Chapter 55

The air felt electric, charged with a heaviness that clung to my skin. The room was still, too still, as if the house itself held its breath. My gaze locked on Sarah, her eyes wide and darting between Adam and me. Adam had come out from his hiding place. His presence was like a shadow, silent but weighing down every inch of the space behind her.

"Sarah," I said, my voice low and steady despite the drumbeat of my heart, "I know. I know why you did what you did to him—the day they cuffed you and took you away. I read about it in your file. You were charged with domestic violence. But you had reason to attack him. It wasn't the affair since you were both guilty of that. It was something else, but no one would listen to you, especially not because you were drunk."

Her lips parted slightly, a tremor passing through them that betrayed her fa?ade of calm. She blinked rapidly, once, twice, a flicker of confusion before she masked it with a forced stillness.

"Wh-what are you talking about?" Her words came out in a whisper, barely pushing past the tension that seemed to thicken with each passing second.

"Steven," I pressed on, my resolve hardening. I know the truth about that day. It has to be why you attacked him—because you found out what he had done."

I held her gaze steady and unflinching. There was a moment—the briefest flicker of fear in her eyes before she masked it again with confusion.

"How do you know?" Her voice cracked around the edges, a picture of vulnerability wrapped in a veneer of strength.

"Journals." I leaned in closer, my words deliberate, piercing the veil of uncertainty that hung between us. "Medical journals—originals and altered ones."

"Altered?" Sarah"s brows furrowed, a crease forming as if her mind was racing to catch up with the pieces I laid out before her.

I nodded, the grim reality settling like dust in the silence that followed. "I found them at Dr. Hancock"s house," I continued, letting each word sink in. "Dr. Pete Hancock. He had them on a flash drive."

Recognition sparked in her eyes, and a connection was made. She knew what had happened to him; we all did.

"Someone killed him too," she whispered, the word hanging heavy in the air.

"Those journals," I said, my voice slicing through the stillness, "they were tampered with… pages replaced, dates altered. Replaced with false diagnoses." I paced a tight circle on the worn carpet, each step punctuating my words. "They fed us Steven"s narrative, Sarah. But Victoria—she was in remission. Years ago."

Sarah"s hands knotted together, white-knuckled as if holding onto the last shred of a reality she thought she knew.

I stopped pacing and turned to face her squarely. "Victoria should"ve been thriving, not… not like this."

"I know," she murmured, her voice barely audible. She looked up, her eyes searching mine for a flicker of deceit. Finding none, something within her seemed to break. "I found something, too." Her voice was stronger now, tinged with anger and hurt. "On the day he threw me out. A bag of medication. Steven brought it home from the hospital."

"Medication?" I prompted, though I felt the truth clawing its way to the surface.

"Drugs he used on Victoria." Sarah"s breath hitched, her control fraying at the edges. "To make her sick. To keep her looking ill."

"Christ," I exhaled sharply, the pieces clicking into place. There it was—the ugly truth laid bare between us.

"Steven played us all," I added softly, my gaze fixed on her. "He was a sick man. I had to look into it, but it's a reality. It"s not just women who suffer from Munchausen by proxy," I said firmly, taking a step toward her. "Men can harbor that same twisted need to be needed, to orchestrate sickness."

Her eyes, wide with the horror of understanding, remained locked on mine.

"It's a disease? I didn't know what was wrong with Steven," she whispered, the name a poison on her lips.

"It is."

I reached out, placing my hand gently on her shoulder. The tremor beneath my fingers spoke volumes. "He took control by making Victoria ill—playing the doting husband. She was sick as a young child; she had leukemia, but he enjoyed the attention so much that he hid from you that she was actually in remission a few years later. He kept making her sick to get the attention he craved from doctors and nurses when taking her to the hospital. The seizures and the unusual reactions and symptoms that they couldn't quite diagnose were all from the medication he was poisoning her with. And he kept you away from her to remain in control."

"Control…." The word seemed to shatter in her mouth, fragments of the life she thought she had known scattering like glass. "That"s why he was always there, always…."

"Playing the caretaker," I finished for her. "While all along, he was the cause."

Her frame shook as if the ground beneath her feet had given way. A sob clawed its way up from the depths of her being, a raw sound that resonated with the pain of betrayal. She looked away, her chest rising and falling in jagged rhythms.

"I was so certain when I found those meds that he was making her sick on purpose, but I thought I had to be crazy for thinking like that," Sarah gasped, the reality of it hitting her like a physical blow. "The appointments, the treatments… It was all him."

"All him," I confirmed, the bitterness of the truth tasting like ash. "You weren't crazy."

"I tried to tell everyone, but no one would listen. I tried everything for Victoria…." Her voice broke, the name of her daughter wrapped in layers of guilt and sorrow.

"Victoria was a pawn in his sickness." My voice felt distant and clinical, even as anger seethed within me.

Sarah"s face crumpled, and she collapsed into herself, a small, broken figure consumed by the enormity of what she knew. With each ragged breath, she grappled with a reality that had been manipulated beyond recognition—a life torn apart by the man she had vowed to love and trust.

"Steven…." Tears streaked down her cheeks, her body convulsing with sobs that had been held back for far too long.

"Sarah," I crouched before her, my hand finding hers and squeezing tight. "We"ll make this right—for you and Victoria."

Adam"s shadow loomed over us, a silent sentinel to our charged exchange. His eyes never left Sarah, sharp and calculating, as if trying to piece together a puzzle only he could see.

"Sarah," I began, my voice steady despite the vortex of emotions swirling in the cramped living room. "I"ve seen what he"s done—the lies he"s woven into the very fabric of your lives."

Her eyes, red-rimmed and wide, lifted to meet mine. "No one has believed me before."

"The evidence doesn"t lie, Sarah. The journals, the medications—he manipulated them all to paint a picture that served his narrative."

A shiver ran down her spine, and Adam shifted his weight behind her, a wordless gesture that seemed to tether her to the here and now.

"Everything points to Steven, not you." My words cut through the thick air, each syllable a promise. "I will not stop until everyone sees that. Until Victoria gets the life she deserves, free from this… this charade."

"Can we really expose him? After everything?" Doubt shadowed her face, but beneath it, a spark of something fierce flickered to life—a mother"s protective rage, perhaps, or the dawning realization of empowerment.

"Trust me," I said, and it was more than reassurance; it was a vow. "We have the truth on our side. And I"m not just going to sit back and watch an innocent person suffer for crimes they didn"t commit. I know you didn't kill him, even though you had the motive."

Adam"s presence was a quiet force, his breathing a steady counterpoint to Sarah"s uneven gasps. He didn"t speak, didn"t need to. His vigil spoke volumes.

"Thank you for believing me," Sarah"s voice broke into a whisper, barely audible over the storm brewing outside. Her eyes, misted with unshed tears, locked onto mine, a silent testament to her fragile state. "I thought I was alone in this."

"You"re not alone," I replied firmly, squeezing her hand. "I"m here now, and we"re going to fix this mess."

Her nod was almost imperceptible, but it carried the weight of her world—a world turned upside down and shaken until all she thought she knew spilled out like loose change from a pocket.

"Sarah, whatever it takes, we will?—"

"That night," she said. "The night Steven died, I had… I just couldn't stand it anymore. I knew he had her in the house with him and that he was poisoning her. I kept thinking of all the seizures, all the times he had taken her to the hospital because she was unresponsive. And all the attention he always got from it, from our families and friends, who always felt so sorry for him because he was the caretaker. And it was all a lie? And he was still doing it to her? I couldn't take it, so I fell off the wagon and had a drink. I had to try and stop him. And maybe, if someone else hadn't killed him, well…."

"Don't think like that," I said. "You're not a murderer."

"But I was happy that he was dead," she said. "And that made me feel bad."

"You can't blame yourself for"

The click of the door handle cut me off mid-sentence, snapping our focus to the room's entrance. Time seemed to stutter as the door inched open, the ominous creak mingling with the howl of the wind.

"Who's there!" Adam"s voice, finally breaking its silence, was sharp and commanding.

Instinctively, we turned to look just as a figure stepped through the threshold, a gun clasped in their unsteady grip, the barrel glinting ominously in the dim light. My heart slammed against my ribs, each beat a drumroll in the tense silence that followed.