And now… There was space. Space she intended to fill.
So she leaned closer, voice breaking just enough to make it sound real, convincing, and pitiful.
"Look at me, Nathan… please…" Because if she played this right, if she kept him drowning in guilt and tethered to her—
He wouldn't think.
He wouldn't question.
And slowly, inevitably…
He would choose her. And little by little, he'd tilt toward her until Ashley faded out of his memory completely.
She hadn't planned for things to spiral this far, but she couldn't deny that the outcome pleased her.
Nathan still refused to believe the woman they pulled from the lake wasn't Ashley. That stubborn doubt lingered, clinging to him. But now that Maddison was here, she would erase it, force reality to bend if she had to. Truth didn't matter. Proof didn't matter. What mattered was what Nathan believed.
And she would make him believe.
That the corpse in that lake was Ashley. Whether it was or not.
