Chapter 4 - THE LOCKED BEDROOMMargaret eventually showed Claire Daniel's childhood bedroom.
"Everything is still here," she whispered.
The room smelled faintly of old wood and dust.
A guitar leaned against the wall.
Trophies filled a shelf.
Childhood photographs showed a smiling boy who seemed impossibly far away from the dying man Claire remembered.
Claire touched one photograph.
"Why didn't he ever tell me?"
Margaret looked down.
"Daniel believed he could solve everything himself."
That night, a storm swept across the estate.
Unable to sleep, Claire returned to the bedroom.
She searched through Daniel's old things, desperate to find something that could explain the years she had lost.
Then she noticed something strange.
One floorboard was slightly raised.
She knelt.
Her fingers found the edge.
She pulled.
Beneath it was a small cedar box.
Inside were envelopes.
Dozens of them.
Every envelope had the same name.
Claire.
Her hands began to shake.
She opened the first letter.
"My dearest Claire..."
Her eyes filled instantly.
Daniel's words seemed to bring his voice back from the dead.
He wrote about his illness.
His fear.
His regret.
His love.
Then she reached the final letter.
And stopped breathing.
"I gave these letters to Victoria."
Claire stared at the page.
"She promised to send them to you."
The room seemed to tilt.
Victoria had not forgotten.
She had lied.
For months.
Maybe years.
And suddenly Claire understood.
May you like
Daniel hadn't abandoned her.
Someone had made him believe Claire had abandoned him.
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