Chapter 6

Adrian POV

I heard it at 3:58 AM and at first I thought I was dreaming but there it was, crying sounds coming from down the hall where it shouldn't be coming from because that room had been locked for two years.

I got out of bed and walked toward the sound, my chest getting tighter with each step because this wasn't possible. Sophia was dead and no one had a key to that room except me and Charlotte but Charlotte wouldn't do this, wouldn't come here in the middle of the night to play games.

The crying got louder as I reached her door and I pressed my hand against the wood and felt the sound vibrating through it, and I knew that sound. I'd heard it too many times in the months before she died, that specific kind of sobbing that meant she'd been at it for hours.

"Sophia?" The word came out before I could stop it even though I knew how insane it was to talk to a ghost.

The crying didn't stop.

I pulled out my keys and my hands were shaking which was stupid because I was not meant to shake or get scared, but something about this was wrong. I unlocked the door and pushed it open and turned on the light.

Empty.

The room was completely empty but the crying was still there, louder now, and I followed it to the nightstand where her phone was sitting with the screen glowing.

Voicemail playing on loop.

I picked it up and saw it was the last one she'd left me, the one from the night she died, the one I'd never been able to delete.

Her voice came through the speaker, broken and raw. "Adrian, I can't do this anymore, I can't keep pretending I'm fine when I'm not, and I know you don't love me, I know you never will, but I thought maybe if I tried hard enough you'd see me as something other than a contract."

I stopped the playback and set the phone down because I couldn't listen to the rest, couldn't hear her saying she was done and she was sorry and she couldn't live like this anymore.

Someone had turned it on and that someone had to have been in this room.

I pulled out my phone and opened the security app, scrolling through today's footage starting from this morning. There. 2:15 PM. The door opening.

Charlotte walked into frame carrying something and went into the room, stayed for maybe ten minutes, then came back out and locked the door behind her.

I called her to confirm I was right and she answered on the third ring sounding annoyed. "Adrian? It's four in the morning, what—"

"Why were you in Sophia's room?" I asked her.

Silence and then a sigh. "I was wondering when you'd notice."

"You have a spare key."

"Dad gave it to me years ago." She said.

"That doesn't give you the right to go in there whenever you want."

"Doesn't it?" Her voice had an edge now. "You married another girl, Adrian, another contract bride who looks exactly like Sophia, and you think I'm just supposed to sit back and watch you make the same mistakes?"

"What I do is none of your business." I said to her hoping it sticks.

"It is when you're going to kill this one too."

The words hit like a punch and I closed my eyes, took a breath. "Why did you turn on Sophia's phone?"

"I didn't."

"The security footage shows you in that room and now her phone is playing her last voicemail so don't lie to me, Charlotte."

"I'm not lying." Her voice changed and got quieter. "I went in there to look for something but I didn't touch her phone, it was already on when I got there."

"That's impossible, the battery died two years ago." I said doubting.

"Then someone charged it because it was on and playing that voicemail and honestly it was one of the most horrible things I've ever heard, her begging you to love her while you just ignored—"

"I know what she said." I cut her off.

"Do you? Because it doesn't seem like you learned anything from it."

"What did you go in there to find?" I asked her to change the topic.

Charlotte was quiet for a moment and I heard her moving around, probably pacing because she always paced when she was upset. "Sophia left a letter for whoever you marry next and I found it in her desk drawer."

My chest tightened. "What does it say?"

"I don't know, I haven't read it, but the envelope says 'To be given to Adrian's next wife' so I'm guessing it's for Elena."

"Don't give it to her." I said

"Why not? It's addressed to her." Charlotte replied me.

"Because whatever Sophia wrote isn't going to help anything, it's just going to make things worse and you know it." I tried explaining to her.

"Maybe Elena deserves to know what she's getting into." Charlotte said stubbornly.

"She already knows, we have a contract, everything is spelled out."

"Does she know you picked her because she looks like Sophia? Does she know what happened to the last girl who fell in love with you?"

"Elena isn't going to fall in love with me." I said, trying to convince myself.

"That's what you said about Sophia and look how that turned out." Charlotte took a breath. "I'm giving Elena that letter tomorrow at noon and you can either be there or not but it's happening either way."

"Charlotte, don't do this."

"It's already done and you can't stop me because I don't work for you and I don't answer to you." Her voice got harder. "Sophia deserves to have her voice heard even if she's not here anymore." She completed angrily.

"She made her choice." I replied to her because that is the truth.

"She made a choice based on the pain you caused and refused to acknowledge, there's a difference."

I didn't have an answer for that because she was right and we both knew it.

"I'll be there at noon," Charlotte said. "And Adrian? You should read that letter before Elena does because Sophia was a lot angrier than you think and a lot smarter than you gave her credit for. Whatever she wrote in there, it's not pretty."

She hung up.

I stood in Sophia's room looking around at all her things I'd locked away because I couldn't deal with them, couldn't face what I'd done, and now Charlotte was going to hand Elena a letter that would probably destroy whatever trust we'd built.

I walked to the desk and pulled open the top drawer and there it was, a blue envelope with Sophia's handwriting on the front.

"To whoever he marries next. I'm sorry."

I picked it up and it was heavier than expected, multiple pages probably, and the seal was still intact which meant Charlotte really hadn't read it.

I should open it now and should know what Elena was going to see tomorrow, but my hands were shaking and I couldn't make myself break that seal because whatever Sophia had written was going to change everything.

I put the letter back and closed the drawer and left the room, locking the door behind me.

Tomorrow Charlotte would give Elena this letter and Elena would read whatever Sophia had written and then she'd leave, would tear up our contract and walk away, and I'd lose everything because I kept making the same mistakes.

I went back to my room but didn't sleep, just sat there holding Sophia's phone and thinking about her last voicemail and the letter waiting in that desk and the girl down the hall who looked exactly like her.

History was about to repeat itself and I had no idea how to stop it.