CHAPTER 7 – The Mother Everyone Thought Was Dead
Sophia couldn't breathe.
Her knees nearly gave out.
"My... mother?"
The woman on the screen looked older, thinner, and exhausted.
But those eyes...
Sophia would have recognized them anywhere.
The same warm brown eyes that had kissed her forehead every night before she mysteriously disappeared twenty years ago.
The billionaire grabbed Sophia before she collapsed.
"She's alive."
Sophia shook her head, tears streaming down her face.
"No... I buried her."
Victor smiled.
"You buried an empty coffin."
The words echoed through the penthouse.
Sophia remembered the funeral.
The coffin had never been opened.
Everyone had insisted the fire had destroyed her mother's body beyond recognition.
She had been only six years old.
She had believed every word.
Victor laughed again.
"Your mother died only on paper."
"We needed the world to think she was gone."
The billionaire glared at him.
"Where is she?"
Victor looked at his watch.
"You have exactly one hour to find her."
"After that..."
"...the building she's trapped in will explode."
He pressed another button.
A digital countdown appeared on every screen.
00:59:59
The timer began ticking down.
Before anyone could react, Victor's phone vibrated.
He looked at the message—and for the first time that night, his confident smile disappeared.
"What?" he muttered.
One of his own men rushed into the room.
"Sir..."
"The vault has been opened."
Victor spun around.
"Impossible!"
"The code was known only by three people."
The guard swallowed hard.
"It wasn't opened with a code."
"It was opened with facial recognition."
Victor's face turned pale.
"Whose face?"
The guard hesitated.
Then answered.
"Sophia Blackwell."
Everyone turned toward Sophia.
She stared back in disbelief.
"I've never even seen your vault."
The guard nodded.
"Exactly."
"Which means..."
"...someone who looks exactly like you opened it."
Silence crushed the room.
The billionaire slowly realized the horrifying truth.
"There are two Sophias."
Victor closed his eyes.
"You weren't supposed to find that out tonight."
Suddenly, the penthouse windows shattered.
A military helicopter hovered outside.
Ropes dropped from the sky.
Black-clad operatives stormed into the room with flawless precision.
They weren't police.
They weren't military.
Every operative wore the same silver phoenix emblem.
Their leader removed her helmet.
Sophia gasped.
Standing before her...
was a woman with the same face.
The same eyes.
The same scar on her left wrist.
She looked exactly like Sophia.
The woman smiled sadly.
"I've waited twenty years to meet you..."
Then she spoke the words that stopped everyone's heart.
"I'm your twin sister."
The countdown continued.
May you like
00:48:12... 00:48:11... 00:48:10...
And neither sister knew which one of them had been living a lie.
