I leave the clinic in a daze.
Dr. Harrison's final words are on a loop in my head.
Sarah Jenkins didn't commit suicide.
It's a bomb.
A clean, perfectly placed narrative bomb that detonates the entire foundation of Theo's story.
Of his trauma.
Of my understanding of him.
The drive back to the house on the cliff is an exercise in dissociation.
I am floating above my own body.
Watching myself navigate the winding coastal roads.
Watching my hands grip the steering wheel.
My therapist brain is screaming at me.
He's manipulating you, Elara.
This is a classic triangulation tactic.
He's positioning himself as the holder of secret knowledge to gain your trust and turn you against Theo.
But another part of me, a smaller, more fearful part, is whispering.
What if he's telling the truth?
What if Theo Raine, my volatile, chaotic, fake husband… is something far worse than I ever imagined?
By the time I pull into the driveway, my anxiety is a living thing.
A frantic bird beating its wings against my ribs.
I have to talk to him.
I have to know.
But how do you ask a man if the great tragedy of his life was a lie?
How do you do that without sounding like you're putting him on trial?
Clause 2d: Party A will not, under any circumstances, attempt to analyze, diagnose, or treat Party B.
This isn't therapy.
This is a criminal investigation where I am a suspect, a victim, and now, a potential detective.
The rules no longer apply.
I find him in the living room.
He's standing in front of the wall of glass, staring out at the ocean.
His posture is rigid.
The silence in the room is heavy with the weight of the blackmail note.
He knows I'm there, but he doesn't turn.
"You were gone a long time," he says, his voice flat.
"I ran into someone," I say, my voice carefully neutral.
I walk further into the room.
"An old mentor of mine from the university. Dr. Harrison."
I watch his back for any reaction to the name.
Nothing.
Not a flinch.
"He said he was worried about me," I continue, treading carefully. "About the news."
"The whole world is worried about you, Elara," he says, a bitter edge to his voice. "I'm getting emails from shareholders I haven't spoken to in years, asking about my 'psychological stability.'"
"He said he knew you, Theo."
That gets his attention.
He turns slowly, his eyes narrowed.
"He knew you through Sarah."
Still nothing. His face is a perfect, unreadable mask.
"He told me he was her therapist."
The mask cracks.
Just for a second.
A flicker of surprise.
Of something dark and unreadable.
"He said what?"
"He was Sarah's therapist," I repeat. "He said he was treating her right up until she died."
Theo just stares at me.
The silence stretches, thick with unspoken questions.
I have to push.
I have to know.
"He also said…" I hesitate, my throat suddenly dry. "He said that there was more to the story. About her death."
The explosion is instantaneous.
And terrifying.
"And you believed him?" he roars, his voice bouncing off the glass walls.
He takes a step toward me, his body vibrating with a sudden, violent anger.
"A complete stranger tells you some cryptic bullshit, and you immediately believe him over me?"
"I didn't say I believed him!" I shoot back, taking a step back. "I'm telling you what he said! This is part of the investigation, Theo! He's a piece of the puzzle!"
"Or he's the one playing the game!" he yells. "Did that ever occur to your brilliant, analytical mind? That maybe he's the one who drugged us? Who sent the note?"
"Yes, it occurred to me! That's why I'm trying to get the facts!"
"No, you're not!" he accuses, pointing a finger at me. "You're doing it again! You're putting me under your microscope! You're looking at me like I'm a case study, a puzzle for you to solve. We have a contract, Elara! Or did you forget that part?"
"Our contract didn't account for potential murder accusations!" I yell, my own control finally snapping.
"So that's what this is," he says, his voice dropping to a dangerous, low snarl. "You think I killed her."
"I didn't say that!"
"You didn't have to! It's written all over your face! The clinical judgment, the suspicion! You can't turn it off, can you, Doc? You can't just be a person in a room. You always have to be the therapist."
"And you always have to be the patient!" I fire back, the words tasting like poison. "The brooding, tragic hero with a dark past, blowing up every life you touch because you can't handle your own chaos! You live in a goddamn shrine to a dead woman, Theo! You haven't moved on, you've just built a prettier cage for your grief!"
The words hang in the air, ugly and true.
He flinches as if I've physically struck him.
The anger drains from his face, replaced by a look of raw, naked pain.
I've gone too far.
I've used my clinical insight as a weapon.
And I've hit him right where he's most vulnerable.
He just stares at me for a long, silent moment.
"You're right," he says, his voice chillingly quiet.
"This was a mistake."
He turns, grabs a set of keys from a bowl by the door, and walks out.
He doesn't slam the door.
He just closes it quietly behind him.
The silence he leaves behind is worse than the yelling.
It's the silence of a catastrophic, irreparable breach.
I'm left shaking in the middle of the vast, empty room.
I sink onto the sofa, my body trembling with adrenaline and regret.
I shouldn't have said that.
It was cruel.
It was a low blow.
But it was also true.
An hour passes.
Then two.
The sun begins to set, painting the sky in fiery colors that I'm too numb to appreciate.
He doesn't come back.
My phone buzzes on the coffee table.
A news alert.
My heart seizes.
I pick it up with a shaking hand.
The source is TMZ.
The headline is a gut punch.
JUST DAYS AFTER SHOCK VEGAS WEDDING, A TROUBLED-LOOKING THEO RAINE SPOTTED IN HEATED CONVERSATION WITH MYSTERY BRUNETTE.
Below the headline is a photo.
It's him.
He's outside a dark, smoky-looking bar.
He looks furious.
Devastated.
And he's leaning in close to a woman.
A beautiful woman with long, dark hair who has her hand on his arm.
They are paparazzi shots.
Grainy.
Invasive.
Proof that he did exactly what I knew he would do.
He ran straight into a self-destructive spiral.
And he took our fragile, fake narrative down with him.
That's it.
I can't do this.
I can't tie my professional survival to a man who is a human time bomb.
I can't save my dream by shackling myself to his nightmare.
I stand up, my decision made.
It's over.
I'm breaking the contract.
I'm done.
I march into my room, my prison cell, and yank my suitcase from the enormous walk-in closet.
I throw it on the bed and unzip it with a single, angry motion.
I start grabbing my clothes, my toiletries, the sad little pieces of my life I brought into this mausoleum.
I'm leaving.
I'll call Maya.
I'll go to a hotel.
I will face the medical board and I will tell them the truth.
All of it.
I would rather have my career burned to the ground with integrity than saved by a lie that is already falling apart.
My suitcase is open on the bed.
I go back to the closet for the last of my things.
As I reach for my blazer, my hand brushes against the wall at the back of the closet.
It feels… strange.
Not solid, like the rest of the walls.
There's a slight give to it.
A seam I didn't notice before.
My curiosity, a detached, clinical thing, overrides my anger.
I press my hand against it.
Gently at first.
Then harder.
There's a soft click.
And a section of the wall swings inward, into darkness.
My breath catches in my throat.
It's not a safe.
It's a door.
A hidden door.
My plans to leave, my anger, my resignation… it all evaporates.
Replaced by a single, overwhelming question.
What is he hiding?
I stare into the dark, secret space.
And I know, with a terrifying certainty, that I can't leave.
Not yet.