They Found My Body

The police?

Had they found my body already? Did they know Julian had killed me?

Hope surged through me.

A tall, solidly built man with a stern face entered the room.

“Mr. Whitmore. Detective Nathan Hayes.” He showed his badge, studied Julian briefly, then got straight to the point. “Stella Whitmore is your wife?”

“Yes. We made it official a few days ago, though we haven’t held the wedding reception yet.” Julian coughed, his face pale. “Excuse me. I’ve been unwell. I just had surgery. Detective, what’s happened to my wife?”

Concern filled his voice.

Hayes’s expression grew grave.

“We found her car in an undeveloped area south of the city. It was badly wrecked. There was some blood inside, and testing confirmed it was your wife’s. But Stella herself is still missing.”

“What? Stella’s missing?”

Julian’s face changed so dramatically that he almost fell out of bed.

Hayes caught him.

“Mr. Whitmore, we’ve deployed everyone available to look for her—”

His phone rang before he could finish.

“Detective, we found a bloodstained coat by the river. It looks like the one Stella Whitmore was wearing when she disappeared. We’ll need time to confirm the blood.”

Before Hayes could answer, Julian seized his arm.

“Take me there. I know every piece of clothing Stella owns.”

Julian rode to the river in the detective’s car.

As he drove, Hayes glanced at Julian’s anxious face a couple of times.

“Mr. Whitmore, I understand your family adopted your wife from an orphanage?” he asked carefully.

“Yes. Stella came to us when she was seven. We grew up together. We’ve always been close. She depends on me a great deal.”

The more devoted he sounded, the sicker he made me.

It was true. I was the Whitmores’ adopted daughter.

Julian had been my brother in everything but blood.

And when I was seven, he had chosen me himself.

“Would you like to come home with me? I’ll be your big brother. I’ll protect you.”

He had even given me my name.

“I like stars. How about Stella? Stella Whitmore. You’ll be as beautiful and bright as the stars.”

When I first arrived, I was terrified of doing anything wrong. I hardly dared to speak. I wouldn’t even take an extra piece of candy.

What if his parents disliked me? What if they decided I wasn’t worth keeping and sent me back?

Life at the orphanage had barely been life at all.

Sour porridge. Beatings. Insults. Those were ordinary things.

The worst part was having no hope. No future.

At seven, I did everything I could to please the adults so I could stay with the Whitmores.

When Julian’s mother decided to throw away the doll I had brought from the orphanage, my favorite possession, I handed it over obediently. It hurt, but I said nothing.

Julian retrieved it from the trash.

He washed it himself and left it beside my pillow.

“You don’t have to throw it away. If you like it, keep it. Just hide it so Mom doesn’t see.”

“Don’t be scared, Stella. I chose you. You were the best one. Nobody’s going to send you away.”

He stroked my head, then produced a handful of the expensive candies I had been staring at over dinner, too frightened to reach for them.

“Go on. Eat them. As long as I’m here, you can have whatever you want. I’ll take good care of you.”

And afterward, he really had seemed to.

He looked after me. Protected me.

In my lonely, gray little world, he had been the only warmth. The only hope.

He said he liked my hair long, so I kept it long for years.

He cared about Whitmore Group, so I threw myself into learning how to run a business. I swallowed my disgust and smiled my way through rooms full of calculating old men. I drank until my stomach bled and considered it a privilege.

Every memory now struck me like a slap across the face.

I looked at that familiar man and didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

To him, I had only ever been a convenient incubator for replacement organs.

But my love had been real.

All those years, it had been real.

Numbly, I raised a hand and pressed it against my chest.

So even after you died, even after someone took your heart, it could still hurt.