“I came to find out why my office wasn’t cleaned today,” Victoria replied coolly.
She tried to step inside, but he instinctively moved to block her. At that moment, a sharp cough echoed from inside the house, followed by the soft whimper of a child.
Without asking permission, Victoria pushed past him.
The air inside smelled of soup, medicine, and damp walls. The furniture was mismatched and worn. In the corner of the small living room, on an old mattress, lay a little boy—no older than six—his face flushed with fever, his thin body shaking beneath a threadbare blanket.
But it wasn’t the child that stopped Victoria’s breath.
On the dining table, among scattered medical papers and empty pill bottles, stood a framed photograph.
It was her brother.
Ethan Caldwell.
The same smile. The same eyes. The man who had died fifteen years earlier in what her family publicly called a “tragic accident.”
Beside the photograph lay a gold pendant.
Victoria recognized it instantly. It was a Caldwell heirloom—her grandmother’s pendant—lost the day of Ethan’s funeral.
Her hands began to shake.
“Where did you get this?” she demanded, her voice breaking through the room like thunder.
Miguel collapsed to his knees.