"Check under the bed." The words glowed on Isla's phone screen like a warning.
"Don't," Damien said, grabbing her arm as she moved toward the massive bed.
Isla pulled away. "We need to know what we're dealing with."
Her heart pounded as she got down on her knees and lifted the hanging edge of the comforter. At first, she saw nothing in the darkness beneath the bed. Then her eyes adjusted.
A small wooden box sat against the wall. Isla reached for it, her fingers trembling.
"Be careful," Damien warned, crouching beside her.
The box was old, its wood smooth from years of handling. A tiny golden lock held it shut, but the key was missing.
"I've never seen this before," Damien said, taking the box from her.
"Can you open it?"
He examined the lock. "I need something thin and strong."
Isla pulled a bobby pin from her hair and handed it to him. With expert movements that surprised her, Damien picked the lock in seconds.
"Where did you learn to do that?" she asked.
A shadow crossed his face. "My father locked away my mother's things after she died. I wanted something to remember her by."
The vulnerability in his voice made Isla see him differently for a moment. Not as the cold businessman, but as someone who had also lost family.
Damien opened the box carefully. Inside lay a child's drawing, faded with age. It showed two stick figures—a boy and a girl—holding hands in front of what looked like a tree house. At the bottom, in childish handwriting, were the words: "Damien and Isla forever."
"That's impossible," Isla whispered, staring at her own name. "I never knew you as a child."
Damien's face had gone pale. "This is my handwriting from when I was a kid."
"But that's... we couldn't have..."
"Someone's playing games with us," he said firmly, putting the drawing back in the box. "Creating fake evidence."
"It looks really old," Isla argued. "And why would my brother mention my mother? She died when I was five."
Before Damien could answer, Martin knocked on the open door. "Sir, security has searched the grounds. There's no sign of the intruder."
"Increase patrols tonight," Damien ordered. "And I want to know how he got past our system."
After Martin left, Damien locked the bedroom door. "Try to get some sleep. I'll keep watch."
But sleep seemed impossible with everything spinning in Isla's mind. The fake videos. The pregnancy threats. Her mysterious brother. And now a drawing suggesting she and Damien had known each other as children.
Eventually, exhaustion won. As she drifted off, the wooden box clutched to her chest, Isla fell into a dream unlike any she'd had before.
She was running through woods, laughing. The summer air smelled like pine and adventure. Ahead of her, a boy with dark hair climbed the ladder to a tree house.
"Come on, Isla! I'll show you the secret room!"
The boy turned, and though his face was blurry, something about him felt so familiar it made her heart ache.
"Wait for me!" Dream-Isla called, her voice younger, higher.
The scene shifted. Now they were sitting on the edge of a dock, feet dangling in cool lake water. The boy handed her an ice cream cone.
"When we grow up," he said seriously, "we should get married."
"Why?" Dream-Isla asked, licking her ice cream.
"Because then we can be together forever," he said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "And no one can separate us."
The boy's face started to come into focus—dark eyes, a small scar above his eyebrow—when suddenly a woman's voice shattered the moment.
"Isla! Get away from him!"
The scene dissolved into chaos. Someone grabbed her arm, dragging her away. The boy reached for her, screaming her name. A gunshot echoed through the trees.
"Forget him," a man's voice commanded. "You must forget him..."
Isla woke with a gasp, her heart racing. Sunlight streamed through the windows. Damien stood by the bed, concern etched on his face.
"You were crying in your sleep," he said. "And saying my name."
Isla touched her cheeks, finding them wet. The dream felt more vivid than any she'd ever had—not like a dream at all, but a memory.
"I dreamed about a boy," she whispered. "We were at a lake, in a tree house. He had a scar..." Her eyes locked on Damien's forehead, where a faint line marked his skin above his right eyebrow.
Damien's hand moved automatically to the mark. "I got this when I was eight. Fell out of a tree house at my family's lake property."
A chill ran through Isla. "In my dream, someone pulled me away from the boy. There was a gunshot."
"Isla," Damien said carefully, sitting on the edge of the bed. "My mother was shot at our lake house when I was eight. I witnessed it. After that, I was sent to boarding school overseas."
"That's just a coincidence," Isla insisted, but doubt crept into her voice. "We never met as children."
"I don't remember much from that summer," Damien admitted. "The therapists said I blocked it out because of the trauma."
Before they could discuss it further, Isla's phone rang. It was Serena.
"Isla! Thank God you're okay. Julian's awake. He's asking for you."
"How is he?" Isla asked, relief flooding her.
"Better, but..." Serena's voice dropped. "He says he knows the truth about you and Damien. About what happened when you were children."
Isla's eyes met Damien's. "We'll be right there."
As she hung up, Damien's phone buzzed with a text. His face darkened as he read it.
"What is it?" Isla asked.
He showed her the screen:
Don't go to the hospital. They're waiting for you. The boy in Isla's dreams is the key to everything. Ask her about the locket.
"What locket?" Damien asked.
Isla's hand went to her throat, feeling for something that wasn't there. The gesture was automatic, like a habit she didn't know she had.
"I don't have a locket," she said, confused by her own reaction.
Damien walked to his closet and returned with a small safe. He entered a code and opened it, removing a velvet pouch.
"This was found in my penthouse the morning after our supposed wedding," he explained, tipping the contents into his palm.
A delicate gold locket gleamed in the sunlight. Isla gasped, reaching for it with trembling fingers. The necklace felt right in her hand, familiar in a way she couldn't explain.
"Open it," Damien urged.
Inside was a tiny photograph—a little boy with dark eyes and a familiar scar, his arm around a small girl with Isla's honey-colored hair. On the opposite side, engraved in flowing script, were the words: "Remember the promise."
"That's us," Isla whispered, stunned. "But how?"
A noise from the hallway made them both jump. Footsteps approached their door, then stopped. Something slid under the crack—a yellowed newspaper clipping.
Damien grabbed it, his face going pale as he read the headline:
TRAGEDY AT CALLOWAY LAKE HOUSE: WIFE KILLED, SON TRAUMATIZED
Below was a photo of police cars surrounding a familiar lake house from Isla's dream. In the background, barely visible, was a small girl being led away by a man in a suit. The caption identified him as Richard Bennett—Isla's father.
"My father was there when your mother was killed?" Isla's voice shook.
"Apparently we both were," Damien said grimly.
A knock at the door made them freeze. Martin's voice came through the wood.
"Sir, there's a Ms. Celeste Donovan here to see you. She says it's urgent—about Mrs. Calloway's dreams."
Isla and Damien stared at each other.
"How could she know about my dreams?" Isla whispered.
"Because she gave them to you," came a woman's voice from the other side of the door. "I can help you remember everything—about the boy, the lake house, and why they made you forget."
As Damien moved to open the door, Isla noticed something she hadn't seen before: a tiny camera blinking in the corner of the ceiling.
Someone had been watching her sleep all night.
And someone had been directing her dreams.