name haunted me.
Eleanor Windsor.
James's biological mother. The one everyone said died when he was just a child.
The same name I found scribbled in my mother's necklace… hidden like a message for a future she never got to see.
Why would my mother keep that name? Why would she hide it?
Unless…
Unless she knew something.
I stared at the faded paper for hours, trying to convince myself I was wrong. That this was just some forgotten name. Some coincidence. But deep down, I knew better.
This was no coincidence.
This was a clue.
A knock at the window made me jump.
I turned sharply—expecting wind, a bird, anything normal.
But what I saw made my breath vanish.
James. Soaked in rain again, standing by the tall garden window of the Blake estate like a ghost from the past. His suit was drenched, hair plastered to his forehead. But his eyes were full of fire.
I opened the window with shaking fingers.
"You could've used the door," I whispered.
"Didn't feel like waiting," he said hoarsely. "We need to talk. Now."
I let him in, and he stepped inside, water dripping onto the hardwood floor. His presence filled the room like a storm. Unrelenting. Familiar.
"You look like hell," I murmured.
"You look like you've seen a ghost."
I held up the tiny scrap of paper. "I have."
His eyes widened as he took it. "Where did you get this?"
"It was inside my mother's necklace."
He stared at the name, as if it were a curse. "Eleanor… My mother."
"She's supposed to be dead," I said. "But what if she's not?"
James sat on the edge of my bed, hands pressed to his face. "There were rumors when I was younger. Whispers that she didn't die, that she ran away. But my father made it clear—she was gone. He remarried six months later. No funeral. No closure."
He looked up at me. "And now you're saying your mother—Sophia Moore—had a connection to her?"
I nodded. "They knew each other, James. Maybe even worked together. And maybe—just maybe—my mother didn't die in an accident either."
James stood, pacing the room. "This… this goes deeper than I thought. If Eleanor was alive after her supposed death, and if Sophia knew… then maybe both women were threats."
"Threats to who?" I asked.
James didn't answer right away.
But the silence spoke volumes.
"My father," he said finally. "Everything leads back to him."
The weight of it hit me like a stone. "You think he killed them?"
"I think he covered up something—something massive. Eleanor never fit into his world. She was gentle, free-spirited, too rebellious for high society. They fought all the time before she vanished. And when she did… he erased her like she never existed."
I gripped the edge of the bed. "And Sophia?"
"I think she found out the truth… and paid the price."
A shiver crawled down my spine.
My life, my past, my pain—they were all pieces of someone else's cover-up.
"Then we need to find Eleanor," I whispered.
James nodded slowly. "If she's alive, she's the only one who can destroy my father."
"But where would she be?"
He pulled out his phone, unlocking a file. "I've been investigating for years. I never found a grave. No death certificate. Nothing official. Just one thing—a wire transfer made fifteen years ago to a clinic in the countryside. No patient name. But the money came from one of my father's offshore accounts. And the transfer memo said… 'For E. W.'"
I leaned forward. "E. W. — Eleanor Windsor."
He nodded. "I think she was institutionalized. Hidden. Locked away."
"And you think she's still there?"
"I don't know."
I placed my hand over his. "Then let's find out."
He looked at me like I was the only real thing in his world. His voice was rough when he spoke next.
"You're not safe here, Amelia."
I smiled bitterly. "I never was."
He brushed a strand of hair from my cheek. "I swear to you… no one will touch you. Not while I'm alive."
I didn't know whether to run from him or into his arms. But I knew one thing for sure:
My mother didn't die in a car crash. And James's mother might be alive.
Everything I thought I knew about love, family, and safety was a lie.
And the deeper we dug… the more dangerous it would become