Chapter 2

Alanna powered on the laptop. The screen flickered to life, showing a familiar desktop background: a photo of her, Cameron, and Anderson, smiling on a yacht during a summer trip years ago. They looked so happy, so unbreakable. Her finger traced the image of Cameron's face on the screen. It felt like a lifetime ago.

She noticed it then. In the main house, all the photos of her had been replaced. On the mantle, where a picture of her and Cameron at their engagement party had once sat, there was now one of Cameron and Bailey, laughing at some charity gala. In the hall, the family portraits had been rearranged, with Bailey seamlessly inserted where Alanna used to be.

Her heart ached with a dull, heavy pain. She had been erased.

She opened a custom application on the desktop, a small icon shaped like a heart. Cameron, a tech mogul in his own right, had designed it for her. It was their private space, a digital diary where he would leave her notes, poems, and sweet nothings.

She scrolled back, her eyes blurring with tears as she read the old entries.

"Can' t wait to see you tonight, my love. Counting the seconds."

"You looked so beautiful today. I' m the luckiest man in the world."

Then she reached the date she was taken. The entries changed.

She found the first one written after her disappearance.

"Where are you, Alanna? My world is gray without you. I' m so sorry. I should have protected you. This is all my fault. Come back to me."

The entries were filled with anguish and self-blame. He chronicled his desperate, frantic search. He described a car accident he got into while chasing a false lead, how he' d woken up in the hospital with a broken leg, calling her name.

Reading his pain was a strange form of torture. A part of her ached for the man who had written those words.

Then, a new name appeared.

"Bailey brought me soup at the hospital today. She cried, saying she feels so helpless. She' s a sweet girl. She reminds me a little of you."

The mentions of Bailey became more frequent.

"Anderson is a wreck. Bailey is the only one who can get him to eat. She' s been a rock for both of us."

"Went to check another lead in the mountains today. Bailey came with me. It' s nice not to be alone."

Slowly, the tone of the entries shifted. The raw pain began to fade, replaced by a quiet companionship. Alanna felt a knot of dread tighten in her stomach, but she couldn't stop reading. It was like pressing on a bruise, a self-inflicted pain she couldn't resist.

He was falling in love with her sister. Her replacement.

The entries about searching for Alanna became less frequent. Instead, they were filled with places he had gone with Bailey. The search for her had become their love story.

Alanna leaned her back against the cold, dusty wall, the laptop feeling heavy in her lap. The man who wrote these words was a stranger.

Then she saw the last entry, dated just one week ago.

"I love her. I know I shouldn' t. I feel like I' m betraying you, Alanna, wherever you are. But I love Bailey. I don' t know what to do."

A tear dropped onto the screen, distorting the words. It was over. The love she had held onto like a beacon in the darkness was gone. He had given it to someone else.

The door creaked open. Cameron stood there, a silhouette against the hallway light.

He saw the tears on her face, his gaze dropping to the laptop screen. He didn't look surprised. He looked tired.

He walked in and tried to close the laptop. Alanna' s hand shot out, stopping him. She looked up at him, her eyes questioning, demanding.

He sighed, running a hand through his hair. He pulled a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and lit one, a habit he' d picked up after she disappeared. The smoke curled around his head, obscuring his face.

"I love her, Alanna," he said, the words quiet but clear in the still room.

It was one thing to read it. It was another to hear him say it. The confirmation shattered the last piece of her heart.

"But you are my fiancée," he continued, his voice taking on a gentler, persuasive tone. "I will honor my promise. We will get married. I just... I need some time."

He looked at her, his eyes pleading. "Please, just don't take it out on Bailey. She's innocent in all this. Once we're married, I'll cut off contact with her, I promise."

Alanna felt a hysterical laugh bubble up in her throat. He was asking her, the victim, to be patient while he got over his love for her kidnapper.

She didn't say anything. Instead, she slowly stood up. Without a word, she lifted the hem of her shirt.

The room was silent except for the sharp intake of Cameron's breath. Her torso was a roadmap of cruelty. Livid scars, old and new, crisscrossed her skin. Cigarette burns dotted her stomach like constellations of pain.

"They kept selling me," she said, her voice eerily calm. "But my body was too damaged. The buyers would complain. So they'd send me back. And every time they sent me back, they punished me for being defective."

Cameron stared, his face a mask of horror. He took a step back, his hand coming up as if to ward off the sight. Then he quickly dropped it.

"Alanna, I..." he started, but his voice failed. He couldn't look at her scars. He couldn't even look at her face. He looked at the wall behind her. "It doesn't matter. I'll still marry you. We'll get you the best doctors."

But she saw it. In that split second before he masked it, she saw the flicker of disgust in his eyes. He was a man obsessed with perfection. His cars, his suits, his company, his woman. She was no longer perfect. She was tainted. Broken.

A bitter smile twisted her lips. "I'm calling off the engagement."

He looked shocked. "What?"

"I can't marry a man who is in love with someone else," she said, her voice gaining strength. "I have my pride."

"Pride?" He let out a harsh, disbelieving laugh. "After everything, you're talking about pride? What more do you want from me, Alanna? I'm still willing to marry you!"

His words, meant to sound noble, felt like the deepest insult. The love he had for her was gone, replaced by a sense of duty, of pity. And even that was conditional.

Her heart, which she thought couldn't break any further, felt like it was turning to ice.

Just then, the door opened again.

"Cameron? Is everything alright? I thought I heard shouting." Bailey stood there, wearing a breathtaking evening gown of pale blue silk. It shimmered under the dim light, a cascade of hand-sewn crystals sparkling on the bodice.

Alanna recognized it instantly. It was a one-of-a-kind couture piece from a famed designer. Cameron had bought it for her two birthdays ago.

He had told her, "This dress was made for a queen. It was made for you, Alanna. No one else in the world could wear it."

And now, it was on Bailey.

Bailey smiled sweetly, completely ignoring the tense atmosphere. She did a little twirl. "Isn't it beautiful, Alanna? Cameron said I could wear it to my farewell party."

The sight of that dress on that woman was the final, brutal blow. It was a declaration of war. A statement that everything that was once Alanna's now belonged to Bailey.

A dry, rattling laugh escaped Alanna's lips. It was a sound of pure, unadulterated heartbreak.

She looked at Cameron's guilty face, then at Bailey's triumphant one. Without another word, she slammed the door shut, locking them out.

She heard Cameron's sigh of frustration from the other side, and then his footsteps walking away, followed by Bailey's lighter ones.

Alanna slid down the door, her body finally giving out. She sat on the cold, hard floor of the storage room, surrounded by the ghosts of her past, and knew she was completely, utterly alone.

All night, she stayed awake, methodically going through the boxes. She took every photo, every letter, every gift from Cameron and Anderson and sealed them in a single, large box. With each item she packed away, she felt a piece of her love for them die.