I Called For Help In Cold Room But My Husband Called Me A Liar Chapter 09

I Called For Help In Cold Room But My Husband Called Me A Liar Chapter 09

Those three years, the rose bush bloomed outrageously bright. No one knew my bones lay buried beneath its

roots.

An assistant carefully set up an easel for Thomas.

His hands trembled so violently he couldn’t line the sketch paper straight against the board. He taped it crookedly, ripped it off, and re-taped it three times before it sat even. Staring at the photos of my skeletal

remains, he couldn’t bring himself to set pencil to page.

Thomas parted his lips, yet not a single sound escaped him.

He squeezed his eyes shut. The hollowed skull replayed on a loop behind his lids, until Cecilia’s face

materialized clear as day.

Never had he hated his gift for profiling more than in that moment. He’d only glanced at the photos a handful of times, and he already knew the skull belonged to me.

He shot to his feet, slamming his pencil and sketchpad onto the floor. The stack of crime scene photos tumbled off the table and scattered everywhere. He paid it no mind, staggering to yank open his office door.

Sasha’s hand froze mid-knock on the frame. She blinked, then softened into her usual gentle smile.

“Tom, we’re supposed to head back to my parents’ house today-”

Before she finished speaking, Thomas shoved her hard.

Sasha tottered backward in her thin leather heels, twisted her ankle, and crumpled to the floor, all the color draining from her face. “Tom!”

Thomas didn’t glance back. He grabbed his car keys and bolted out the door.

The engine roared to life. A man who’d always followed every traffic law, Thomas slammed the gas pedal all the way down, blowing through four red lights in a row.

His jaw was clamped tight, eyes bloodshot. Veins bulged along his knuckles wrapped around the steering wheel. Tears dripped onto his hands, and he never even noticed.

I sat in the passenger seat watching him, my heart a knot of conflicting emotions.

I’d imagined this day recently-the moment he learned the whole truth. But now that it was here, I felt none of

the relief I’d pictured.

Three long years, everyone had called me shameless, vicious, a monster. And Thomas had believed every

word

He’d spent three years hating me, and three years falling for the stepsister I’d despised above all else.

Now the truth had finally come out

When Thomas pulled up to the dig site, police tape already cordoned off the entire rose bush.

An officer who didn’t recognize him blocked his path.

“Crime scene. Unauthorized personnel stay back.”

“I’m family of the victim!” Thomas roared, his eyes blazing red.

He shoved past the officers holding him back and forced his way through the tape.

Alex, who’d been examining the excavation, sighed and stepped aside to let him pass. “You’re here. Come

look.”

Thomas stood motionless beside the bare pit where the bush had been dug up.

My skeleton had already been transported back to the precinct lab. Only the empty hole in the dirt proved I’d

ever existed.

Silent, Thomas followed Alex back to the station.

The medical examiner handed him a thick folder of autopsy reports, her eyes glistening with tears, voice

thick with grief.

“Fifteen stab wounds across the victim’s body-every single one deliberately missing vital organs.”

“The freezing temperatures inside the walk-in freezer slowed her blood loss. Marks on the bones confirm she was still alive when the dismemberment began, contrary to what the killer claimed.”

Thomas’s head snapped up, his mind going blank for a beat.

“What do you mean?”