Chapter 1: The Secret Inside My Backpack
“GIVE ME THAT BACKPACK, YOU THIEF!””
Linda’s scream shattered the quiet Sunday afternoon as she grabbed the straps of my backpack and yanked them toward herself.
I stumbled backward, my shoulder striking the living room wall. My fingers tightened around the bag until my knuckles turned white.
“Stop!”” I cried.
“You have no right to take it!””
“Then explain why you stole something that belongs to me!”” Linda snapped.
She dug her manicured nails into the fabric and pulled harder. A framed photograph on the side table rattled, nearly falling to the floor.
That was when my father walked through the front door.
David Mitchell stopped in the doorway, his briefcase hanging from one hand. He looked at Linda, then at me, then at the backpack we were fighting over.
“What on earth is going on here?””
Linda released one strap so quickly that I nearly fell.
“David, thank God you're home.”” She pressed a hand against her chest, breathing as though she'd just escaped an attack.
“Your daughter has been stealing from me.””
My father’s face tightened.
“Stealing what?””
“My jewelry. Some important documents. I found her sneaking around my bedroom, and now she's trying to hide everything in that bag.””
“That isn't true!”” I shouted.
Linda turned toward him with wounded eyes.
“I'm trying so hard to make this family work, David. But your daughter treats me like an enemy. I've been patient for three years, and this is what I get?””
She wiped at the corner of her eye.
There wasn't a tear.
My father set his briefcase down.
“Jasmine, is there something you need to tell me?””
I stared at him.
I was seventeen years old. I had lived in this house since I was born. I knew which floorboard creaked outside his bedroom, which cabinet held the good coffee, and exactly how his face looked when he was trying to decide whether to believe someone.
Right now, he was looking at me as if I were a stranger.
“Dad, she's lying.””
“Then open the backpack,” Linda demanded.
“Let him see for himself.””
I hugged it tighter.
“No.””
Linda gave a short, disbelieving laugh.
“See? If you're innocent, why won't you open it?””
Because the envelope inside could destroy everything she had built.
Because I'd spent the last two nights wondering whether exposing her would destroy my father, too.
And because the last time I'd tried to tell him the truth, Linda had smiled sweetly and convinced him I was having trouble adjusting to our family.
My mother had been dead for four years. I had learned the hard way that grief made adults uncomfortable, especially when it came from a child who refused to smile on command.
Linda had entered our lives eighteen months after Mom died. At first, she brought casseroles, bought me expensive school supplies, and told Dad that I needed a woman in my life.
Then the little things began.
My mother's photographs disappeared from the hallway.
The necklace she'd left me went missing from my dresser.
Linda started opening my mail, checking my phone, and questioning every conversation I had with Dad.
Whenever I protested, she reminded him how much she sacrificed for us.
And whenever he left the room, her smile disappeared.
Three nights ago, I had discovered why.
Now she stood between me and the truth, wearing the same pearl earrings she had worn to my mother's memorial service.
“Jasmine,” Dad said, his voice lower now.
“Give me the bag.””
I shook my head.
“Please, Dad. Just listen to me for one minute.””
“I've been listening to you argue with Linda for months.””
“Because she's been doing things behind your back!””
Linda gasped.
“David, did you hear that? She's accusing me of God knows what because I caught her stealing.””
She reached for the backpack again.
I twisted away.
“Don't touch it!””
“HOW DARE YOU SPEAK TO ME LIKE THAT?”” she screamed.
My father stepped forward.
“Both of you, stop!””
For one hopeful second, I thought he might finally see what was happening.
Then Linda lowered her voice and delivered the sentence she'd used to win every argument since the day she moved in.
“David, I think your daughter needs help. She's been obsessed with your first wife lately. She keeps digging through old things, and now she's imagining conspiracies.””
My stomach dropped.
She was doing it again.
Turning my love for my mother into a weapon against me.
Dad looked exhausted. His eyes moved from Linda's carefully arranged hair to my trembling hands.
“Jasmine, what is in the backpack?””
I swallowed.
“Something Mom left behind.””
Linda's face changed.
Only for a second.
But I saw it.
The color drained from her cheeks, and her fingers curled around the edge of the sofa.
“That's ridiculous,” she whispered.
I looked directly at her.
“You know exactly what I'm talking about.””
She lunged.
“GIVE IT TO ME!””
Dad caught her wrist before she could grab the bag.
“Enough!”” he barked.
“Why are you so afraid of what's inside it?””
The room fell silent.
My heart pounded so violently that I could hear it in my ears.
Slowly, I lowered the backpack to the coffee table and unzipped the front compartment.
Linda took one step backward.
I pulled out a thick, sealed envelope.
My father's name was written across the front in my mother's handwriting.
David Mitchell.
Dad stared at it.
His mouth opened, but no words came out.
“Where did you get that?”” he finally whispered.
“From Mom's old sewing box,” I answered.
“The one Linda told you had been empty since we moved.””
Linda shook her head rapidly.
“David, don't read it. You don't know what she found. That girl has no idea what she's holding.””
My father reached for the envelope.
Linda grabbed his sleeve.
“Please,” she begged.
“You need to trust me.””
He slowly pulled his arm away.
For the first time since I could remember, Linda looked genuinely frightened.
I placed the envelope in my father's hand.
“Dad, you need to read this before she destroys the evidence.””
He turned it over.
There was a second line beneath his name, written in faded blue ink.
If Linda is still living in our home when you read this, it means she has already done what I feared.
Dad's face went white.
He looked at Linda.
Then he looked at me.
And finally, he broke the seal.
The first thing he pulled out was a photograph.
The second was a bank statement.
The third was a handwritten letter that began with six words.
David, your wife is not who…
He stopped reading.
His hands began to shake.
Linda rushed toward him, but he lifted the letter out of her reach.
“Don't,” he warned.
She froze.
Dad looked down at the photograph again, studying the image as though he were seeing it for the first time.
Then he turned toward his wife.
“Linda,” he whispered, “why is my signature on a document dated two months before we met?””
Linda's lips parted.
No answer came.
And that was when I realized something even more terrifying than the truth inside the envelope.
My mother hadn't merely suspected Linda.
She had known something about her long before my father ever fell in love with her.
May you like
Something that had been hidden for years.
And now my father was about to discover that the woman he had married had entered our lives for a reason neither of us had ever imagined.
