After a brutal carjacking, Jessica unexpectedly gives birth and abandons her child. Years later, divorced and haunted by her past, she takes her daughter back-only to uncover shocking truths about her ex-husband, her brother's deadly secrets, and a murder that changes everything. Love, betrayal, and blood ties collide in a gripping tale.
Chapter 1 The Weight Of The Past
I sat in the restaurant on my laptop screen . The memories I had spent years trying to bury clawed their way back to the surface, refusing to be ignored. My younger brother, Nathan, had died when he was just a few months old. And everyone blamed me.
"Murderer!" Aunt Martha had screamed, pointing a trembling finger at me.
"This girl is cursed!" another neighbor shouted.
I had only been six years old, too young to understand why everyone turned against me. But I remember my mother's face, a mask of grief and rage, as she stood over me.
"You killed him, Jessica! If you hadn't been standing there like a useless fool, your brother would still be alive!" she spat.
My father was no better. He was an alcoholic, a man who saw his children as nothing more than collateral damage in the war between him and my mother. That night, when Nathan died, my mother had come home late again. My father had been waiting. The argument started like every other, but this time, it escalated.
He shoved her. She fought back, grabbing a knife, a fork-anything she could get her hands on. My father's sjambok cracked through the air as he struck her. In the chaos, my mother, desperate to win the fight, grabbed a pot of boiling water.
"You think you're a man?! Let me show you what a real man feels like!" she yelled as she threw the scalding liquid.
But my father moved. And the boiling water landed on Nathan instead. The wails of my baby brother were deafening. Then, in a horrifying moment, my father slipped on the spilled water and fell-right on top of Nathan.
Silence followed. And then, chaos.
My mother turned on me. "You were just standing there! You could have saved him!"
I had only been a child. But from that day forward, I was branded as the murderer. I was the cursed one. The community turned against me. "She's a bad omen," they whispered. "She will bring misfortune wherever she goes."
Those words followed me my whole life. It was why I never wanted children. I feared I would bring them the same fate. I was only a child and l didn't deserve that