Chapter 1 — The Man at the Door
Chapter 1 — The Man at the Door
The apartment door opened slowly.
Grace stood beside the bed with the photograph clutched against her chest. The pillow Nathan had contaminated lay inches from her hand, still damp beneath the warm bedroom light.
A man stepped inside.
He wore Nathan’s charcoal coat.
He had Nathan’s height.
Nathan’s shoulders.
Nathan’s face.
But there was blood running down the side of his forehead.
Grace stopped breathing.
The stranger stared at her from the doorway, equally stunned.
“Grace?”
His voice was rougher than Nathan’s, weakened by exhaustion, but it carried a familiar hesitation she had not heard in years.
Grace backed away.
“Don’t come closer.”
The man immediately raised both hands.
“I’m not going to hurt you.”
“You look exactly like my husband.”
His expression twisted.
“I am your husband.”
Grace’s fingers tightened around the photograph.
It showed two young men standing beside one another in front of an old lake house. They had identical faces.
On the back, someone had written:
Nathan and Nicholas Cole. Summer 2008.
Grace looked from the photograph to the injured man.
“Nicholas?”
Pain flashed across his face.
“No.” He swallowed. “Nicholas is the man you’ve been living with.”
The room tilted around her.
Before Grace could answer, the injured man’s eyes shifted toward the pillow.
His face went pale.
“Did you touch that?”
“No.”
“Good. Don’t.”
He crossed the room, pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and carefully covered the pillow.
Grace kept her phone raised.
“Where is Nathan?”
“I’m Nathan.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“No.” His eyes met hers. “I expect you to remember.”
“Remember what?”
“The scar beneath my left shoulder.”
Grace froze.
Six years earlier, on their honeymoon, Nathan had shown her a thin white scar from a childhood boating accident. The man she had been living with recently had always refused to undress with the lights on.
She had thought he had become insecure.
The injured man slowly unbuttoned the top of his shirt and pulled the fabric aside.
The scar was there.
Exactly where it should have been.
Grace felt the photograph slipping between her fingers.
Then the man whispered, “Nicholas took my life three years ago.”
A faint sound came from the hallway.
The elevator bell.
Nathan—the man who might actually be Nicholas—was coming back.
The injured man grabbed Grace’s wrist.
“We have less than thirty seconds.”
Grace pulled away.
“You don’t get to touch me.”
“Then listen. He didn’t poison your pillow to kill you.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“What was it for?”
“To make you forget.”
Footsteps approached the apartment.
Slow.
Controlled.
Familiar.
The real Nathan reached beneath the bed and pulled out a small metal case.
Inside were syringes, documents and another sealed envelope.
This one was marked:
OPEN ONLY IF GRACE REMEMBERS THE FIRE.
The lock turned.
Nathan looked at her.
“Grace, whatever happens next, do not let him know you’ve seen me.”
May you like
The door opened.
And Nicholas walked in smiling.
