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My fingers tightened until the paper handles dug painfully into my skin.
Who was he talking to?
What trap?
Why did it involve me?
Silence stretched between his sentences.
Then his voice grew quieter.
“I kept everything.”
A chill raced through my body.
Everything?
“I kept everything.”
I edged closer without thinking.
The hardwood floor creaked.
I stopped breathing.
Matthew didn’t notice.
He continued pacing.
“I honestly wasn’t sure she’d ever believe she could do it.”
My stomach twisted.
Make it where?
“I honestly wasn’t sure she’d ever believe she could do it.”
He chuckled.
“No… no, she still doesn’t know.”
Blood rushed loudly through my ears.
I wanted to burst into the room.
I wanted to demand answers.
Instead, I stayed hidden.
Fear rooted me in place.
“No… no, she still doesn’t know.”
His next sentence shattered something inside me.
“If she’d figured it out earlier, the whole thing would’ve fallen apart.”
My heart raced.
What had he been hiding?
I leaned forward, desperate to hear more.
Then he said the words that sent me stumbling backward toward the front door.
“My plan is about to work.”
His footsteps stopped.
“My plan is about to work.”
I never heard the rest.
I couldn’t.
Panic swallowed every rational thought.
I rushed outside before he could see me.
By the time I reached my car, tears blurred the windshield.
I sat there shaking so violently I couldn’t fit the key into the ignition.