OPHELIA: Chapter 40
Blurb
Elizabeth Lockwick wants one thing… to ensure Ophelia remains dead.
For years she’s weaved a life seen through rose-coloured glasses in idyllic Vermont with her husband Sebastian Lockwick, an alluring man with a broken moral compass, whose intent lies in protecting his wife. However, apart from her unorthodox understanding of Sebastian’s dark and gritty hidden nature, she finds herself slipping away from her sanity in maintaining this picturesque life.
After receiving a gruesome gift from an unknown sender threatening to expose her, she finds herself haunted and possibly hunted by her buried past.
In order to make things right for herself and ensure that her secret is hidden, she reluctantly travels back to her sleepy small hometown in Wisconsin. A town where young girls seem to be mysteriously disappearing. There, she reunites with the dysfunctional Pierre-Louis’, a French-American family who sheltered her in their manor in her time of need.
With time slipping away, she struggles with her guilt and a dangerous affair and realizes that perhaps Ophelia wasn’t dead after all these years.
Elizabeth suddenly finds herself caught in a game of cat and mouse, unsure of which she really is this time and who she can trust.
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Chapter 40
Ophelia rushed through the doors of the manor, with her heart dragging on the floor. She stopped at the hall where the bloodied girl was sitting surrounded by the Pierre- Louis family.
“Elizabeth?” Sally suddenly stood to face her friend.
Ophelia ran to collect the girl in in embrace. “Sally, what happened?” She asked in a shaky voice. “Who did this to you?”
“Ophelia,” Florence suddenly spoke coldly, “Why is the girl addressing you as Elizabeth.”
Sally slightly pulled away from her friend in confusion, “Ophelia?”
Stefan interjected to address Florence, “Mother, the girl needs to rest. Have someone arrange a room for her.”
“I’ll call the doctor again and see where he’s at.” Rosie said whilst walking out the room.
Stefan’s father hadn’t been here. Elaine stood watching at the staircase whilst Diane sat at the sofa afar, unbothered. Her words were as cold as the blood running through her veins, “Get the bloody thing out of my sight.”
Stefan frowned at his grandmother’s words. He was about to say something but Ophelia shook her head slightly to prevent him from making the matter even more worse. “Go up ahead with her,” he said sympathetically.
Sally sat at the edge of the bed in a deep memory.
Ophelia tried to smile but it came out as a sort of broken smile. “The doctor said you’ll be fine with a lot of rest and hydration.” She tried to assure her, “The baby’s fine.”
“Frank isn’t,” she spoke solemnly.
“What?”
“You’re not who I think you are, are you?” She suddenly said.
The question took Ophelia back. Sally was right. She wasn’t honest with her. Guilt flushed within her blood. Shame licked at her bones. She lowered her eyes, she couldn’t look up at her. she couldn’t face the innocent girl who she seemed to have put in danger. “I’m sorry,” Ophelia whispered.
“This house was the one in the painting,” Sally observed.
“Sally,” Ophelia tried to bring her to her sense, “What happened to Frank?”
Sally’s eyes quickly locked onto hers. A flush of fear washed across them. Her voice lowered, almost inaudible, “That wasn’t my blood on my clothes. That was Frank’s.” She paused and allowed Ophelia to sit on the edge of the bed near her. Ophelia placed a hand over her friend’s, as a deep sense of shock travelled through her body. “He’s alive,” Sally quickly stated, “He’s alive and he will be fine.” She struggled with the last part. “He’s in the hospital, recovering.”
“Sal,” Ophelia spoke softly, “Tell me exactly what happened. I can help you, I promise I can try to make this better for you at least. I’ll tell you everything. Anything.” A tear fell down Ophelia’s cheek. She had meant every word she said to the girl.
Stefan suddenly knocked on the door with a tray of tea, “Rosie sent this for her.” They both looked up at him. He noticed Ophelia’s tired face. He hadn’t seen her look this way since the death of her parents. It was as if the girl inside was finally cracking open and suffocating on her misery. It made him uneasy. Unsettled. Hurt. It hurt him to see her that way.
Quickly, Ophelia’s pulled her sniffle in and tried to smile at him and back at Sally. “Rosie’s homemade tea was the closest to magic we could have ever gotten.” She stopped and stood awkwardly, almost losing her balance when Stefan steadied her.
“You have a fever,” he frowned whilst noticing how hot her skin was.
She ignored his statement and turned her attention to focus on Sally. “I never introduced you.”
“Stefan Pierre Louis,” he held out his hand for her to shake, after placing the tray down.
“Your name,” Sally slowed, “It sounds familiar.”
He looked at her curiously, a bit perplexed. He hadn’t known this woman. Ophelia spoke in a gentle tone whilst sitting back down on the bed. “Because you bought a painting of his.”
“Oh yes,” Sally sat up a little straighter, “The artist. The one with the dreadful looking woman.” She paused, realizing that the woman was someone she had seen just downstairs a little while ago when she arrived here in a panicked state.
Ophelia bit back her smile from the girl’s words.
“Yes,” Stefan answered, “My mother is quite dreadful not only in looks I can assure you.”
“I’m sorry,” she quickly fumbled.
He smiled, warmly at the girl whilst taking a seat near the window. “There’s no need to apologize. Would you allow me to stay a little?”
Sally nodded. There was a certain warmness about this man that gave her comfort- that seemed to also give her friend as well comfort. She turned to Ophelia with a curious look, “If you’re not Elizabeth Lockwick then, who are you?”
Ophelia turned and looked out the window, away from their gazes, afraid of the judgement and scorn Sally might return her with. “Someone I tried to erase.” She lowered her eyes as she said that, “But I could never erase her, not matter what I did. My past haunted me too much. I hated who I was- who I am. Ophelia- Lucian. Except, the Lucien in me feels dead. It’s all just letters put together though, changing your name doesn’t change who you are. It changes how others might see you but it never changes how you feel on the inside. It’s like I’m swimming in my own shit of pain and consequences. And, it doesn’t change what I did.”
“Lily,” Stefan spoke, bringing her eyes towards him.
A sadness swept across them as she spoke, “Most importantly, I hated what I left behind. What I walked away from.” She quickly turned her attention away from him and gathered her thoughts from straying too far to parts of herself she kept locked away. “Sebastian isn’t my husband. I’m not even married to him,” she scoffed in a bitter laugh, disgusted almost with herself. “It was a façade I maintained. I did it to keep myself save. I guess I was trying to survive. He needed help at the time and I did too, so it felt convenient.”
“I had no idea. All this time… I thought you were so in love.”
“Love?” Ophelia scoffed in a laugh, “That’s not love, Sally.”
Stefan sat and silently soaked in her words. This was the first time he was hearing her speak about her life after this place in such a vulnerable manner. He could have told how much she trusted Sally. How much this simple innocent stranger meant to her and probably what tormented her the most. This girl fell into their disastrous world.
“I’m sorry,” she apologized, “I’m sorry this had to happen because of me. It shouldn’t have.”
“It’s not your fault, Ophelia,” she said using her friend’s real name.
“Maybe it is.”
“Don’t say that.”
“Sally,” Stefan interjected with furrowed eyebrows, leaning back in concern, “Tell us what happened that got you here.”
With a deep sigh, Sally closed her eyes and remember the incident which took place. “It’s like a nightmare,” she began, “Frank’s last client had left and I went to the pharmacy to pick up a few items. When I returned, the house was a mess. I don’t even think I was out that long, maybe thirty minutes for the most. And,” she paused again, “There he was, stabbed in his left shoulder, bleeding on the floor.”
“I don’t understand,” Stefan frowned, “Why would someone attack your husband?”
“I don’t know, he kept saying Ophelia- Ophelia-. I didn’t know who that was at the time. He then said the name Elizabeth and neighbours.” She turned to Ophelia confused, “Frank said that the man said that he’ll kill you for killing Dean. I didn’t know what to do and I knew frank needed help so I drove him straight to the hospital and made the report.”
Ophelia scowled, perplexed by what she was hearing. She didn’t know a Dean. This was very odd. “Sally, I don’t know a Dean.”
The girl breathed heavily and looked up at the ceiling with teary eyes, “I was so scared and confused. I didn’t understand anything that was happening. I thought the police would have thought I tried to kill my husband. It’s a stupid thing to run, I just panicked. God, I’m so stupid.”
“You were scared and that’s understandable,” Ophelia tried to reassure her. “Did Frank describe to you the person who attacked him?”
“Well, when I thought about the attacker mentioning your name I thought maybe they attacked Frank because they wanted to steal something in that box you gave me to hold onto for you. The investigators didn’t reach to my house yet so I looked at the home camera and…”
“What did you see?” Stefan asked.
“It was- that man.” She turned to Ophelia, “The one that came to your house with his wife. I used to see them going in and out. Even just a few days ago.”
Ophelia paused for a minute to soak in this information. This wasn’t possible. “Christopher?”
“I’m not sure what his name was but he was tallish, fair, wore a khaki-coloured pants, had that slight curly hair from what I could have seen on the footage.” The description had fit him perfectly. “I didn’t want to tamper with any more evidence so I rushed out with the chest you gave me. I had to tell you, I had to warn you that you were in danger. Yet, part of me knew I was running because I was scared.”
Ophelia looked at Stefan in concern and worry.
Why did her ex, Christopher Cane, attack Frank in such a manner?
Who was Dean?
**
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