Chapter 2 – The Woman Who Never Stopped Waiting
No one moved.
The crystal chandeliers glittered above them while the silence stretched across the marble floor.
Finally Evelyn broke it.
"Margaret is old. She confuses memories."
Margaret turned sharply.
"No."
Her voice was surprisingly firm.
"I remember every bride who walked through this boutique."
She pointed toward the dress.
"I made that embroidery myself."
Sofia looked down again.
"You made it?"
Margaret nodded.
"For my daughter's wedding."
The room froze.
"My daughter, Eleanor."
She gently traced the golden crest.
"Eleanor Matthews."
Sofia whispered the initials aloud.
"E...M."
Margaret smiled sadly.
"She was pregnant when she vanished."
Evelyn immediately interrupted.
"That's enough."
But Margaret continued anyway.
"Eleanor believed someone wanted her inheritance more than her life."
Sofia felt the blood leave her face.
Inheritance.
The word echoed strangely in her chest.
"My daughter disappeared before the wedding."
Margaret's hands trembled.
"The police searched for months."
"They never found her."
"They told me she probably ran away."
Margaret looked directly at Evelyn.
"I never believed them."
Evelyn's breathing became uneven.
One of her companions quietly whispered,
"We should leave."
But Evelyn couldn't.
She couldn't stop staring at Sofia.
May you like
Because the young woman standing before her had Eleanor's eyes.
The same eyes she had spent twenty years trying to forget.
