Chapter 8: The Deleted Album

The tape was precise. A perfect square of matte black, sitting like a dead pixel in the corner of the frame. It wasn't a mistake. It wasn't a smudge. Someone had climbed up on a chair and carefully blinded the house's eye.

I switched apps, my thumb hovering over the cloud icon. *Sarah's iPhone.* The name was still there, a ghost in the machine.

But when I tapped the folder, the screen flashed gray.

*Error: Content Unavailable.*

I tried again. *Error.*

I checked the main photo stream. The pictures of Cabo, the woman with the coral lipstick, the convertible—they were gone. Wiped clean, as if they had never existed.

My heart thudded against my ribs. Mark must have seen the sync notification. Or maybe the system had auto-purged unauthorized devices.

I needed proof. I needed something tangible that didn't disappear when the wifi flickered.

I scrolled through the system menu. *Data Management. Backup & Restore. Recently Deleted.*

Empty.

"No," I whispered. "No, no, no."

I tapped frantically, opening random folders. *Music. Contacts. Notes.*

In the *Files* app, nestled under a sub-directory labeled "System Cache," I found a folder named "Recovered_Items_01."

I opened it.

It wasn't the photos. It was a single, corrupted video file and a folder labeled "Deleted."

I tapped the folder.

It contained one image.

I maximized it. It was a selfie, taken from a high angle. The woman—Chloe, or Sarah, or whoever she was—was in the foreground, smiling that same voracious smile. But it was the background that made my stomach drop.

She wasn't on a beach. She was standing in front of a mirror in a room with pale blue wallpaper and white wainscoting.

It was my guest room. The room she was sleeping in right now.

But the wallpaper was wrong. We had painted the guest room sage green when we moved in. The blue wallpaper was from the previous owners. We had stripped it down three months ago.

I stared at the timestamp.

*October 12, 2021.*

Two years ago.

Two years ago, this woman had stood in my house. In my guest room. Before I even knew Mark had a sister.

I zoomed in on the reflection in the mirror behind her.

There was a man standing in the doorway. He was blurred, out of focus, but I knew the set of his shoulders. I knew the way he leaned against the frame, arms crossed.

It was Mark.

And he was wearing a blue shirt I had bought him for our first anniversary.

The date wasn't wrong. The location wasn't wrong.

She hadn't just arrived last week. She had been here before.

I heard the front door open downstairs. The heavy *thud* of the deadbolt sliding home.

"Honey? I forgot my laptop!"

Mark's voice drifted up the stairs, cheerful and mundane.

I scrambled to close the app, my fingers slipping on the glass. I needed to hide the tablet. I shoved it under the mattress, pushing it deep until my fingers brushed the slats.

Footsteps on the stairs. Heavy. Fast.

I lay back, pulling the duvet up to my chin, arranging my face into a mask of pain and exhaustion.

The door opened.

Mark stood there, breathless, his tie slightly askew. He scanned the room, his eyes darting to the nightstand, then to my hands.

"Everything okay?" he asked.

"Fine," I said, my voice raspy. "Just... woke up."

He walked over to the bed. He didn't kiss me. He reached for the nightstand and picked up the water carafe. He swirled the stale water.

"You should drink more," he said.

Then he looked at the nightstand again. He frowned.

"Where's the tablet?"

My heart stopped.

"I don't know," I lied. "You took it last night."

"No," he said slowly. "I left it right here. Next to the water."

He looked at me. Then he looked at the lump under the mattress where the duvet was slightly tented.

"Elara," he said, his voice dropping an octave. "What are you hiding?"