Everyone is a Suspect
LILIANA’S POV
The streetlights blurred past my windshield as I drove, my hands clenched around the steering wheel tighter than I realized. The rational part of me whispered that I should just go home, pour a glass of wine, and collapse into bed after the kind of day I’d had. That I should shut the door on the boutique, on that venomous woman’s face, on her words that had lodged in my chest like splinters.
Ronny is my fiancé.
The words echoed again, acidic, impossible to ignore. My mind kept circling back, tearing itself apart. If she was lying, why was she so sure of herself? If she wasn’t lying… why hadn’t he mention it?
I should’ve driven home.
Instead, my foot pressed harder on the gas, and before I knew it, I’d taken the turn toward Ronny’s neighborhood. My pulse jumped as I rolled past the iron gates, the darkened trees whispering against my windows. What the hell was I doing? Barging into his house like this wasn’t the plan. He’d said afternoon. It wasn’t afternoon. It wasn’t anything close to civilized.
And yet—I didn’t stop.
By the time I pulled into his driveway, my chest felt tight, like every nerve inside me was sparking. The house loomed, shadow and light spilling across the stone facade, quiet in a way that made me ache with unease.
The door opened before I could knock. The familiar kind-faced maid appeared, her eyes soft with recognition.
“Miss Liliana,” she said warmly. “Come in.”
I hesitated only a second before nodding, stepping past her into the dim, clean scent of his home.
And then I saw him.
Ronny sat on the couch, the glow from his laptop illuminating his sharp features. Papers were spread across the table in a mess that looked nothing like the man I thought I knew—Ronny was usually meticulous, controlled. Tonight, though, he was chaos.
And his chest was bare.
My eyes dragged over him before I could stop myself—the ink carved into his skin. The sight of him hit me like a punch to the gut, a reminder of everything I was trying not to feel.
He didn’t notice me at first, too focused on the screen, his brows drawn tight, jaw clenched. But at my voice, steady and too casual for the storm raging inside me, his head jerked up.
“You said you had some questions to ask me,” I said, my tone smooth, betraying nothing.
His eyes widened, surprise flashing across his face. Quickly, he snapped his laptop shut and rose to his feet, straightening like he was trying to pull professionalism back over himself like a cloak.
“I didn’t know you were coming,” he admitted, his voice low, guarded. “We agreed to meet in the afternoon. I figured you were busy.”
“I was,” I said evenly, sliding onto the couch opposite him as if I had every right to be there. “But here I am.”
Silence stretched, heavy and humming with things unspoken. I crossed one leg over the other, adjusting the cuff of my blouse, refusing to be the first to crack. But Ronny did. He always did.
He leaned forward, forearms braced on his thighs, eyes dark as they locked onto mine. “What was your parents’ relationship like before your mom died?”
The question stunned me. I’d expected deflection, maybe some smug jab at me showing up uninvited. Not… this.
I blinked, my throat suddenly dry. “Why?”
“Because,” he said carefully, “sometimes the answers aren’t where we think they are. Start at the beginning.”
I looked away, my gaze tracing the edges of the papers scattered across his table, though I wasn’t really seeing them. “They were… getting into fights. More often than usual. Little things, big things. The house was quieter, but it wasn’t peaceful. It was… tense.”
He nodded once, as though confirming something to himself. “Did they ever mention divorce?”
My head whipped back toward him, startled. “Divorce? No. Never. My father would never—”
“Then how come,” he interrupted gently, “he remarried after six months?”
The words hung in the air like a guillotine.
I froze.
Six months. I’d thought about it before, of course. The way he brought my stepmother and stepsister into our home as though they’d been waiting in the wings. But I’d shoved the thought aside, burying it under excuses—grief makes people do strange things, maybe he needed comfort, maybe he was just trying not to drown.
But six months.
“Too soon,” Ronny said softly, studying me like every twitch of my face mattered.
My lips parted, a soundless breath escaping. For a long moment, I couldn’t speak. And then the words tumbled out, broken, jagged.
“Do you think… do you think my father had something to do with my mother’s car accident?”
The silence that followed was suffocating.
Ronny didn’t flinch. He didn’t look shocked. He just sat there, watching me with those unreadable eyes that gave nothing away. Finally, he said, “Does he have any reason to do that?”
I shook my head wildly, then stopped, confusion and fear colliding inside me. “I—I don’t know. I don’t know anymore.”
He leaned back, exhaling slowly. “Everyone is a suspect right now. I’m still searching.”
His voice was calm, steady. But the words detonated in my chest.
Everyone is a suspect.
Which meant my father was, too.
I stared at him, trying to hold onto the image of the man who used to lift me onto his shoulders, who tucked me into bed with stories, who smiled at my mother like she was his entire world. But that image wavered, broke, warped into something I didn’t want to see—the man who’d brought a stranger into our home, who’d smiled with his arm around another woman not even a year later, who never seemed to look back.
My head throbbed, pain flaring sharp at my temples. I pressed my fingertips against them, willing the ache to stop.
“Liliana.”
His voice was low, grounding. I forced my eyes open, found his gaze still on me, unwavering.
But I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think.
Could my father have killed my mother?
The question clawed at me, louder and louder, until it was the only thing I could hear.
And I didn’t know if I wanted the answer.
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