Selma froze when his phone vibrated at exactly 2:17 a.m. The apartment was silent, with only the soft tapping of rain against the windows breaking the stillness. Outside, the city had finally surrendered to the darkness of the night. He had been sitting alone in the living room for nearly an hour, staring at the blank page the woman had handed him at the cafe earlier that day.The paper still lay on the coffee table, untouched, as if it was silently mocking him every time he looked at it. The words the woman had written echoed in his mind.“Write one thing you feel each day.”Before he could look away, his phone vibrated again, Selma frowned. Almost nobody contacted him at this hour.Reaching for the device, he glanced at the screen. The moment it lit up, his pulse slowed and then seemed to stop altogether.Unknown Number and there was only one message.“I knew your father.”Selma's fingers tightened around the phone. Suddenly, the room felt smaller and the air heavier. His eyes rema

Selma's pulse hammered against his ribs as the man stepped through the cafe door, the room fell unnaturally silent. Even the elderly couple near the window stopped talking and turned to look. Gabriel froze in his seat, every trace of color draining from his face. Coffee dripped from the edge of the shattered cup onto the floor, but neither man seemed to notice. The stranger calmly closed the umbrella in his hand, the deliberate movement felt unsettling. Rainwater slid from his dark coat and pooled on the floor tiles as he stood there, watching them.His eyes swept across the room once before stopping directly on Gabriel. A faint smile touched his lips, it wasn't friendly or warm but rather it was the kind of smile that made people uncomfortable without knowing why.Selma's heart skipped a beat as he watched Gabriel's hands begin to tremble. That alone terrified him. Just minutes ago, Gabriel had been talking about secrets buried for twenty years, now he looked like a man staring at

Gabriel dropped the phone. The device hit the table, bounced once, and crashed onto the floor and neither of the men moved.The message remained burned into Selma's mind.YOU SHOULD HAVE STAYED SILENT.A cold sensation crawled down his spine. Outside, the black SUV was still parked across the street, its engine running and its dark windows hiding whoever was inside, I watched it waiting.Rain drummed steadily against the glass, filling the tense silence between them.Gabriel's breathing had become uneven. His chest rose and fell rapidly like a man fighting to keep panic under control.Selma frowned and leaned forward. "Gabriel." There was no response. "Gabriel." This time, he said it louder.The old man finally blinked.His eyes shifted toward Selma, and what Selma saw sent a chill down his spine, fear stared back at him. Pure fear. Not the fear of old memories but the fear of something present, something real."They found us," Gabriel whispered.The words barely escaped his mouth, Se

Selma stopped so suddenly that Gabriel almost collided with him. The warehouse fell silent once again, leaving only the distant drip of water echoing through the darkness.His eyes remained fixed on the phone screen as the message glowed beneath the flashlight's beam.IF YOU HEAR HER VOICE, RUN.A cold sensation crept through his chest. Gabriel noticed the change in his expression immediately."What is it?" he asked.Selma didn't answer, instead he turned the screen toward him. The old man's face instantly drained of color."No..."The word barely escaped his lips.Then the woman's voice echoed through the warehouse again. Weak, fragile and desperate."Please..."The sound came from deeper inside the building, somewhere beyond the rows of abandoned machinery.Gabriel's breathing grew uneven as his eyes darted nervously through the darkness."We need to leave."Selma looked toward the source of the voice, his pulse hammering in his ears. Every instinct warned him that something was wro

​Selma’s heart nearly stopped for a moment, he thought he was imagining her.​Inside the warehouse, the lights flickered as rain poured through the shattered entrance and the wind howled through the building and yet, Matilde Elias remained standing there real, alive and staring directly at him.​Twenty years of anger surged through his chest so violently that it stole his breath, his fingers tightened around the notebook, the sharp edges digging into his skin, but he barely felt it. All he could see was her: the woman who destroyed Rafael, the woman who stood by while his father drowned in depression, and the woman who had locked the door on the night Rafael died. She was the one person he had spent years trying to erase from his life. ​A dozen memories crashed into him at once: his father sitting silently at the dinner table, his trembling hands, his tears, and ultimately, his grave. Every old wound seemed to reopen simultaneously.​"Selma."​The sound of her voice hit him harder t