Chapter 2: I know Everything
1070 Words
Mimi didn’t sleep.
She sat on the edge of her bed with the phone glowing in her hands, the three words burned into the screen.
**I know everything.**
No name. No number she recognized. Just those three words and a timestamp that said 2:07 a.m.
She deleted the message. Then she went into recently deleted and erased it again. Her hands wouldn’t stop shaking. Every soft sound in the house—pipes ticking, wind against glass, someone turning over in another room—made her flinch.
At 6:14 a.m. she finally stood up, pulled on an oversized hoodie, and went downstairs like nothing was wrong.
The kitchen already smelled like coffee.
Jordan leaned against the counter in black sweatpants, shirtless, scrolling through his phone. He looked up when she entered, expression carefully blank.
“Morning.”
“Morning.”
Nicole walked in two minutes later, hair still damp from a shower, wearing one of Jordan’s old academy T-shirts. She didn’t look at either of them when she reached for a mug. Jason appeared next, yawning, followed by Lexus, who headed straight for the espresso machine. Sampson came last, silent as always. Miriam drifted in last, headphones around his neck, eyes half-lidded.
They moved around each other like a normal family.
No one mentioned the night before.
Nicole’s phone buzzed on the marble. She glanced at it, smiled the soft public smile she used for her boyfriend, and typed a quick reply. Mimi watched the way Jordan’s jaw tightened for half a second before he looked away.
The first crack of the day.
---
By mid-morning the pretense was already wearing thin.
Mimi found herself alone in the laundry room folding towels she didn’t need to fold. Jason slipped in behind her, shut the door, and locked it. He didn’t ask. He just turned her around, lifted her onto the folding table, and pushed her underwear aside. The s*x was quick and almost angry—his hand over her mouth, her legs locked around his waist, the dryer humming beside them like white noise. When he came he stayed buried inside her for several long seconds, forehead pressed to hers.
“You okay?” he asked quietly.
She almost told him about the message. The words sat on her tongue like something poisonous. Instead she nodded.
Jason kissed the corner of her mouth and left first.
Mimi stayed on the table longer than she should have, staring at the ceiling, heart still racing for two different reasons.
---
Nicole lasted until early afternoon before the guilt started eating her.
She was in the home gym trying to burn it off when Sampson walked in. He didn’t speak. He just watched her finish the set, then crossed the room, took the weights from her hands, and backed her against the mirrored wall. The kiss was rough. His hand slid into her shorts without warning. She was already wet. She hated that she was already wet.
He f****d her right there against the mirror, one hand braced beside her head, the other gripping her thigh. Every time she made a sound he kissed her harder to swallow it. When she came, her eyes locked with her own reflection over his shoulder—flushed, guilty, wanting more.
Afterward Sampson fixed her clothes with surprising gentleness.
“Your boyfriend texted you three times while we were in here,” he said.
Nicole’s stomach dropped. She hadn’t even heard the phone.
Sampson walked out without another word.
---
Lexus found Mimi on the back terrace just before sunset. The sky was the color of bruised fruit. She was sitting on one of the low lounge chairs, knees pulled up, staring at the locked gates in the distance.
He sat beside her. For a long time neither of them spoke.
Then he said, very quietly, “Someone sent you a message last night.”
Mimi’s head snapped toward him.
Lexus didn’t look at her. “I saw your face this morning. You’ve been checking your phone every thirty seconds since.”
She opened her mouth. Closed it.
He finally turned. His eyes were calm, almost kind, and somehow that made it worse. “Whoever it is, they’re inside this house or they have access to it. There’s no other way.”
Mimi’s voice came out small. “It said ‘I know everything.’”
Lexus was quiet for a moment. Then he reached over, took her hand, and laced their fingers together like it was the most natural thing in the world.
“Then we need to figure out who before they decide to tell the rest.”
He didn’t kiss her. He didn’t try to take it further. He just held her hand while the sky went dark, and for the first time since the gates closed, Mimi felt something close to safe.
It didn’t last.
---
That night the house settled into its second long silence.
Jordan was in the upstairs study when Nicole slipped in. She didn’t bother with words. She climbed into his lap, straddled him in the big leather chair, and rode him slow while the city lights glittered beyond the glass. This time it felt different—less frantic, more dangerous. Like they were both pretending the outside world still mattered.
When it was over she stayed on him, forehead against his, breathing the same air.
“I’m starting to forget what his voice sounds like,” she whispered.
Jordan’s hands tightened on her hips. He didn’t ask whose voice. They both knew.
Down the hall, Jason had Mimi pressed against the wall of the guest suite again, one hand under her thigh, the other braced beside her head. They moved like people who already knew every sound the other made. When she came she bit his shoulder hard enough to leave a mark. He followed a moment later with a low, broken sound against her neck.
Neither of them mentioned the message.
Neither of them mentioned the partners waiting outside the gates.
---
At 1:17 a.m. every phone in the house lit up at the same time.
A new message. Same unknown number.
This time it went to all seven of them.
**Stop pretending you’re not f*****g each other.**
**I have proof.**
**And I’m only getting started.**
In seven different rooms, seven people stared at their screens.
Somewhere in the dark house, a floorboard creaked.
Then another.
Someone was moving.
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