Chapter 13: The Ghost Returns
272 Words
Lena’s grip on the phone tightened. Leo. The stepbrother she had once trusted. The stepbrother she had abandoned.
“Where are you?” she demanded, keeping her voice steady.
Leo chuckled softly. “You sound tense. Not happy to hear from me?”
Lena swallowed hard. She didn’t know if she was.
“You disappeared,” she said. “You left without a word.”
“You wouldn’t have listened to me even if I stayed.” His voice was calm, but there was an edge to it. “I tried to warn you about Ethan. I tried to warn you about Victoria.”
Lena closed her eyes briefly. She had been so blinded by love, by trust, that she had ignored every red flag. And in the end, she had lost everything.
She exhaled. “You were right.”
Silence. Then, a quiet laugh. “Didn’t expect you to admit that.”
Lena leaned back against the leather seat of her car, her mind racing. “Are you the one who left the note?”
Another pause. “Yes.”
Her pulse spiked. “Then you remember.”
“I remember everything.”
Lena’s nails dug into her palm. This changed everything. She wasn’t the only one who had been sent back. Leo had, too. But what did that mean? Why them?
And more importantly—what did Leo want?
“Why now?” she asked. “Why reveal yourself?”
Leo’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Because you’re running out of time.”
Lena’s breath caught. “What do you mean?”
But the line had already gone dead.
- Writer
