He Watched Me Burn — Now I'm Back to Light His

"Where did you get that hairpin?" I asked, cutting through Camille's shrill argument with Marcus.

The dining room fell silent. Camille blinked, her hand flying to the right side of her head. Her fingers brushed the silver crescent moon.

"Adrian gave it to me," she snapped, lifting her chin. "He said it suited me."

"It looks cheap," Vivienne sneered, adjusting her silk shawl. "Just like the rest of you. I am calling security."

I pushed my chair back. The wood scraped harshly against the marble floor.

"Where do you think you're going, Sloane?" Marcus demanded, slamming his palm on the table.

"I've lost my appetite," I said.

"You sit back down," he ordered. "We are not finished discussing your failures as a wife."

"I believe we are," I said, keeping my posture rigid.

"You let a tramp walk right into our dining room," Vivienne said, her tone thick with disgust. "You cannot even control your own husband."

"He is your son, Vivienne," I replied. "Perhaps you should have taught him how to lock a door."

"How dare you speak to me like that?" she gasped.

"Discuss his manners with Camille," I said, gesturing to the girl in the white dress. "She wants the job."

I walked out.

I reached the master suite and twisted the deadbolt. The lock engaged with a heavy thud.

I grabbed my laptop from the nightstand and carried it to the velvet armchair by the window. I booted the encrypted drive. My fingers struck the keys, sharp and fast.

Silver crescent moon hairpin. Right side.

White silk halter dress.

Dressing room mirror.

I documented every detail from the vision. In my previous life, I spent my final days screaming at Adrian, demanding answers about his sudden obsession with this girl. I died choking on smoke, ignorant of when or how he found her. He had molded her into a replica of me, and I had simply let him.

Not tonight.

I picked up my phone and dialed a number I kept buried in a secure contact folder.

It rang twice.

"Sloane," a rough, low voice answered.

"Are you busy, Julian?" I asked.

"Never too busy for you. What do you need?"

Nine months ago, I found him bleeding behind a dumpster in the rain. I paid off the eighty thousand dollars he owed to a local syndicate, handed him a burner phone, and told him to wait for my call.

"I need a background check. Fast and quiet."

"Give me a name."

"Camille. She claims to be Adrian's girlfriend."

"Last name?"

"I don't have one yet. She's twenty-two, wears vintage cuts, and just got thrown out of the Vega estate."

"I'll find her," Julian said. "What's the objective?"

"Track her schedule for the last six months," I instructed. "Every hotel, every restaurant, every flight. I want to know exactly when Adrian brought her into the picture."

"You think he's hiding assets under her name?"

"Adrian is arrogant, but he isn't stupid," I said. "He wouldn't trust a twenty-two-year-old with his money. But he might trust her to move it."

"Understood. Anything else?"

"Pull the transaction logs for Cross Aerial's offshore accounts. I want the entire cash flow."

"That requires bypassing their internal security," Julian noted, the sound of a keyboard clacking in the background. "It might trigger an alert if I push too hard."

"Then don't push," I said. "Slip in. Just get me the numbers."

"Got it, Sloane."

The line went dead.

I lowered the phone and leaned against the cold glass of the windowpane.

Rain began to spit against the glass, distorting the streetlights. Down below, the iron gates of the estate swung open. A black sedan tore onto the main road, its taillights bleeding into the dark. Camille, retreating from the battlefield.

Adrian thought he held all the cards. He thought he could buy my compliance with two million dollars while he built a younger, more obedient version of me. He expected me to play the victim.

I was going to flip the table before they even set the pieces.

Hours passed. The house remained silent. Adrian never returned from his supposed business emergency.

At midnight, the screen of my phone illuminated the dark room.

A single encrypted message from Julian.

I unlocked the device and opened the text.

Halfway through the cash flow. Someone accessed the same archive before you. Vivienne's clearance. Access time: 3:00 PM today.