The Secrets My Wife Left Behind

Right in front of us, the food on the table was still steaming, and our half-empty beer glasses were gathering condensation. Yet I stopped dead in my tracks, freezing as I stared at my brother-in-law, Silas Parker, entirely unable to force a single word out.Mark Miller. Not a real name, but a secret code.Five years ago, my wife Scarlett Parker and I watched a crime thriller together. In the movie, the protagonist cracked a cryptic dying message left behind by a best friend, slowly unraveling the web of clues to catch the real killer.After the credits rolled, Scarlett had been completely wired. She curled up in my arms, grinning up at me."Babe, let's come up with our own secret code just like that," she’d said."Let's make it... Mark Miller!"If either of us ever gets taken out, we have to find a way to pass that name along. It'll mean the sender was murdered!"Watching her all lit up and animated, I’d just laughed it off at the time.We were ordinary people working normal

The entire car ride back was suffocatingly tense.I leaned my head against the passenger window, pretending to catch some rest, but I kept a sharp eye on Silas' every move.He drove smoothly, his expression completely unreadable, but I had this gut feeling that he kept stealing glances at me in the rearview mirror.When we pulled up outside my house, I pushed the car door open, muttered a quick thanks, and hurried toward the front door."Jace," Silas called out, stopping me in my tracks, "Let the past stay in the past. If Scarlett is watching over you from heaven, the thing she'd want most is for you to move on and live a normal life."My footsteps paused. I turned back to look at him, but his face gave nothing away."I know. Thanks, man."With that, I turned, unlocked the front door, slipped inside, and slammed it shut, pressing my back flat against the wood as I gasped for air.Without wasting a second, I headed straight for the study and carefully dragged out a dusty cardboa

Silas had tried to block me from investigating back then simply because he was terrified of his crimes coming to light!My heart hammered frantically against my ribs as I immediately spilled everything I had uncovered to Mr. Hunter.Mr. Hunter’s expression turned fierce, and he whipped out his phone on the spot, ordering his team to launch an immediate, full-scale investigation.Before I left, Mr. Hunter gave me a grim warning. "Until the truth comes fully to light, you need to stay as far away from Silas as possible. Do not set him off, or you'll put a target on your own back!"I promised I would, but a burning tide of hatred was raging inside my chest.Silas was a total monster. He had murdered his own sister yet spent years parading around wearing the mask of a righteous, supportive brother.A scumbag like that didn't deserve to spend another second breathing air on this earth.After leaving the coffee shop, I stopped by a local store, bought the sharpest utility knife I coul

I stared blindly at the security clearance protocols printed on the paperwork, my mind completely blank.…"Besides, right after the intelligence leak back then, internal affairs launched an immediate mole hunt," Mr. Hunter continued, his tone solemn."Silas was actually the first person among all related personnel to voluntarily submit to a background check. Every single call log, communication record, and travel history was cross-examined and verified over and over again, and nothing was found."Every single word systematically tore down the foundation of the truth I had spent three years building.I looked at those black-and-white investigation results on the page, feeling every ounce of strength drain straight out of my body until my legs gave out and I collapsed back into the chair.No.This made no sense.If Silas wasn't the mole, then why had he lied to me? Why did he fake Scarlett's depression diagnosis? Why did he go to such lengths to block me from investigating her d

Clutching the medical files, I bolted out the door like a madman, slammed my foot on the gas, and drove straight to Silas' place.I hammered on his front door with everything I had until he finally pulled it open.The second he saw the papers in my hand, the color drained completely from his face.I shoved past him, stormed into the apartment, and slammed the thick stack of files onto the coffee table."What the hell is this?" I glared right at him. "I’ve never seen you for any kind of treatment. Where did these records come from? What did you do to me?"…Silas stared back at me, his lips parting, but not a single word came out.In his eyes, there was a heavy, tangled mix of pain and hesitation that I couldn't read, along with a flicker of panic I had never seen on him before."Jace," he finally said after a long, agonizing pause, "Stop digging.""Why the hell should I stop?" I fired back, my eyes burning red. "Scarlett's death, these creepy medical files, and every single se