Chapter 2 - the woman in the black dress
The following morning, Ethan came downstairs to find Sophie sitting at the breakfast table in a yellow dress.
Vanessa stood behind her, arranging her hair into two neat braids.
“There he is,” Vanessa said brightly. “We were just talking about how excited Sophie is for the foundation dinner.”
Sophie looked confused.
The Mercer Foundation dinner was three weeks away. Children were not usually invited.
Ethan poured coffee.
“I thought it might be good for her to come this year.”
Vanessa tied a ribbon around the second braid.
“She can meet everyone who loved her mother.”
At the mention of Claire, Ethan’s hand stopped above his cup.
Vanessa noticed.
“I’m sorry,” she said gently. “I know the anniversary is close.”
Claire Mercer had died in what police called a highway accident. A truck had crossed the center line during heavy rain. Claire’s car had left the road before investigators could determine whether the collision had been intentional.
For almost two years, Ethan had refused to attend social events.
Vanessa had entered his life slowly.
She was patient, graceful and careful not to appear interested in his wealth. She worked with a nonprofit that provided temporary housing for widowed parents. She understood grief, she said, because her first husband had died after a long illness.
Six months after meeting Ethan, she moved into the Mercer house.
A year later, they married in a private ceremony.
Sophie had been three.
At first, Vanessa had been kind to her.
She read bedtime stories and bought matching dresses. She filled the house with photographs of the three of them smiling together.
The cruelty began in small ways.
A toy vanished when Sophie asked about her mother.
Dessert disappeared when she cried.
The bedroom door was locked from the outside for “quiet time.”
Vanessa never acted angrily in front of Ethan.
She acted concerned.
“Sophie has been struggling with rules.”
“She is testing boundaries.”
“She sometimes says things that are not true because she misses Claire.”
Ethan believed each explanation because Vanessa delivered it with tears in her eyes.
That morning, he crouched beside Sophie.
“Do you want to come to the dinner?”
Sophie looked toward Vanessa.
Her stepmother smiled.
It was not a kind smile.
“Yes,” Sophie answered.
Ethan touched her cheek.
“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.”
Vanessa laughed softly.
“She changes her mind every five minutes. Last night, she begged to come.”
Sophie studied her father.
He looked tired.
There were gray shadows beneath his eyes. His company was negotiating a government contract, and he had spent most nights at the office.
She did not want to make him more tired.
“I want to come,” she said.
Ethan kissed her forehead.
“Then you’ll sit beside me.”
After he left, Vanessa removed the yellow ribbons from Sophie’s hair.
“You made him suspicious.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You looked at me.”
Sophie did not understand how looking could be a crime, but Vanessa had many rules that made no sense.
Vanessa took her phone from the counter.
“Go upstairs.”
Sophie moved toward the staircase.
As she reached the hallway, she heard Vanessa speaking.
“She heard me last night.”
A pause.
“No, she doesn’t know enough yet.”
Sophie stopped beside the wall.
Vanessa’s voice dropped.
“The foundation dinner changes nothing. I’ll have access before then.”
Another pause.
Then Vanessa said a name Sophie had never heard.
“Adrian is gone. Stop using him to frighten me.”
Sophie moved closer.
The floor creaked.
Vanessa ended the call.
“Sophie?”
The child ran upstairs.
Behind her, Vanessa followed.
Sophie entered her room and tried to close the door, but Vanessa caught it with one hand.
“Who were you talking to?” Sophie asked before fear could stop her.
Vanessa stared at her.
“No one.”
“You said Adrian.”
For several seconds, Vanessa did not move.
Then she entered the room and closed the door behind her.
“Adrian was my husband.”
Sophie frowned.
“You said he went to heaven.”
Vanessa knelt until their faces were level.
“I said he was gone.”
“Is he dead?”
Vanessa’s smile returned.
“Some people do not have to be dead to disappear.”
She stood and opened Sophie’s wardrobe.
From the back, she removed a black evening dress protected inside a garment bag.
She held it against herself in the mirror.
“I’m wearing this to the foundation dinner.”
Sophie watched her.
Vanessa looked elegant and beautiful.
No one seeing her in that dress would believe what Sophie saw when they were alone.
Vanessa turned from the mirror.
“When your father looks at me, he sees the woman who saved him.”
She placed the dress back inside the wardrobe.
“When he looks at you, he sees the woman he lost.”
Sophie’s eyes filled with tears.
Vanessa leaned close.
“So tell me, little girl. Which one of us do you think he can afford to lose again?”
That afternoon, Sophie drew a picture of her family.
She drew herself beside Ethan.
She drew her mother Claire above them, surrounded by yellow stars.
May you like
At the edge of the page, she drew Vanessa in a black dress.
Behind Vanessa, she drew a man without a face.
