I thought Vanessa’s obsession with an ancient freezer was grief talking. Then I found a loose panel at the bottom and realized she had been protecting something.
“Don’t.”
I spun around so fast I hit my elbow on the freezer lid.
Vanessa stood at the bottom of the basement stairs.
She wasn’t wearing a coat even though it was January.
I could see the shock on her face
“How did you know I was here?”
She ignored the question.
I looked down at the screwdriver in my hand.
Then at the loose white panel under the empty baskets.
“What’s under this?”
Vanessa glanced toward the basement window.
“Something your mother asked me to protect.”
“From who?”
“Your brother.”
I actually laughed.
Not because anything was funny. Because my brother, Ryan, was Vanessa’s husband.
“You’re protecting something from your own husband?”
“I know how it sounds.”
“No, I don’t think I do.”
Vanessa flinched.
Not startled. Afraid.
That was when my anger disappeared.
Footsteps crossed Mom’s kitchen.
Heavy. Familiar.
Vanessa hurried to the freezer, reached behind a bag of frozen peas I’d left on the floor, and pulled out something tiny.
Cold metal.
A key.
“Put that in your pocket.”
“Vanessa—”
“Please.”
The basement door began to open.
My brother called down, “Jess?”
Vanessa shut the freezer.
Our mother, Diane, had died four days earlier.
It wasn’t sudden.
She’d had congestive heart failure for years, and the last six months had been especially hard.
Still, knowing someone is dying doesn’t make the phone call easier.
Ryan and I spent the next few days doing what families do after death.
What happened next changed everything… FULL STORY on the next page.
TAP ” READ MORE ” 👇
