Chapter 7
753words
That was all it took for Vicky to steady herself again, even letting a faint, smug smile surface.
My chest rose and fell violently with anger.
This vampire had lived for centuries, yet learned nothing.
Even now, he lacked the courage to admit his own mistakes.
This was the man I had loved for three years.
Vampire loyalty to marriage was nothing but a joke.
Claire spoke before I could.
“Don’t push it too far?” she lashed out.
“You’re the one who refused to save us because of your ignorance. You don’t get to decide what ‘too far’ means anymore.”
She turned to Ethan.
“Didn’t you say divorce meant divorce? What, you are crawling back to me now? You coward.”
Her words hit their mark. Both men were visibly enraged.
Once the documents were signed, Claire and I finally felt relieved.
We didn’t care how they felt anymore. We left with our lawyer without looking back.
We stood outside and breathed in deeply, staring at the sky.
Then we decided to go to a mall for the first time in ages.
We planned to spend some of the assets we had just received, to vent all the bitterness we had swallowed.
Ethan headed straight to the vacation cabin to investigate.
Vicky pretended to be worried and tried to follow him, but Lucien insisted on sending her home.
He said her hand had been burned by the cross and she needed rest.
I sneered inwardly.
I had already noticed the panic and tension in her eyes.
Claire saw my blank expression and thought I was still hurting.
She hurried to comfort me.
“It’s okay. Once they catch the arsonist, the truth will come out. Let’s see how long she can keep pretending.”
Warmth spread through my chest.
I took her hand, and we went to a restaurant near the mall first.
Later, we shopped until our legs ached, then went back home with our hands full of shopping bags.
Lying together on the couch, it felt like we had gone back in time.
After the divorce, everything felt lighter.
Even our bodies seemed to recover faster.
We paused in front of a baby store.
It still hurt, but we were young.
There would be other chances, other people, and someday, children of our own.
Just as we began to relax, the fire department called.
I answered. It was Ethan’s voice.
Claire rolled her eyes and walked into the bedroom.
“The arsonist didn’t leave any traces. The house was completely destroyed. There’s nothing to work with,” he said.
“Do you remember any other details?”
Something immediately felt wrong.
The door had clearly been sealed by vampire magic.
The driver who happened to pass by demanded money before helping.
Claire’s phone and wallet had already burned near the fire.
And I couldn’t access my subcard.
The arsonist fled the scene with terrifying speed.
That couldn't be human.
There were too many coincidences.
The truth was far worse than I had imagined.
“The spell on the door was strange,” I said.
“It locked itself automatically.”
In the past, every door had been enchanted personally by the brothers.
This had never happened before.
Ethan was silent for a moment.
Then he said, “That cabin… my brother and Vicky went there the weekend before you did.
If anything, the spells should have been reinforced.”
Reinforced?
I turned that word over in my mind.
If Lucien had been careless, Vicky could have tampered with the spell herself.
He was never guarded around her.
I replayed the incident again in my head.
The missing driver was suspicious too.
After the incident, Claire and I tried to contact him to compensate for the damage to his car.
But the number he left was fake.
Claire still remembered his license plate and asked me to gave it to Ethan.
A full day passed.
That night, he called me back.
He said the driver wasn’t home.
It looked like he had packed up and left.
That was the last straw.
I shouted into the phone,
“So what if he moved? Follow his identity then! We smashed the front of his car. He demanded money before helping us, and now he disappears without even asking for compensation.”
“ Doesn’t that strike you as suspicious?”
“You’ve worked in the fire department for years. Are you investigating a case, or trying to let the killer walk free? With this many red flags, are you really that blind?”
