Chapter 6: Gathering Evidence

For the next few days, I shut myself away, telling others I was too sad and had fallen ill.

In reality, I sat at my desk, legal pad in hand, making lists and plans. I watched the mailman deliver sympathy cards, heard the phone ring off the hook. In fact, I secretly had people keep watch on the sitting room.

At dusk, Faith lifted the curtain and entered.

She crept in quietly, her footsteps barely audible on the old wood floors. “Young Mrs., Derek requests to see you.”

I put down the book in my hand, powdered my face, and then had Faith invite Derek in.

Derek bowed properly to me.

He shuffled his feet, looking like a nervous teenager at his first job interview. I hurried to help him up. “Derek, what’s all this for?”

“Natalie, I know it’s rough. But I’ll step up—I’ll finish school, get a real job. You won’t have to worry about me.”

His voice cracked just a little, but there was a steadiness to his resolve I hadn't seen before. Looking at the boy before me, who seemed to have grown up overnight, I couldn’t help but feel emotional.

Derek is a year younger than me. Though he never disliked studying, he wasn’t very diligent.

He'd always preferred tinkering with cars or shooting hoops behind the garage. It was the same in my previous life. Derek did eventually get his degree as he said. But I never understood why he gave up a job in Chicago and instead asked to be transferred back to Maple Heights.

“Are you still sad?”

Derek looked at my pale face and asked tentatively.

He hesitated, as if afraid I might break if he pressed too hard. I came back to my senses and shook my head with a bitter smile.

“Although Marcus and I were only married for two months, we had feelings for each other. With such a change, of course I am sad.”

It was a half-truth, but Derek didn’t know how to comfort me, so he just told me to take care and left.

I watched him go, the door closing softly behind him. At night, the informant I sent to watch the sitting room came to report that Mrs. Sutton at my mother-in-law’s side took a bundle and left the house through the back door.

“Keep following, and remember, don’t alert anyone.”

Faith was a bit puzzled: “Young Mrs., are you suspecting…”

Her words hung in the air, heavy as the coming storm. I glanced at her and didn’t deny it.

Faith covered her mouth in horror and dared not say more.

It wasn’t until midnight that Mrs. Sutton returned to the house.

Early the next morning, the person I sent to follow finally came back.

Paige was someone I met a few days ago when I was preparing to hire a private investigator at the local bar. At that time, her father was threatening to send her to a halfway house.

She wore ripped jeans and a faded hoodie, with a tough look in her eyes that said she'd seen too much. I happened to pass by and offered her a job. Finding she had good street smarts, I kept her by my side.

"I tailed Mrs. Sutton down to the river. She handed off the bundle to some guy on a boat. He docked in Toledo, but it was too dark to see who he met."

Paige pulled a battered notebook from her pocket, flipping to her scribbled notes. “I followed the boatman. His boat docked at Toledo, then he went to a house and handed the bundle to someone inside. But it was too dark—I couldn’t see that person’s face.”

I blew on the tea in my hand, the corners of my lips curving up.

“So they’re hiding in Toledo.”

Just a river away from Maple Heights, yet I was deceived for ten whole years.

The knowledge burned like ice in my veins. This time, I promised myself, would be different.