Page 154 of Chandelier Enthralled
Willa walked ahead of me, and I followed her into the kitchen. We proceeded towards the corner nook.
She sat before the screen again and awakened the mouse with a swift shake.
Willa sent a file from her phone to the laptop. I helped her with the transfer, accepting the file.
“I want to see it,” I admitted. “But at the same time, I don’t.”
“I get that.” She refocused on the screen. “Their cameras captured everything.”
Originally installed to monitor their lawn for security, their surveillance also covered my property. Had I known this, I might have been more cautious about my privacy.
Willa fast-forwarded the footage to right before Amelia’s recorded time of death, and then let it play.
I saw Amelia coming through my backyard’s side gate. She was being manhandled by a man I didn’t recognize. He was leading her toward the pool. She resisted, but he was too strong. Her body turned towards the house as she struggled.
Amelia began screaming…but there was no sound.
Was she calling my name?
They continued to struggle.
I turned away, unable to watch what he was doing to her. My heart was racing as though this was live footage, and I could rush outside and save her.
I stared at the window, but all I could see was the truth unfolding. She hadn’t come for a midnight swim, hadn’t tried to awaken me. She’d not taken a midnight dip, in that rebellious fashion of hers, being too drunk to stay afloat.
Amelia had been murdered that night—and I’d been sleeping when she’d needed me the most.
“Why would this happen?” asked Willa.
“They came for Jake at first, and then Atticus, and…”
“Now you?” She shuddered. “Cameron is your fourth partner.” She looked sympathetic. “Jewel will come for him next.”
I glanced back at the screen, at Amelia’s lifeless floating body.
Willa was staring at Amelia, too, her expression filled with horror.
“This exonerates you, Greyson.”
“Technically.” I was still guilty in other ways.
“Do you recognize the killer?”
“No.”
“Do you think he works for Jewel?’
“Perhaps.” I rubbed my chin, trying to remember if I had ever seen him at Pendulum.
“Want some tea?” she offered.
Not sure why, but I laughed—an outrageous response, but facing the truth has its consequences.
It lets the nightmares bleed into our daylight hours. Once seen, it can’t be forgotten. And then, everything I’d just seen in the footage replayed in my mind like a film, only I was seeing it all from a different perspective.
A thread pulled, unravelingeverything.
Jewel had focused on me, a more dangerous and unsettling move that felt terrifying.More than this, Amelia had been in harm’s way, and I hadn’t done enough to get her out of the city.
