“She’s suspicious.”
I froze in the hallway with my hand inches from my coat.
The front door hadn’t latched behind me.
And through the crack in the study door, I heard my future mother-in-law’s voice in a tone I’d never heard before.
Cold. Calculating.
I had only come back for my forgotten coat. Tomorrow I was supposed to walk down the aisle.
Now I was standing in the shadows, listening to my own murder being planned.
A familiar laugh answered her.
Adrian. My fiancé.
“Emily thinks being a corporate attorney makes her brilliant,” he said. “Once we’re married, she’ll relax.”
My stomach dropped.
Vivian sounded uneasy.
“And if she refuses to transfer the company shares?”
“She won’t. I’ll keep playing devoted husband until she signs. After that, the lake house accident solves everything.”
For a second I told myself I had misheard.
Then a third voice joined in.
Lucas Grant. Our wedding planner. Adrian’s best friend.
“The boat has already been serviced,” Lucas said calmly. “The fuel line will fail far enough from shore. Everyone knows Emily can’t swim.”
Vivian laughed softly.
“Tragic widowhood will suit my son.”
They weren’t joking. They weren’t venting.
They were finalizing my death like it was the wedding seating chart.
My hand was shaking so hard I thought I’d drop my purse.
But then something inside me went completely still.
I slipped my phone out and hit record.
Fear disappeared. Focus took its place.
Then Adrian said the one sentence that killed every last piece of love I had for him.
“Her father built that medical software empire, but Emily controls it now. Tomorrow I marry two hundred million dollars. By autumn, I bury her.”
Three years. Three years I loved that man.
He wasn’t marrying me. He was hunting me.
