But the moment I opened the door, I heard hurried footsteps outside. I dodged back instinctively, and as the door swung open, a gleaming meat cleaver came slicing down at me!
I barely dodged in time by throwing myself backward.
Derek Kane, mouth full of blood, had grabbed the cleaver and was swinging it at me repeatedly.
I wasn't afraid. My mind was ice-cold.
This wasn't the first time I'd dealt with something like this. I just hadn't expected him to have the guts.
I slammed the door shut with everything I had!
Derek Kane's arm was caught in the door frame. He let out a pig-like shriek of agony. I threw my whole body against the door and rammed it several times!
I heard his bones crack. The cleaver clattered to the ground.
He yanked his arm back. When I yanked the door open, he stumbled backward from the momentum and crashed to the floor.
As he fell, a large glass shard embedded itself deep into his neck—leftover from the shattered glass.
He convulsed in agony a few times, then went completely still.
I froze.
I hadn't meant to kill him.
But he was dead.
How...?
Even if I told the police everything, there were no security cameras in my apartment, and his body was covered in marks from what I'd done to him.
The glass shards all bore my fingerprints. I could claim he attacked me with the cleaver, but who would believe me?
Someone might tell me to trust the law. But if the law were trustworthy, why did my husband's life only earn an acquittal?
Bastard!
I sat numbly on the sofa, staring at the wedding photo on the wall, at my husband's face.
I murmured to him, "I've tarnished your name after all."
No...
I told myself I couldn't become a murderer! I couldn't let my child grow up without a mother!
He was so small. I couldn't let him suffer the same childhood I had!
I forced myself to calm down and started cleaning the blood and glass from the floor, trying to figure out what to do with the body.
I was about to finish cleaning and start dealing with the corpse when the doorbell rang.
I jumped, staring at the door.
Who was it?
I didn't dare make a sound. I dragged the body into the bedroom first. Then a voice called out: "Hello, delivery."
I exhaled. It was the food I'd ordered.
I closed the bedroom door, threw on a new jacket, and opened the front door.
But standing outside wasn't just the delivery person—there was also a strange man.
He explained politely that he'd rung the bell earlier but I hadn't answered. He'd assumed I wasn't home, but then ran into the delivery person and figured someone who ordered food had to be home—maybe I'd just stepped out to throw out trash—so he waited.
I casually said I'd been busy, then asked who he was.
He introduced himself as Adrian Cross and handed me a white envelope, saying it was a condolence gift.
Hearing that name nearly stopped my heart!
Adrian Cross—captain of the city's criminal investigation unit. My husband had mentioned him often. Some fires were deliberately set, and when criminal activity was uncovered, the case would be transferred to criminal investigation. My husband used to gush like a starstruck fan, saying there was no criminal Adrian Cross couldn't catch. Whenever he saw case-closure announcements, my husband would say he was proud to have helped someone so great.
I never imagined I'd meet his idol under these circumstances!
I'd just killed Derek Kane, and a criminal investigator showed up at my door!
I accepted the envelope and thanked him. Adrian Cross sat down, stared at the wedding photo on the wall, and sighed, telling me to take care of myself.
I was too nervous to speak. Then he noticed the injuries on my hand and asked how I'd gotten hurt.
I said I'd dropped a glass and cut myself picking up the pieces. That was why I'd taken so long to answer the door.
He glanced at the trash can where glass fragments stained with both my blood and Derek Kane's lay mixed together, and told me to be more careful next time—don't pick up glass with bare hands.
Just then, the baby started crying in the bedroom.
Adrian Cross asked if he could go see the baby.
I immediately said no—the baby was hungry and needed to nurse, it wouldn't be appropriate for him to come in.
He paused, then said he was just looking and would leave soon—he still had work to do.
How could I let him in? Derek Kane's corpse was lying right there in the bedroom!
But Adrian Cross was already on his feet heading for the bedroom. I scrambled after him, asking him to wait—my underwear was out on the bed, I needed to tidy up first.
He quickly apologized, saying he hadn't thought of that, and let me go sort things out first.
I forced myself to calm down and grabbed the door handle.
What do I do... With so little time, where could I hide a body?
The closet was impossible—packed with clothes.
Under the bed wouldn't work either. I'd stuffed so many things under there, there was no room for a corpse!
Nervously, I opened the door—and froze at what I saw.
The floor was empty.
Derek Kane's body, which had been lying there just moments ago, had vanished without a trace!
Not just the body—there wasn't a single drop of blood anywhere on the floor!
I stared blankly, my mind going blank. Mechanically, I gathered the underwear from the bed, then checked the closet, dropped to the floor and peered under the bed.
Nothing.
I went to the balcony and looked down. Everything was normal below.
How was this possible? I lived on the eighth floor!
How had Derek Kane's corpse just disappeared from this apartment?
When I was certain there was no body in the room, I finally opened the door. Adrian Cross came in and gently played with the baby.
Looking at the baby, he asked softly, "What does it feel like to be a mother?"
I said I didn't know.
He spoke gently: "Ethan Cole told me about your past. He was the one who rescued you, right? You've suffered a lot. I understand that losing him is devastating, but I hope you can leave the past behind and embrace the future—for your child's sake."
I nodded and thanked him.
We exchanged phone numbers.
He said being a single mother wasn't easy, and I should reach out if I ever needed help. He and my husband had been like brothers in arms.
I saw him out. After he left, I still couldn't stop thinking about what had happened.
How could such a large body just disappear?
Was Derek Kane still alive?
Impossible—I'd checked to make sure!
I searched the entire apartment and couldn't find him. This baffled me completely.
My in-laws came that evening to pick up the baby. They were worried I was exhausted and took him every weekend to care for him.
After they left, I went to the property management office.
Vanishing body aside, I still had plenty to deal with.
Derek Kane had come to my home—there were cameras in the hallway, the elevator, and at the community entrance.
Once his family reported him missing, the investigation would lead straight to me. Even without a body, I'd be the prime suspect!
Infiltrating the property management office wasn't hard—this was just a residential building, not a bank. The real problem was accessing their computer.
I wasn't a hacker; I couldn't crack their password. The only option was to physically walk out with their hard drive.
Before they closed for the day, I pretended to use their restroom. Once inside, I climbed onto the sink and unlocked the window.
Then I left, waited until after hours, and climbed back in through the window.
Sitting at the computer, ready to dismantle the hard drive, I noticed the power button flickering.
I hesitated, then moved the mouse. The screen lit up.
I let out a long breath—they hadn't even turned off the computer!
The surveillance footage was on the system. I pulled up the playback and scrutinized the community entrance.
Derek Kane had arrived at my building around 6:30 p.m., so he must have entered the community around that time.
I rewound to 6:00 p.m. and watched closely, not daring to miss a frame.
Suddenly!
At precisely 6:15 p.m., the surveillance feed turned to static!
I was stunned. What was going on?
I skipped forward. The feed didn't return to normal until after 8:00 p.m.—by which time Derek Kane's body had already vanished. The cameras had completely failed to capture his entry!
I sat there dumbfounded. The cameras had malfunctioned at the exact critical moment. I didn't even need to steal the hard drive now.
I carefully wiped my fingerprints off the mouse, left through the restroom, and wiped down the window sill too.
Back home, I still couldn't wrap my head around it.
A vanished corpse. Broken surveillance.
It was as if an invisible hand had reached down and erased every piece of evidence for me!
In the dead of night, I lay alone in the apartment.
The smell of diapers lingered. I opened a window to air it out, and a faint scent hit my nose—something sickeningly familiar. The smell of blood, the scent I'd grown up with.
It seemed to seep from the sheets, the pillow, the mattress itself.
No!
I bolted upright and scrambled under the bed.
The space under the bed was crammed with clutter. I pushed myself halfway in, rolled over, and switched on my flashlight.
A blood-soaked nightgown wrapped around a head, revealing half of a pale face. Those glassy, unblinking eyes stared directly into mine.
It was Derek Kane's body.
He'd been strapped to the underside of the bed frame.
My heart hammered—not from fear of the corpse, but from terror at what this meant.
Someone had been in my home, right under my nose, and in that short window of time, they'd fastened his body to my bed frame!
How could I not have noticed? Even setting aside the obvious, driving fasteners into a bed frame should have made noise!
I steadied myself and examined more closely.
He hadn't been nailed up at all.
Zip ties— dozens of them— had been threaded through the gaps in the bed frame slats, securing Derek Kane from head to toe.
That explained why there had been no sound.
But the question remained: who could have done this in such a short time? Was my apartment haunted?
I glanced at the wedding photo, at my husband's face.
Impossible.
I shook my head, trying to stop my imagination from running wild.
Taking a deep breath, I steadied myself, then spun around and shouted into the empty apartment: "Come out!"
No answer.
The silence was so complete I could have heard a pin drop. The living room was dark, an endless black hole.
I swallowed hard. Regardless of how, Derek Kane's corpse was still in my home.
I had to dispose of this body.
What do I do...?
The surveillance cameras were working again. I couldn't just stash him in a giant suitcase and walk out like they do on TV—that would give me away instantly!
While I was strategizing, my phone rang, startling me half to death!
I picked it up—an unknown number. I declined the call.
But the unknown number called right back.
I answered: "Who is this?"
A raspy voice on the other end said: "Derek Kane is under your bed."
My heart lurched!
It felt like an invisible hand had grabbed my heart and was squeezing it tight!
I scanned the room, confirmed I was alone, then whispered: "What are you talking about? I don't understand."
"Don't play dumb now that things have come this far. Don't make this tedious… A body is hard to get rid of, isn't it? Your community has cameras everywhere. A body this size—no matter how you try to carry it out, it'll be noticed. Even if you chopped it into pieces and carted it out in batches, you couldn't finish before the police come knocking."
I took a deep breath. This person really did know everything!