Elena POV

I couldn't sleep and the balcony was right there, just outside my bedroom window where Sophia had jumped two years ago.

Every time I closed my eyes, I saw her climbing over that railing and letting go, falling thirty floors to the pavement below, and I didn't even know what she looked like beyond that portrait at Richard's house but my brain was filled in the details anyway. It made her look like me because apparently that's what she did look like and that made everything so much worse.

I pushed the covers off and sat up because lying there wasn't working, wasn't helping, and the silence in the apartment was pressing against my ears until I thought I'd go mad from it.

The hallway was dark when I stepped out and I didn't turn on any lights because I didn't want Adrian knowing I was awake. He'd probably just tell me to go back to bed like I was a child who couldn't handle a little insomnia.

I walked slowly and my bare feet were cold on the floor and I realized I didn't actually know where anything was in this place. Adrian had shown me my room and the kitchen and that was it, no tour, no explanation of what was behind all these other doors.

I passed a door and then another bedroom with furniture covered in white sheets and then what looked like an office with papers scattered across a desk. I kept going because I wasn't tired and I had nothing else to do. Exploring was better than lying in bed thinking about a dead identical wife.

The hallway turned and I followed it, running my hand along the wall to guide me, and my fingers hit a doorframe that felt different from the others with heavier wood.

I stopped and looked closer.

There was a small metal plate near the handle with a name engraved on it.

SOPHIA

My heart started beating faster and I don't know why because it was just a door, just a room, but something about seeing her name there made everything feel more real. She'd lived here and slept here. She had walked these same hallways and then she had died.

I reached for the handle and tried to turn it but it was locked.

I pulled harder but it wouldn't budge and of course it wouldn't because Adrian had locked it for a reason, had locked away everything that reminded him of her, and I was standing here in the dark trying to open a dead woman's room like some kind of idiot.

"Don't."

I jumped and spun around so fast I almost fell.

Adrian was right behind me and I hadn't heard him coming, hadn't heard anything, and he was just there in sweatpants and nothing else with his hair messy like he'd been sleeping but his eyes were wide awake and cold.

"I was just looking around," I said and my voice came out too high. "I couldn't sleep and I didn't know this was-"

"Step away from the door." He said 

"Adrian, I wasn't trying to-"

"Step away from the door, Elena."

I moved back and he came closer, so close I could feel the heat coming off his skin, and he reached past me to touch the wood. Not the handle, Just the door itself. His palm pressed flat against it like he was making sure it was still there, still locked and still keeping whatever was inside hidden.

"This room stays locked," he said and his voice was different now, colder than I'd ever heard it. "Forever. Do you understand?" He asked.

"Why?" I asked. "What's in there?"

"That's not your concern." He retorted.

"I live here now so actually it kind of is my concern and-" I tried to make him understand.

"This room has nothing to do with you." He was still touching the door and his hand was shaking slightly and I realized with a shock that he was scared, actually scared. "You don't go near this door. You don't touch it. You don't ask about it. Are we clear?" Adrain emphasized.

"No, we're not clear because you're acting like there's a body in there or something and-"

"Are we clear, Elena?"

His eyes met mine and there was something in them that made my stomach drop, made all my arguments die in my throat, and I nodded.

"Say it," he said.

"We're clear."

"Good." He stepped back but he didn't leave, just stood there blocking the hallway like he thought I might try to run past him and break down the door. "Go to bed."

"I told you I can't sleep."

"Then lie there and pretend until morning."

"I keep seeing the balcony," I said and I hated how small my voice sounded. "I keep thinking about her jumping and I can't-"

"You'll get used to it." He cut me off.

"How can you say that?" The words came out louder than I meant them to. "She died there, your wife died there, and you just act like it's nothing."

"It was two years ago."

"So what? You just forgot about her? Locked up her room and moved on like she never existed?"

"I didn't forget about her," Adrian said and his jaw was tight. "But I'm not going to spend the rest of my life mourning someone who made her own choice."

"She killed herself because you couldn't love her back."

"She killed herself because she signed a contract she didn't fully understand and then changed the terms without telling me." He ran a hand through his hair. "I told her from the beginning what this was. A business arrangement and nothing more. She agreed and then she fell in love anyway and expected me to do the same."

"And when you didn't she jumped off your balcony." I completed it for him.

"Yes."

The word hung in the air between us and I didn't know what to say to that, didn't know how to respond to someone who could talk about his wife's suicide like it was just another failed business deal.

"Go to bed, Elena," he said again. "And stay away from this door."

He walked away and I heard his bedroom door close, just close quietly like he had perfect control over everything including how much noise he made.

I stood there staring at Sophia's door and the engraved nameplate and I thought about her locked inside, or her things locked inside, or her ghost locked inside, and I wondered what Adrian was so afraid of that he had to keep it sealed away like this.

I reached out and touched the metal plate, traced the letters of her name with my finger.

"What happened to you?" I whispered.

No answer.

I went back to my room and got into bed but I didn't sleep, just lay there staring at the ceiling and listening to the city outside and thinking about locked doors and dead wife and a man who are too scared to face their own past.

The clock on my phone said 3:47 AM when I heard it.

Someone is crying.

Soft at first, so soft I thought maybe I was imagining it or maybe it was coming from outside or maybe I was finally losing my mind. But then it got louder and I sat up because that was definitely crying, someone sobbing like their heart was breaking.

I grabbed my phone and turned on the flashlight and opened my door.

The hallway was dark and the crying was louder out here, clearer, and it was definitely a woman. Not just crying but sobbing, the kind of deep wrenching sobs that came from real pain.

I followed the sound and my heart was pounding because I already knew where it was coming from, already knew what I'd find before I got there.

Sophia's door.

The crying was coming from inside the locked room.

I pressed my ear against the wood and it was right there on the other side, so close, like someone was sitting on the floor just beyond the door crying and crying and crying.

"Hello?" I said.

The crying stopped then complete silence.

Every hair on my body stood up and my hands started shaking because that wasn't normal, wasn't natural, the way it just cut off like that.

"Is someone there?" I asked louder.

Nothing.

I tried the handle even though I knew it was locked and it was, wouldn't turn, wouldn't open, and I pulled harder but it didn't matter because it was sealed tight.

"Sophia?" I whispered.

No answer.

But I'd heard the sound of someone crying and I knew I'd heard it, knew it wasn't pipes or wind or my imagination because that was real crying, present tense, happening right now on the other side of this door.

Someone was in that room or something.

I stepped back and my whole body was shaking now because this wasn't possible, wasn't real, Sophia was dead and dead people didn't cry. Dead people didn't make noise. Dead people stayed buried and they didn't come back.

I should wake Adrian and tell him what I heard but what would I say? That his dead wife was crying in her locked room? He'd think I was insane and maybe I was, maybe grief and stress and everything that had happened in the past few weeks had finally broken something in my brain.

I stood there for a long time just staring at that door and waiting for the crying to start again.

It didn't.

The hallway stayed silent.

Finally I went back to my room and got into bed but I didn't close my eyes, didn't even try to sleep, just lay there staring at the wall and thinking about what I'd heard.

Real crying sounds from inside a locked room where no one should be.

Adrian POV

I heard it at 3:58 AM and at first I thought I was dreaming but there it was, crying sounds coming from down the hall where it shouldn't be coming from because that room had been locked for two years.

I got out of bed and walked toward the sound, my chest getting tighter with each step because this wasn't possible. Sophia was dead and no one had a key to that room except me and Charlotte but Charlotte wouldn't do this, wouldn't come here in the middle of the night to play games.

The crying got louder as I reached her door and I pressed my hand against the wood and felt the sound vibrating through it, and I knew that sound. I'd heard it too many times in the months before she died, that specific kind of sobbing that meant she'd been at it for hours.

"Sophia?" The word came out before I could stop it even though I knew how insane it was to talk to a ghost.

The crying didn't stop.

I pulled out my keys and my hands were shaking which was stupid because I was not meant to shake or get scared, but something about this was wrong. I unlocked the door and pushed it open and turned on the light.

Empty.

The room was completely empty but the crying was still there, louder now, and I followed it to the nightstand where her phone was sitting with the screen glowing.

Voicemail playing on loop.

I picked it up and saw it was the last one she'd left me, the one from the night she died, the one I'd never been able to delete.

Her voice came through the speaker, broken and raw. "Adrian, I can't do this anymore, I can't keep pretending I'm fine when I'm not, and I know you don't love me, I know you never will, but I thought maybe if I tried hard enough you'd see me as something other than a contract."

I stopped the playback and set the phone down because I couldn't listen to the rest, couldn't hear her saying she was done and she was sorry and she couldn't live like this anymore.

Someone had turned it on and that someone had to have been in this room.

I pulled out my phone and opened the security app, scrolling through today's footage starting from this morning. There. 2:15 PM. The door opening.

Charlotte walked into frame carrying something and went into the room, stayed for maybe ten minutes, then came back out and locked the door behind her.

I called her to confirm I was right and she answered on the third ring sounding annoyed. "Adrian? It's four in the morning, what-"

"Why were you in Sophia's room?" I asked her.

Silence and then a sigh. "I was wondering when you'd notice."

"You have a spare key."

"Dad gave it to me years ago." She said.

"That doesn't give you the right to go in there whenever you want."

"Doesn't it?" Her voice had an edge now. "You married another girl, Adrian, another contract bride who looks exactly like Sophia, and you think I'm just supposed to sit back and watch you make the same mistakes?"

"What I do is none of your business." I said to her hoping it sticks.

"It is when you're going to kill this one too."

The words hit like a punch and I closed my eyes, took a breath. "Why did you turn on Sophia's phone?"

"I didn't."

"The security footage shows you in that room and now her phone is playing her last voicemail so don't lie to me, Charlotte."

"I'm not lying." Her voice changed and got quieter. "I went in there to look for something but I didn't touch her phone, it was already on when I got there."

"That's impossible, the battery died two years ago." I said doubting.

"Then someone charged it because it was on and playing that voicemail and honestly it was one of the most horrible things I've ever heard, her begging you to love her while you just ignored-"

"I know what she said." I cut her off.

"Do you? Because it doesn't seem like you learned anything from it."

"What did you go in there to find?" I asked her to change the topic.

Charlotte was quiet for a moment and I heard her moving around, probably pacing because she always paced when she was upset. "Sophia left a letter for whoever you marry next and I found it in her desk drawer."

My chest tightened. "What does it say?"

"I don't know, I haven't read it, but the envelope says 'To be given to Adrian's next wife' so I'm guessing it's for Elena."

"Don't give it to her." I said

"Why not? It's addressed to her." Charlotte replied me.

"Because whatever Sophia wrote isn't going to help anything, it's just going to make things worse and you know it." I tried explaining to her.

"Maybe Elena deserves to know what she's getting into." Charlotte said stubbornly.

"She already knows, we have a contract, everything is spelled out."

"Does she know you picked her because she looks like Sophia? Does she know what happened to the last girl who fell in love with you?"

"Elena isn't going to fall in love with me." I said, trying to convince myself.

"That's what you said about Sophia and look how that turned out." Charlotte took a breath. "I'm giving Elena that letter tomorrow at noon and you can either be there or not but it's happening either way."

"Charlotte, don't do this."

"It's already done and you can't stop me because I don't work for you and I don't answer to you." Her voice got harder. "Sophia deserves to have her voice heard even if she's not here anymore." She completed angrily.

"She made her choice." I replied to her because that is the truth.

"She made a choice based on the pain you caused and refused to acknowledge, there's a difference."

I didn't have an answer for that because she was right and we both knew it.

"I'll be there at noon," Charlotte said. "And Adrian? You should read that letter before Elena does because Sophia was a lot angrier than you think and a lot smarter than you gave her credit for. Whatever she wrote in there, it's not pretty."

She hung up.

I stood in Sophia's room looking around at all her things I'd locked away because I couldn't deal with them, couldn't face what I'd done, and now Charlotte was going to hand Elena a letter that would probably destroy whatever trust we'd built.

I walked to the desk and pulled open the top drawer and there it was, a blue envelope with Sophia's handwriting on the front.

"To whoever he marries next. I'm sorry."

I picked it up and it was heavier than expected, multiple pages probably, and the seal was still intact which meant Charlotte really hadn't read it.

I should open it now and should know what Elena was going to see tomorrow, but my hands were shaking and I couldn't make myself break that seal because whatever Sophia had written was going to change everything.

I put the letter back and closed the drawer and left the room, locking the door behind me.

Tomorrow Charlotte would give Elena this letter and Elena would read whatever Sophia had written and then she'd leave, would tear up our contract and walk away, and I'd lose everything because I kept making the same mistakes.

I went back to my room but didn't sleep, just sat there holding Sophia's phone and thinking about her last voicemail and the letter waiting in that desk and the girl down the hall who looked exactly like her.

History was about to repeat itself and I had no idea how to stop it.

Elena POV

I woke up to knocking sounds on my bedroom door and for a second I forgot where I was, thought maybe I was back in my old flat, but then I remembered and everything came crashing back.

"Elena." Adrian's voice came through the door. "Get dressed and come out."

I sat up and rubbed my eyes, my whole body aching from lying awake all night thinking about the crying sound I'd heard. "Why?" I asked him.

"Just do it."

His footsteps walked away and I dragged myself out of bed, pulled on jeans and a jumper, tried to make my hair look decent even though I felt like death. When I opened my door, Adrian was standing in the hallway outside Sophia's room with a key in his hand.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"Opening it." He put the key in the lock. "You wanted to see what's inside so I'm showing you."

"But last night you said-"

"Last night was last night and this morning my sister is coming over to give you something Sophia left and I'd rather you see the room first." He turned the key and I heard the lock click. "So come here."

I walked over slowly because this felt wrong, felt like a trap, but he just stood there waiting.

"Whatever you see in here," he said, "remember that Sophia made her own choices."

"What does that mean?" I asked.

He pushed the door open without answering.

The room looked frozen in time and it made my skin crawl. Blue walls, white furniture, windows looking out over the city. Clothes still hanging in the closet like she was planning to wear them tomorrow. Books lined up on the shelf, romance novels with worn spines. Makeup arranged neatly on the vanity.

"It's like a shrine," I said.

"I couldn't get rid of anything." Adrian's voice was flat. "After she died, I locked the door and left it."

"For two years?"

"Yes."

I stepped inside and the room smelled like perfume, something sweet and floral, and there were photos on the walls of her smiling and in every single one she looked exactly like me. Same face, same eyes, same everything.

"She was beautiful," I said.

"Yes."

"Did you love her?"

"No."

The answer came so fast it made me flinch. "Not even a little?"

"I cared about her but I didn't love her, not the way she wanted." Adrian stayed in the doorway like he couldn't make himself come inside. "She knew that."

"But she hoped you'd change." I told him.

"Yes."

I looked at the bed and saw an envelope sitting on the blue comforter, white and new-looking like someone had just put it there. "What's that?"

"The letter Charlotte found yesterday." Adrian's jaw tightened. "I haven't read it."

"Why not?" I asked him.

"Because I don't need to."

I picked up the envelope and turned it over, saw writing on the front in neat careful handwriting. "To whoever he traps next."

My stomach dropped. "She knew you'd do this again."

"Apparently." Adrain replied nonchalantly.

"And you're going to let me read it?"

"Charlotte's coming in an hour to give it to you anyway so you might as well read it now." He crossed his arms. "But Sophia was depressed when she wrote it, she wasn't thinking clearly."

"Or maybe she was thinking more clearly than ever." I retorted.

He didn't respond.

I opened the envelope with shaking hands and pulled out two pages of that same neat handwriting and started reading.

"If you're reading this, it means Adrian found someone else to sign his contract and it means you look like me because he won't be able to help himself. He'll pick someone with my face because he thinks he can fix what happened if he tries again with a different version of the same girl.

He can't.

I'm writing this because I want whoever comes after me to know the truth. Adrian Blackwell is incapable of love. Not because he's damaged or afraid. He's incapable of it because he doesn't want to love anyone. He's chosen business and money and control over every human connection and he'll choose those things over you too.

If you're reading this, run. Leave. Break the contract and deal with the consequences because I promise they're better than staying.

He destroyed me slowly over two years, made me invisible in my own home, looked through me like I was furniture, and when I tried to tell him I was hurting he said I signed a contract and I knew what I was getting into. Maybe I did. But I didn't know it would break me.

If you won't run, if you're staying because you need the money or have nowhere else to go or think you can change him, then at least protect yourself. Destroy him before he destroys you. Everything you need is in the diary."

The letter ended with her signature and I stood there staring at it because this girl had been so desperate she'd written instructions for her replacement before killing herself.

"What does it say?" Adrian asked.

I folded the letter back up because I couldn't look at those words anymore. "She told me to run, said you'd destroy me the same way you destroyed her, and if I wouldn't run then I should destroy you first."

His face didn't change. "And are you going to run?"

"I don't know." I looked around at all her things frozen in place. "She mentioned a diary and said everything I need to know is in it."

"There's no diary." He said to me.

"She said there was."

"Then she was confused because I've been through this room and there's no diary." He answered back.

I looked at the nightstand next to the bed and saw a small leather-bound book sitting there with no title. I walked over and picked it up and Adrian made a noise like he was going to stop me but I opened it anyway.

The first page had Sophia's name and a date from three years ago and the pages were filled with her handwriting, paragraphs of tiny neat words.

"This is her diary," I said.

"That's not-" Adrian stopped. "I thought that was a work journal."

"It's her diary." I flipped through and saw they were all dated, all personal entries about her life and thoughts. I turned to the last entry and my blood went cold when I saw the date.

The day before she died.

"What does it say?" Adrian's voice was tight.

I read the words and my hands started shaking because this changed everything. "She was pregnant."

Adrian went completely still. "What?"

"She was pregnant." I held up the diary so he could see. "It says it right here."

"That's not possible."

"It's written in her handwriting, Adrian, it's right here in her diary."

"She never told me." He said, voice filled with shock.

"Maybe she was going to that night." I looked back at the entry. "This is from the day before she died."

"Let me see that." He held out his hand.

I walked over and gave him the diary and he read it himself, his face going pale.

"Read it out loud," I said. "I want to hear you say it."

His voice came out rough. "I'm pregnant. Twins. His twins. If this doesn't make him love me, nothing will. And if nothing will, then I'll make sure he never forgets me."