“This place smells like overcooked regret,” Leo muttered, stepping over a half-burned couch leg, nudging aside bits of debris with his shoe.
“Less talking, more digging,” Patricia ordered, pulling on gloves. Her face was set with determination, her sharp eyes scanning the wreckage. “We’re finding out what was in those letters.”
Patricia had always been the organized, perfectionist type, the kind of person who made color-coded spreadsheets for grocery lists.
Leo, on the other hand, was more of a wing-it-and-hope-for-the-best kind of guy. But for once, he was just as eager as she was to uncover the mystery.
They worked in silence, shifting through soot, ashes, and broken glass. Minutes turned into an hour.
The sun hung low in the sky, casting long shadows over the blackened ruins.
Leo wiped sweat from his forehead, ready to call it quits, when something hard and metallic caught his eye.
“Wait a second.” He reached down, pulling up a small fireproof lockbox, miraculously intact beneath the wreckage. He grinned, holding it up like a prize. “Found something!”
Patricia rushed to his side. “Open it.”
Leo pried it open with some effort. Inside were dozens of letters, neatly stacked, the edges slightly singed but still readable. Patricia pulled one out, her fingers trembling as she unfolded the paper and read the first line.
Her face drained of color.
Leo frowned. “What? What’s it say?”
Patricia’s voice wavered, barely above a whisper. “To my dearest Richard, the only man I have ever truly loved…”
Leo choked on air. “What the actual—”
Patricia clutched her forehead. “Oh. My. God.”
They stared at each other in stunned silence, realization sinking in like a stone dropped into deep water.
“My dad had a secret lover,” Patricia whispered, her mind racing.
Leo flipped to the last page, scanning the signature. His eyes widened. “Not just any lover.” He turned the letter toward her, pointing at the name.
“The signature says… ‘Forever yours, George.’”
They both screamed. Back at Richard and Lorraine’s house, Patricia stormed into the dining room, her face flushed with anger.
Without hesitation, she slammed the letters onto the table. The impact made the silverware clatter, breaking the quiet tension in the air.
“Explain. NOW.” Her voice was sharp, unwavering.
Lorraine, seated at the head of the table, gasped as she set down her glass. “Oh, dear.”
Her fingers trembled slightly as she reached for the stack of letters. Richard, who had been reading the newspaper, turned unnaturally pale.
The color drained from his face as he stared at the bundle of aged envelopes, as if they were ghosts from his past come back to haunt him.
“Well?” Patricia’s voice cut through the silence.
“We dug through the wreckage. We found the letters. Are you going to tell us the truth, or do we have to read them aloud?”
She held one of the envelopes between her fingers like a loaded gun, ready to fire.
Richard exhaled slowly and pinched the bridge of his nose, his composure slipping.
“So, you found the letters.”
Leo, who had been holding back his frustration, threw his arms up.
“YEAH, WE FOUND THE LETTERS,” he practically yelled. “And let me tell you—what a plot twist!
You’ve been sitting on a freaking soap opera, Richard!” He turned toward Patricia.
“Tell me I’m wrong.”
Patricia didn’t blink. Instead, she pulled out one of the letters, unfolded it, and read the first line out loud.
“To my dearest Richard, the only man I have ever truly loved…”
The words hung in the air like heavy smoke.
“Who is George?”
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