All Chapters of Step Daddy's Lakeside Sin : Chapter 71 - Chapter 80

(Millie POV)The morning had been almost ordinary. Richard left early to meet a contractor about the back porch steps. I stayed behind, moving through the quiet house with a cup of tea, still wearing one of his sweaters. The baby had been active since dawn, small rolls of movement that made me pause every so often with my hand pressed low on my stomach. I was standing at the kitchen window watching the trees when my phone vibrated on the counter. I glanced at it without real concern. Henrietta and I had been messaging carefully for the past two days. I expected her name. But it wasn’t her name.The number was unknown. Local city code. And no name attached.I almost let it go to voicemail. My other hand gripped tightly against the cup of tea I was holding. Then, I released my hand a bit, and wiped my hand on the sweater and picked up the phone.Unknown:Vermont looks quiet from here. Does she sleep better without the old house listening?My blood went cold. I froze instantly. Staring a

(Henry POV)The bass moved through the floorboards and up into my bones.I stood on the mezzanine with an untouched whiskey and looked down over my domain. Violet and blue lights swept across the main room in slow arcs. Three girls worked the polished poles on the center stage, bodies gleaming under the lights. The tallest one climbed with controlled strength, locked her thighs, and arched into a slow spin that drew money from the men seated nearest the stage. Another dancer crawled across the floor in nothing but a garter belt and heels, collecting bills with her teeth while a client laughed and reached for her again.This was the public face of the place. Clean enough for the men who wanted to pretend they were only watching. The real business happened deeper inside.I took the stairs down. The security man at the private corridor stepped aside without a word. The hallway here was warmer, lit in low amber. Behind the first door I passed, a woman moaned in a steady, practiced rhythm w

(Millie POV)The first sign came in the form of a car that didn’t belong. I noticed it from the kitchen window while rinsing the breakfast plates. A dark sedan, too clean for the dusty back roads around here, moved slowly past the end of our drive and disappeared around the bend. It wasn’t the first unfamiliar vehicle we had seen since arriving, but something about the way it crawled made the hair on my arms rise. I stood there with my hands still wet, watching the empty stretch of road long after it was gone.Richard came in from the porch carrying a small bag of tools. He took one look at my face and set everything down.“What is it?”“A car. It was dark. It went by too slowly.”He walked to the window and stared out the same way I had. His shoulders were already tightening.“Could be nothing,” he said, but his voice didn’t sound convincing.“Or it could be the next message.”We didn’t speak about the anonymous texts for a moment. They had become a quiet third presence in the house…

(Henrietta POV)I knew he would come.The silence had lasted too long for someone like Henry. Three days of unanswered messages. Two days of muted notifications. One full day of me pretending the sound of the intercom couldn’t reach me. It was only a matter of time before he stopped asking and started appearing. When the knock finally came, it was measured and calculated. Three slow taps. Not loud enough to alarm the neighbors, but rather loud enough to tell me he knew I was inside. I stood in the middle of my living room and stared at the door, heart beating too hard against my ribs. Every instinct told me to stay quiet. To let him believe I wasn’t home. But the second knock came harder, and his voice followed it which was low, controlled, and far too familiar.“Henrietta. Open the door.”I closed my eyes. My body still remembered him too well. The weight of his hands. The way he spoke when he wanted something. The restroom. The bruises that had faded but not disappeared from my memor

(Richard POV)I should have put her further back in the trees. The second the man spun around, I knew this wouldn’t end with words. He came at me fast and low, no hesitation, no warning. We hit the ground hard near the porch steps. The impact drove the air from my lungs. He was heavier than he looked, and he fought like someone who had been in ugly, close-quarters fights before. Attacking with elbows, knees, in fact nothing clean. I took a solid punch to the ribs and felt something grind. Pain flared white-hot along my side. I still managed to roll him beneath me and get a forearm across his throat. For a moment I had the advantage. Then his hand found a piece of firewood near the steps and swung it. The wood cracked against my shoulder and the side of my head. My vision sparked. I heard Millie cry out from the trees. That single sound cost me half a second.It was enough.The man drove his knee up, threw me off balance, and scrambled free. By the time I pushed back to my feet, blood