SECRET FROM THE PAST

Lily's breath went around her neck.

"what do you mean?" His voice trembled, darting between his wide eyes Liam and the maid. "I don't understand. Is the past?"

The maid was hesitant, she was nervous at Liam before continuing. "They are saying ... you are not really a lily Harper. That your real identity is completely something else."

silence.

Liam's cold gaze intensified, narrow with suspicion. "Is it true?"

"No!" Lily retreated, shaking her head. "They are lying. I am a lily Harper. I swear-"

But even when words left her lips, the memories gnawed in her mind. faint. Remote.

Buried for years.

"Lily," Adrian's voice became softened, but her eyes shone with something else curiosity, calculation. "If you are not telling us something there, then you need to say it now."

"I don't know what they are talking about!" He insisted, but his voice erupted uncertainty.

Liam stepped closer, her appearance became heavy, her silver gray eyes piercing her soul.

"Then why do you look like you are lying?"

Lily lagged behind until her back hit the wall.

"Because it's all too much!" she cried. "First you force me into this twisted system, now there is some rumor about my identity I don't even know how I ended here in the first place!"

Liam's gaze was fixed on it, cold and unlimited. But Adrian took a slow step.

"Then let's mean," Adrian mumbled. "Tell me, Lily ... Do you remember your father's death?"

The question freezed him.

Lily's lips participated, but no words came out.

Do you remember your father's death?

The room blurred as a glow of memory, thought she had moved forward.

A low light room.

Raised voice.

His father was screaming.

A gun tablet.

Then - darkness.

"No ..." Lily whispered, grabbed her head. "No, no, no. It's not correct."

But the memory wouldn’t stop.

The door. Blood on the floor. Someone pulling her away. A voice whispering, “Forget everything.”

“I said—stop!” Lily screamed, falling to her knees.

Liam flinched. For a brief moment, his cold exterior wavered.

Adrian, however, remained still. Watching. Waiting.

“Lily,” Liam said slowly, “what aren’t you telling us?”

Tears streamed down her face as she looked up at him.

"I... I don’t remember."

But deep down, something inside her whispered that wasn’t true.

There was something.

Something she had fought to forget.

Suddenly, Liam’s phone buzzed again. He yanked it from his pocket, glancing at the screen.

His expression changed.

From suspicion to shock.

He turned the screen toward Lily.

“You don’t remember this?”

Lily squinted through her tears.

A grainy photo.

A younger version of her, no older than eight, standing next to a man.

Liam’s father.

Liam’s voice was barely above a whisper. “Why are you in a photo with my father?”

The blood drained from Lily’s face.

“I—I don’t know,” she stammered, backing away.

But the truth was, she did.

The memory crashed over her like a tidal wave.

Her father’s voice, pleading.

Liam’s father standing tall, cold, and furious.

Her father collapsing to the ground.

Her small hands covered in blood.

“No…”

Lily fell to her knees.

“I thought it was just a nightmare,” she whispered.

Liam stepped back, his face pale for the first time.

“That night… the night my father died…” His voice broke. “You were there.”

Lily looked up at him, her own face a mask of horror.

“I didn’t kill him!” she screamed. “I swear I didn’t!”

Liam’s silver eyes hardened again, his walls rebuilding in an instant.

"Then prove it."

Adrian stepped forward, smiling faintly.

“Well, well. Looks like the perfect engagement just got a lot more interesting.”

Lily could barely breathe.

The truth was coming to light.

A truth that could destroy her.

Or save her if she survived Liam’s wrath.

But one thing was certain.

Nothing would ever be the same again.