The lighthouse stood alone on the cliff—an old spine of white stone rising out of the thick fog. Its rotating beam cut slow circles through the haze, the only moving thing in a world gone silent.
Mara approached on foot, boots crunching over wet gravel. Every instinct warned her to wait for backup. But whoever messaged her knew things only the killer should know. If she stalled, she risked losing the trail.
Her hand rested on her holster as she circled the lighthouse. The metal door at the base was closed, heavy with rust and old hinges.
She pushed it.
It didn't budge.
A heavy lock secured it shut.
But someone had recently disturbed the dirt around the threshold—fresh shoeprints, half washed by fog. Not from earlier responders. These were deep. Recent. Alone.
She crouched, examining them.
Men's size. Work boots.
Not Elias's.
Not Caleb's.
Someone else had been here.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket.
Another message.
Keys are where the widow left them.
Mara frowned. "What—"
Then she remembered the scene from Caleb's book The Widow's Drowning. In the novel, the murderer left the key hidden inside the victim's shoe.
She turned toward the lighthouse wall, where the staged victim's shoes had been found—placed neatly beside her body.
The forensic team had removed them hours ago. But the ground still held the imprint where they had rested.
Mara dug into the wet sand.
Her fingers closed around metal.
A small brass key.
Exactly where the killer wanted her to find it.
She swallowed hard, stood, and slid the key into the lock.
It turned smoothly.
The door creaked open.
A breath of cold, stale air escaped—air so still it suggested the basement had been sealed for years.
Mara drew her flashlight and stepped inside.
The basement was narrower than she expected, more like a carved-out chamber beneath the lighthouse. Old stone walls glistened with moisture. The floor sloped downward, funneling toward a darker corridor.
Mara swept her light across the space.
Dust motes floated lazily through the beam.
Shelves lined the walls—old equipment, ropes, rusted tools.
And on the far shelf… something new.
Mara's heart ticked faster.
A stack of books.
Caleb Stone's novels.
All first editions, pristine, untouched by the decades around them.
And beside the books lay an envelope.
Her name written on it in neat black ink.
DETECTIVE MARA ELLISON
She scanned the basement again.
No sounds. No movement.
But every nerve screamed that she was being watched.
She opened the envelope.
Inside was a single photograph.
Mara froze.
It was a picture of Ruth Stone—the missing sister.
Standing right here, in this basement.
Ten years younger.
Eyes wide, terrified.
And behind her… a shadow.
A figure wearing a dark coat, face obscured.
But Ruth Stone wasn't looking at the figure.
She was looking directly at the camera.
Directly at whoever took the picture.
Mara flipped the photograph over.
On the back, written in shaky handwriting:
He found me.
You're next.
—R.S.
A noise echoed softly from deeper in the basement.
A single footstep.
Mara's flashlight snapped toward the sound.
"Greyharbor Police!" she barked. "Show yourself!"
Her voice bounced through the stone corridor but brought no reply.
Then she saw it.
On the floor, a wet footprint—fresh—leading deeper into the dark passage.
Someone was down here.
Someone who had come minutes before she arrived.
Her fingers tightened on her weapon.
She took one step forward.
Then another.
The basement swallowed her as she followed the prints into the black.
Halfway down the passage, the walls squeezed tighter. The ceiling dipped. The air grew colder.
The footprints ended abruptly in front of a wooden door—old, swollen with moisture.
A faint light glowed beneath it.
Mara reached for the handle.
Her phone buzzed once.
She glanced down.
A new message.
Welcome to the confession.
Mara's breath hitched.
She pushed the door open.
The room inside was small, windowless, lit only by a single hanging bulb.
In the center of the room sat a chair.
On the chair sat a recorder.
And beside it… another photograph.
Mara moved closer, heart pounding.
The photograph showed the same room—but with someone sitting in the chair.
Someone tied up.
Someone gagged.
Someone with Caleb Stone's face.
Mara's pulse slammed against her ribs.
"Caleb," she whispered.
The recorder clicked.
A voice played.
Not Caleb's.
A low, measured voice. Male. Controlled.
"Detective Ellison. You're almost there.
Caleb has written many stories.
Now he's living mine."
The recording hissed for a moment.
Then the voice returned.
"If you want to save him…
you'll have to tell me the truth."
A final click.
Silence.
Mara's throat tightened.
What truth?
What did he want from her?
Another message buzzed onto her phone.
Next clue: the one who lied to you first.
Her mind raced.
The one who lied to her first.
Not Caleb.
Not Elias.
Not Evelyn.
No—
The mayor.
Ruth Kincaid.
Mara turned and sprinted toward the stairs, flashlight cutting through stone shadows.
As she burst out of the lighthouse into the thick fog, one realization struck her with icy certainty:
The killer wasn't just reenacting Caleb's stories.
He was rewriting them—
and she was the new protagonist.