Chapter 3
They were counting down the years until I was gone.
My hand shook as I picked up the phone.
I should not have. I knew I should not have. But I could not stop myself.
I swiped up, and because Vanessa’s phone was not locked at that moment, it opened to her text conversation with Chelsea.
I started scrolling.
My heart pounded so hard I thought I might be having a heart attack.
Chelsea: How’s the final week going?
Vanessa: Exhausting. Eleanor has been on me all day.
Chelsea: Is she still coming to everything?
Vanessa: Unfortunately. But whatever. At least she’ll be dead before our first anniversary.
I read it three times.
Then four.
Then five.
The words did not change.
My hands went numb.
You know that feeling when something is so shocking your body just stops working? My fingers felt thick and clumsy, but I could not stop scrolling. I had to know how deep it went.
Those eight words kept burning in my mind while I went back further in their conversation.
Vanessa: I’m so tired of pretending to care about her boring stories.
Chelsea: Just a few more weeks.
Vanessa: I know. Once we’re married, I can drop the act. Daniel will choose me over her. He always does.
Chelsea: What if she lives longer than you think?
Vanessa: My grandmother was gone at seventy-four. Eleanor is already seventy-two and has blood pressure issues. Nature will take care of it.
There was more.
So much more.
Jokes about my clothes, my house, and my provincial life in Vermont. Comments about how I was clingy and needy. Plans for how Vanessa would slowly push Daniel away from me after the wedding. How she would make it seem as if I was the problem. How she would tell him I could not accept their marriage, that I was jealous of their happiness.
It was all there.
Every smile had been fake.
Every compliment had been a lie.
Every moment I thought we were bonding, she had been waiting for me to disappear.
I heard the shower turn off.
My hands were shaking so badly I could barely hold the phone steady. But I knew what I had to do.
I opened my own phone with trembling fingers and started taking photos.
Screen after screen, I captured every word. Every casual cruelty. Every calculation.
Click.
Click.
Click.
The evidence that would either save my son or cost me everything.
By the time Vanessa came out of the bathroom in her towel, I had it all.
She saw me standing there with her phone in my hand, and her face drained of color.
“Eleanor, I…”
I set her phone down on the counter very carefully. Very deliberately.
When I looked at her, I saw her clearly for the first time. Not the woman I had wanted her to be. The woman she actually was.
“I think I should go back to my hotel now,” I said.
“What did you see?”
Her voice was sharp. Defensive.
“Enough.”
“Eleanor, please. Let me explain. Those messages, they’re not…”
“They’re not what?”
“Not what they seem.”
I looked at her. Really looked at her. I wondered how I had ever thought she was beautiful.
“You talked about me being gone, Vanessa. Multiple times. You were counting the years.”
Her jaw tightened.
For a moment, something flickered across her face. Not remorse. Not shame.
Annoyance.
As if I was being inconvenient by discovering her cruelty.
“You’re overreacting,” she said flatly. “Those were private conversations. You had no right to look at my phone.”
“Private conversations where you discussed how relieved you would be when I was gone.”
“I never said that.”
“At least she’ll be dead before our first anniversary. That is a direct quote.”
She had the audacity to roll her eyes.
“God, it was a joke. Eleanor, Chelsea and I joke around like that. You wouldn’t understand.”
“What wouldn’t I understand? How to be cruel? How to deceive someone who loves you?”
“You know what?” Vanessa’s voice turned cold. “Maybe this is for the best. Maybe we should clear the air.”
“Yes. Maybe we should.”
“Yes, I find you exhausting. Yes, I think you’re overbearing. Yes, I’ve been counting down the time until I don’t have to pretend to care about your quaint little life anymore. But I love Daniel, and I’m going to marry him, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
I felt as if I had been slapped.
“You think Daniel will marry you after he hears about this?”
She laughed.
Actually laughed.
“You think Daniel will believe you? His bitter, lonely mother who can’t let him go? Eleanor, I’ve been preparing for this.”
“What does that mean?”
May you like
“I’ve been telling Daniel for months how jealous you seem. How passive-aggressive you’ve been. If you go to him with this, I’ll tell him you faked those screenshots because you can’t stand to see him happy.”
She stepped closer, her eyes bright and hard.
