บททั้งหมดของ Familiar Strangers : บทที่ 61 - บทที่ 70

Mia's POVThe school hallway was buzzing with the usual Friday energy. Lockers slammed, friends shouted plans for the weekend, and everyone was talking about my party tomorrow. I walked to my locker with my sketchbook tucked under my arm, still smiling from the way Lucas had texted me a funny meme this morning. The party was going to be perfect. Mommy had already ordered the cake, and Daddy had promised not to interrogate every single person who walked through the door.I opened my locker and a small white envelope fell out onto the floor.No name. No stamp. Just my name written in neat, careful handwriting on the front.I picked it up, heart beating a little faster. When I opened it, the note inside was short and typed:"Congratulations on turning fourteen, Mia. Your father thinks the past is over. He is wrong. See you at the party. — A friend of the family"I stared at the paper, the words crawling under my skin. The shadow lady was gone. Everyone said so. Mommy and Daddy ha

Mia's POVThe party was still loud and bright, but everything felt wrong now. I stood near the photo booth with Lucas, trying to smile while he showed me one of the silly pictures we had taken together. My friends were laughing and dancing, the music pulsing through the penthouse like nothing was wrong. But the notes in my pocket felt like they were burning a hole through my dress.Sophia was still here. She moved through the crowd like she belonged, talking to people, sketching in her book, smiling that same calm smile that made my skin crawl. Every time I looked up, she was watching me. Not in a creepy way exactly, but in a way that felt like she knew something I did not.Lucas noticed I was distracted. "You sure you are okay? You look like you saw a ghost."I forced a laugh. "I am fine. Just... party nerves."Before I could say more, Sophia appeared beside us. She held out a fresh drawing she had just finished. It was a sketch of me and Lucas dancing, but the way she had drawn it m

Elena's POVDamian pressed the intercom without looking at me. "Send her up."I wanted to ask him to wait. To give us five minutes to prepare, to put Mia to bed first, to think through what a fourteen year old girl carrying a two year old secret might actually say when she finally got to say it. But the elevator was already moving. And Damian was already standing in the middle of the living room with his arms at his sides, very still, the way he stood when he was deciding how much of himself to show.I touched his arm. "Let me lead."He looked at me. Then he nodded once.Mia had not moved from the couch. She was still holding the drawing of Iris, fingers pressing the edges flat, the same focused stillness she got when she was sketching something difficult. I sat beside her and took her hand."You can go to bed," I said quietly. "You do not have to be here for this."She shook her head. "She came back for all of us. Not just you and Dad."I could not argue with that.The elevator chime

Elena's POVDamian typed slowly, which was unusual for him. He was a man who answered emails in under thirty seconds and signed contracts without rereading them. But he sat at the kitchen table staring at that message from an eight year old girl and took his time with every word.I read over his shoulder.He wrote: 'A poker chip is something people use in card games. Like a coin but made of plastic or metal. Where did you find yours?'Simple. Calm. No weight in it.The reply came in under a minute.'It was in a box with my baby stuff. It is silver and it has a small picture on it. Sophia said it was important but she would not say why. Are you my dads people?'Damian set the phone down on the table.Neither of us spoke for a moment.My dads people.Eight years old and already trying to map the geography of where she came from, the same way Mia used to draw family trees in her sketchbooks with question marks where certain branches should have been."She knows she has a father somewhere

Elena's POVThe introduction was scheduled for Saturday.Patricia Osei had arranged everything with the quiet efficiency of someone who had done this many times and knew that the more carefully you managed the approach, the less likely everything was to fall apart on arrival. Neutral location. A community center forty minutes outside the city with a garden attached. Iris's foster carer, a woman named June, would be present throughout. No surprises. No pressure. Just people meeting people.That was the plan.The plan lasted until Thursday.I was at the agency, first time back in the office properly since the birthday weekend, trying to remember that I ran a company and that the Horizon campaign still existed and that the world had continued rotating while our family drama consumed every available oxygen molecule. Lila had stacked three weeks of decisions on my desk with sticky notes that ranged from professional to genuinely threatening.I was on my second coffee and my first real hour