s society friends, swept toward me, gripping my hands. “We thought—oh dear, I’m so sorry. You just… You look so much like her.”
I gave a small, tight smile. “I’m Bella.”
Her face went pale, and she excused herself without another word.
That night, unable to sleep, I wandered into Arabella’s old bedroom. The scent of her perfume still lingered in the air—jasmine and something darker. On her vanity, a silver jewelry box gleamed in the lamplight.
Inside was a note, folded small enough to fit under the lining. The handwriting was hers. Elegant. Precise.
If anything happens to me, it wasn’t an accident.
My heart thudded in my chest. Outside, the wind rose, rattling the windowpanes. And in that moment, I knew I hadn’t come home for a funeral. I had come home for the truth.
