Chapter 2:

The Woman Who Was Supposed to Be Dead

IRIS:

I knew the moment I said her name that everything would change.

Seraphine.

Even after three years, the name still tasted like ash in my mouth.

Callum’s face paled. His jaw clenched. The tremor in his hands betrayed him, even if his voice remained composed.

“She’s dead,” he said, not asking—declaring.

I shook my head once. “You thought she was. We both did. But someone in this house made sure you believed the lie.”

He stared at the journal like it might bleed. Then he snapped it shut, and the sound echoed like a gunshot in the dead study.

“Why are you telling me this now?”

Because I had to.

Because I was running out of time.

“Because if you don’t remember who she really is—what she’s capable of—she’ll make you forget everything again.”

---

The truth was, I had seen her.

Three nights ago.

I’d heard something in the servant tunnels. A voice humming a lullaby I hadn’t heard since the fire.

I followed it.

And there she was.

Standing in the shadows like a ghost wrapped in silk. Not burned. Not broken. But reborn.

Seraphine Thorne.

The woman who was supposed to die in that fire.

Her golden hair gleamed, untouched by flames. Her smile hadn’t changed—it was still cruel and charming in equal measure. The same smile she wore when she accused me of pushing her down the stairs. When she told Callum I forged letters. When she said I only wanted his money.

She had always been poison—wrapped in diamonds.

And now she was back. Alive. Unforgiving.

I should’ve screamed. Should’ve run.

But I did what I always did around her—I froze.

She came close. Close enough that I could smell roses and rot.

“Miss me?” she whispered.

I didn’t respond.

She ran a finger down my cheek. “You took what was mine, Iris. Now I’m here to collect.”

And just like that, she vanished into the walls again—like the devil never really leaves, just waits in the dark.

---

Callum didn’t believe me.

Not fully.

But he followed me anyway.

I led him down the corridor behind the chapel, the one sealed off since the accident. Lenora said it was unstable, cursed. I knew better.

We reached the locked door. The iron one.

“It was open three days ago,” I whispered.

Now it was bolted shut from the inside.

Callum raised his hand to touch it—then flinched.

“Did you feel that?” he asked.

The cold.

The static.

The echo of something watching.

“Yes,” I whispered. “She’s in there.”

He didn’t say anything for a long time. Just stood there, staring at the door like it was staring back.

Then he turned to me.

“If she’s alive... why hasn’t she come for me?”

I looked at him.

Because that was the worst part.

“She doesn’t want to kill you, Callum,” I said softly. “She wants to use you. Just like before.”

---

That night, I couldn’t sleep.

Not with her lurking in the walls. Not with the truth unraveling piece by piece.

I went back to our old bedroom, needing something to ground me.

That’s when I noticed it—something strange about the wardrobe.

The mirror wasn’t a mirror.

It was a one-way pane.

A hidden door opened behind it, a passage I’d never seen before.

My blood went cold.

And from the dark… a hand reached out and grabbed me.

I screamed—but no sound came.

I was yanked inside the passage.

The door slammed shut behind me.

And there she was.

Seraphine.

Smiling.

Wearing my wedding ring.

Perfect—here’s Chapter Four of Vows He Doesn’t Remember, continuing from Iris’s POV. This chapter dives deeper into Iris’s fear, Seraphine’s twisted mind games, and the psychological tension building in the Thorne estate. It ends on a dark and shocking cliffhanger.

I should’ve known she’d come for me.

Seraphine never lost gracefully. And I had something she believed belonged to her—Callum’s heart.

Now she had me in her grip. Her fingers curled around my wrist like a snake testing its next meal.

She looked… perfect.

Too perfect.

Her skin unscarred, her hair cascading like golden silk over her shoulders, and her dress—black velvet with crimson beading—was the same one I’d worn on my wedding night. The irony nearly made me gag.

She twisted her wrist, displaying the ring. My ring.

“Fits me better, don’t you think?”

I didn’t answer.

Because if I opened my mouth, I’d scream. And I refused to let her hear that.

Instead, I studied her eyes.

The same eyes I saw every night in my nightmares. The ones that laughed when she framed me, when she watched them drag me from the estate in chains, when she whispered lies into Callum’s ears like poison honey.

“How?” I asked.

She smiled like a cat stretching in a sunbeam.

“Oh, Iris. Always so literal. So desperate to make sense of the senseless. Callum was mine first. Before the accidents. Before the secrets. Before you. You just borrowed him while I was... detained.”

“Detained?” I laughed, but it was hollow. “You faked your death.”

“No, darling. They did.” She walked around me slowly, her voice soft. “Lenora. Your precious in-laws. They needed a scapegoat, and I was getting in the way of a much bigger inheritance. They locked me away—said I was unstable.”

She leaned in. “But the truth? I knew too much. And they couldn’t control me.”

I swallowed hard. “So you came back… to destroy me?”

She grinned. “Oh, Iris. I came back to replace you.”

She snapped her fingers.

The passage lit up—dim torches flickering to life—and I saw what lay behind her.

Walls lined with photos. Of Callum. Of me. Of our wedding, our home, our life.

Each one had a red string slashed across it.

Each one had my face burned out.

I stepped back.

She stepped forward.

“You think he loves you?” she whispered. “He doesn’t. He loved who he thought you were. And when he remembers the truth...”

She reached into her pocket and pulled something out.

A syringe.

“I’ll help him forget again.”

My blood turned to ice.

I lunged—but she was faster.

Her guards—two men I hadn’t seen—stepped from the shadows and grabbed me by the arms.

I thrashed, kicked, screamed. No sound escaped. The passage was soundproofed.

Seraphine leaned down, caressing my face with mock affection.

“You’ll sleep now, Iris. Just long enough fo

r me to become you again.”

Then she nodded—and the needle plunged into my neck.

Darkness came fast and brutal.

The last thing I heard was her whispering:

“Say hello to your memories… while you still have them.”