Page 30 of Cruel Obsession

I pause at the door, suddenly overwhelmed by the enormity of what I’m doing. Leaving everything I know. Planning on moving to a remote estate. Working for a complete stranger.

Get the job first, Mirabel.

For Dad.

This is for Dad.

I lock the apartment and head downstairs.

Inside the cab, the city gives way to suburbs, then to countryside, then to deep forest that closes over the road like a canopy. My stomach knots with each mile. The taxi driver hasn’t spoken since we left, and the silence amplifies my thoughts.

The trees grow denser, pressing closer to the narrow road. Shadows dance across the windshield, playing tricks with my vision. I find myself scanning the forest edges, heart jumping whenever something moves between the trees.

“How much farther?” I ask the driver.

He shrugs. “GPS says twenty minutes. No signal out here, though.”

No signal. Isolated. The winding road reminds me of another forest. Another road. Six years ago.

Debra.

Just thinking her name makes my throat tighten. I close my eyes, but it’s no escape—the memories are waiting for me in the darkness.

The school trip to the lake house. Our rare, explosive fight over something so trivial I can’t even remember what started it. Debra, tears streaming down her face, storming out into the trees surrounding the property.

“I need space, Mira,” she’d snapped. “Not everything has to be about you.”

I should have followed her immediately. Should have known something was wrong when she didn’t return for dinner. But I was eighteen and stubborn and angry, and I’d thought letting her cool off was the right move.

By the time we organized a search party, the sun was setting. By midnight, the police had arrived. By dawn, helicopters were sweeping the forest.

But they never found her. No body. No trace. Nothing except a single earring—the tiny silver star she always wore—lying in the dirt near a tire track half a mile from where she’d entered the woods.

And the memory of a man I glimpsed just once through the trees. Tall. Bald. Covered in tattoos that marked him as someone dangerous.

The police had questions about him, but I had no answers. Just the image burned into my brain—massive shoulders, intricate ink etched up his scalp and neck, moving through the forest like he belonged there.

For weeks afterward, I’d wake up certain I’d heard Debra calling my name. For months, I’d think I saw her in crowds, only to find a stranger when I caught up. For years, I jumped at every phone call, every doorbell, convinced it might be her.

Six years, and the wound is still raw.

The taxi turns onto a narrower road, unmarked except for a discreet sign:Private Property. My hands turn clammy. We’re close.

The trees continue another half mile before they finally release us. The road widens, becomes smooth asphalt instead of cracked pavement. Manicured lawns sweep away on either side, dotted with sculptures—abstract metal pieces that probably cost more than my flat.

Then the house appears.

My lungs seize.

The driver whistles low. “That’s not a house, that’s a freaking fortress.”

He’s not wrong.

Ashwater Heights sprawls across the hilltop like something that escaped from a different century. Three stories of gleaming white stone, symmetrical wings extending from a central section crowned with what looks like a glass conservatory. Dozens of windows catch the afternoon light, making the entire structure seem to glow. Columns frame the entrance—proper Greek revival columns that belong on a museum, not a private home.

This is where I’m supposed to work?

The scale is overwhelming. I count at least twenty windows on the front facade alone, each one taller than I am. Balconies jut from the second floor, their wrought-iron railings intricate with scrollwork. Ivy climbs one entire wing, dark green against white stone, controlled and deliberate rather than wild.