Chapter 56
"Wait for him to come find me."
Evelyn's voice was measured, just loud enough to fill the space between the guest room and the hallway.
Sophie looked into her eyes but didn't press further. She'd known Evelyn for twelve years. She knew that when this woman used that tone, there was no room for negotiation.
"Fine. I'll leave the soup in the pot. Heat it up yourself if you get hungry."
Sophie turned and left.
Evelyn put the photo from the nightstand back in her bag, zipped it shut, and turned off the light.
In the darkness, her eyes stayed open.
The outline of the ceiling light became a blurred circle in the night.
Lily Education Fund.
Those words circled through her mind over and over.
He'd built a foundation using her mother's name. Donated thirty million Singapore dollars a year. He'd built a $6.4 billion business empire in Singapore. But he never came back.
Twenty-seven years.
Evelyn rolled over and buried her face in the pillow.
The pillowcase smelled like laundry detergent. The same brand Sophie used.
She closed her eyes.
At two in the morning, Evelyn woke to her phone buzzing.
She reached for the phone and lit up the screen.
A message from Sophie.
Time stamp: 02:07.
Not text. A photo.
The photo showed the floor by Sophie's building entrance.
Dim yellow lighting. The image was a little blurry.
A bouquet of flowers lay on the ground.
White ones.
Chrysanthemums.
Evelyn sat up.
Sophie's second message followed immediately.
[Just saw this when I went down to throw out trash. There's a note tucked under the bouquet.]
The third message was a close-up of the note.
White memo paper, no envelope.
One line of writing.
Handwritten.
Black ballpoint pen.
Sloppy handwriting, but every stroke had force behind it.
[Your mom should've taken you with her when she died.]
Evelyn stared at that line for five seconds.
Her heart rate didn't speed up.
Her hands didn't shake.
She just gripped the phone a little tighter. Then she threw off the covers, stepped barefoot onto the floor, and pulled a clear plastic evidence bag from the nightstand drawer.
She opened the door.
Sophie stood in the hallway, phone still in hand, expression caught between anger and worry.
"Don't touch the note." Evelyn handed Sophie the evidence bag. "Use this to bag it, flowers too. Don't let your hands touch the note directly."
Sophie took the bag and nodded once.
Evelyn went back to her room and changed clothes.
Three minutes later, both of them stood at the building entrance.
The bouquet was placed to the right of the doormat. White chrysanthemums, seven stems, wrapped in white paper. No ribbon, no card holder. The note was tucked under the bouquet, held down by the weight of the stems.
Evelyn crouched and took six photos with her phone. Wide shot, medium shot, close-up, front of the note, close-up of the handwriting, detail of the wrapping paper's creases.
Sophie put on disposable gloves—she'd grabbed them from the kitchen—and bagged the note and bouquet separately.
"We should call the police." Sophie crouched beside her, voice low.
"Check the security footage first."
Evelyn stood up.
The property management office was next to the side entrance of Building One. Staffed twenty-four hours.
Evelyn walked over and knocked on the window glass.
The security guard on duty was a man in his fifties. Just woken up, eyes squinting.
"Pull up the footage from eleven tonight until now. Building Three entrance."
The guard yawned. "You a resident?"
Sophie came up from behind and flashed her owner's card. "My place. Building Three, 1702."
The guard took two minutes to drag himself to the security playback system.
The screen switched to the camera at Building Three's entrance.
Black and white footage. Average resolution.
The guard pulled the timeline to eleven PM.
Eleven to midnight—no unusual foot traffic.
Midnight to one AM—two residents came home and swiped their cards to enter.
One-fourteen AM.
A person appeared on screen.
Black hoodie, hood up, mask covering half their face. Height estimated around 5'7", lean build.
The person walked to Building Three's entrance, bent down, and set something long and narrow beside the doormat. The whole process took less than eight seconds.
After setting it down, the person didn't look back.
Walked straight toward the west perimeter wall of the complex.
Evelyn stared at the screen.
"Is there a camera at the west gate?"
The guard shook his head. "West gate was sealed off at the start of the year. Camera got pulled too."
Sophie swore under her breath.
Evelyn didn't make a sound.
She used her phone to record a video of the monitor footage and took screenshots of four key frames.
Then she pulled out her phone and made a call.
The first call went to the district police station.
Filing a report. Malicious intimidation. Note with death threat implications.
The duty officer recorded basic information and said someone would come collect evidence tomorrow morning.
The second call went to Cedric.
Two forty-three in the morning.
The call connected after two rings.
He wasn't asleep.
"What happened?"
Evelyn laid out the situation in three sentences. White chrysanthemums. The note. The person in the hoodie on the security footage disappearing through the west gate where there were no cameras.
Cedric was silent for two seconds.
"You secured the evidence?"
"Secured."
"Before nine tomorrow morning, I'll have someone from legal meet the police at Sophie's complex to assist with evidence collection. I'll also have the tech team pull street camera footage outside the west gate. That area's an old district—traffic camera coverage isn't great, but there should be one at the intersection three hundred yards out."
Evelyn said "okay."
Cedric didn't hang up right away.
Three seconds of silence on the other end.
"Are you safe right now?"
Evelyn leaned against the outer wall of the guard station. The predawn wind cut through the complex, stirring the still-damp ends of her hair.
"Safe."
"Sophie's building has a secure entrance. They didn't get inside. But if they know your address, we can't rule out escalation."
"I'll handle it."
Cedric paused again.
"If you need to change locations, Parker Group has an apartment in the west district. Independent security system."
Evelyn didn't answer right away.
"Let's see how tomorrow goes first."
"Alright."
The call ended.
Evelyn put the phone in her pocket and stood by the wall for a few seconds.
She looked up toward Building Three. The window on the seventeenth floor was lit. Sophie was home waiting for her.
Evelyn relaxed the muscles around her mouth.
That line of text flashed through her mind.
"Your mom should've taken you with her when she died."
Her fishing post had worked.
The other party's reaction came faster than she'd expected. And more hysterical.
That meant two things.
First, her four words—"Mom, soon"—had definitely reached them. The transmission path matched her prediction. Sophie's social media was being monitored.
Second, their fear had reached the edge of losing control. They were willing to risk being caught on camera to personally deliver—or send someone to deliver—threatening materials to her address.
The greater the fear, the more openings they'd leave.
Evelyn went upstairs and returned to the guest room.
Sophie sat on the living room couch waiting, two cups of hot water on the side table.
"Did you call the police?"