After My Boyfriend Faked His Death and Married My Sister

Tessa led me into the kitchen.

The place was small and smelled like burnt toast. A baby monitor sat on the counter, silent and dusty. Tessa set a chipped ceramic mug in front of me and poured instant coffee. Her hands shook so hard the spoon clinked wildly against the rim.

She sat opposite me. She kept her hands clamped tight around her mug, her knuckles greyish-white.

"Drink," she whispered. "It gets cold fast in here. Jace says we have to keep the heat down."

"Tessa," I said, keeping my voice very quiet. "Look at me."

She lifted her chin, but her eyes slid to the corner of the table. She looked terrified, like a rabbit waiting for a hawk.

"What did you mean?" I asked. "At the door. What happened two years ago?"

Her breath hitched. She looked around the empty kitchen, checking the shadows, before leaning over the table.

"I can't talk loud," she breathed. "I promised him. If people know, they’ll come for me. The police."

"The police?"

Tessa nodded. A tear leaked out of her left eye, running down her pale cheek. "It was raining. So hard. I was driving his car. I didn't see her, Autumn. I swear on my life I didn't see her."

My chest went tight. "See who?"

"The woman," she whispered. Her voice broke on the word. "I hit her. I felt the thud under the tires. I panicked. I wanted to stop, but Jace grabbed the wheel. He told me she was dead on impact. He told me if I stayed, I’d spend twenty years in prison. So he handled it. He took care of the car. He made sure nobody linked it to me."

My coffee sat untouched, going cold.

A hit-and-run. Two years ago.

"Did he tell you who she was?" I asked. My voice sounded flat, even to my own ears.

"He looked her up," Tessa said, nodding fast. "He found out who she was. So I’d never forget what I owed him. So I’d remember the debt."

"Describe her to me, Tessa."

"Why?"

"Describe her."

Tessa swallowed hard. She stared down at the steam rising from her cup, reciting the words like a lesson she had memorized through tears.

"She was twenty-five," Tessa murmured. "Thin. Long dark brown hair. She had a navy blue leather work bag. From some firm in Manhattan. And a black wool coat with silver buttons. She was an out-of-towner. Nobody in Seattle even knew she was here."

Ice water rushed through my veins.

My navy leather tote. My black wool coat. The exact clothes I wore the night I flew back to New York after Jace’s fake memorial service.

He didn't just invent a victim. He made *me* the ghost.

He gave Tessa my clothes. My face. My life. He took my supposed death, twisted it into a murder, and hung it around my little sister's neck like an iron chain.

He made her believe she killed me.

My breath stopped entirely. My heart hammered against my ribs so hard it made my teeth ache. I wanted to grab Tessa. I wanted to shake her and scream that I was right here. I was breathing. I was alive.

Then I looked at her rounded belly. I saw the deep purple shadows under her hollow eyes.

If I told her now, without a net to catch her, she would shatter into a million pieces. The shock would destroy her. I needed every bank slip. I needed every photograph. I needed a trap so tight Jace could never wiggle free.

I forced my hands to relax on the table.

"I have to go, Tessa," I said quietly, standing up.

"You're leaving?" Panic flashed across her face. "You won't tell Mom and Dad, right? Jace said if they know, they’ll hate me. They always loved you more, Autumn. If they knew I killed someone, they’d never look at me again."

The words twisted like a knife in my gut. Jace had poisoned every corner of her mind.

"I won't tell them," I said. I touched her shoulder. She flinched under my fingers, then leaned slightly into the warmth. "I'll see you at the wedding, Tessa. I promise."

I walked out the door and didn't look back.

***

By two that afternoon, the rain had turned into a steady, freezing drizzle. I sat in a booth at a corner diner three blocks away, a greasy plate of fries sitting cold between my elbows.

My cell phone sat beside the napkin dispenser.

At 2:15, the screen lit up.

*Samira Long.*

I let it ring until it rolled to voicemail. Ten seconds later, the automated ding told me she left a message. I held the phone to my ear.

"Autumn, sweetheart?" Samira’s voice was pure honey, dripping with fake maternal sweetness. "It’s Samira. I was just checking the accounts, darling, and the monthly wire didn't go through. The mortgage is due tomorrow, honey. I’m sure it’s just a bank glitch, but call me back right away, okay? Love you."

Twenty minutes later, the screen buzzed again.

*Samira Long.*

Then again.

By three o'clock, the honey was gone. A new voicemail popped up from Ryland Turner.

I pressed play. Ryland’s voice boomed through the speaker, rough and blustering, like a man who thought yelling made him powerful.

"Autumn! What the hell is going on with the account? The SUV payment bounced! Call me back right now. You owe this to us! Don't you forget what our boy did for you!"

I closed the voicemail. I didn't flinch.

At 3:45, my phone buzzed one more time.

The screen didn't show Samira. It didn't show Ryland.

It was a local Seattle number. A number I used to know by heart three years ago.

*Jace.*

The dead man was calling.

I watched the screen pulse. Four rings. Five.

It went to voicemail.

I waited for the notification. Ten seconds passed. A minute. Nothing.

No message.

He was panicked. For thirty-six months, the money had flowed like water. Now, four days before his wedding, the well was bone dry, and I was silent.

I tapped the screen, turning the phone face down on the laminate table.

"Keep waiting, Jace," I whispered to the empty booth. "I'm coming."