Chapter 2 - The Impossible Photograph
Sarah’s trembling hands could barely hold the delicate gold metal of the opened locket. Inside, tucked perfectly into the oval frame where a picture of her late father used to sit, was a tiny, glossy photograph.
It wasn't an old picture. It was fresh. The colors were sharp.
It was a photograph of her mother, Helen. The same Helen who had supposedly perished in a horrific bridge collapse five years ago. But that wasn't the part that drained the blood from Sarah’s face. In the photograph, her mother was standing across the street from the very church they were in right now. She was holding up a copy of today’s morning newspaper. Her eyes looked directly into the camera lens, filled with a desperate, urgent pleading.
"Where did you see her?" Sarah asked again, her voice dropping to a hoarse, terrified whisper.
The little flower girl, a seven-year-old named Chloe whom Sarah had only met through her groom’s extended family, took a timid step forward. She rubbed her throat where the chain had snapped.
"Outside," Chloe whispered, her big brown eyes wide with fear. "In the alley behind the bride's room. A lady in a dark red coat. She pulled me aside while I was picking up dropped rose petals. She gave me the necklace and said... she said I had to wear it. She told me to make sure you saw it before you said 'I do'."
Mark, the groom, stepped closer, his brow furrowed in deep confusion. He looked at the photograph over Sarah's shoulder. He froze. "Sarah... that’s impossible. We buried her. I was at the funeral."
"We buried a closed casket, Mark," Sarah said, her chest heaving as the horrifying reality began to set in. "They told us the fire was too bad. They relied on dental records." She looked up, her makeup beginning to streak as a single tear escaped. "My mother is alive. She's out there right now."
"Sarah, we have three hundred guests waiting out there. The music is about to start," Mark said gently, trying to ground her. "Let me call the police. If someone is playing a sick joke—"
"It's not a joke!" Sarah screamed, the sudden volume making both Mark and Chloe jump. She pointed a manicured finger at the tiny photograph. "Look at her eyes, Mark! Look at the scar on her left jawline from the bicycle accident when she was a teenager. That is my mother! And she looks terrified."
Sarah didn't wait for him to process it. She grabbed the heavy layers of her twenty-thousand-dollar designer wedding gown, hoisted the silk up to her knees, and ran past him.
"Sarah, wait! Where are you going?" Mark yelled, chasing after her.
"I'm finding my mother!" Sarah called back, bursting out of the bridal suite. The heavy oak doors slammed against the walls. The murmuring crowd in the main sanctuary suddenly went dead silent as the bride ran not down the aisle, but toward the back exit.
Chloe stood in the room for a second, looking at the broken gold chain on the floor. Then, she ran after them. "Wait! She gave me a message! A secret message!"
Sarah skidded to a halt in the dimly lit hallway, her satin heels slipping on the polished marble. She spun around, dropping her dress. "What message, Chloe? Tell me exactly what she said."
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Chloe caught her breath, looking nervously at Mark who had just caught up. "She said... 'Tell my little bird the cage was rigged. Don't trust Uncle Richard.'"
Sarah felt the floor drop out from under her. "Little bird" was her mother's private nickname for her. No one else knew it. And Uncle Richard... Uncle Richard was the man who had taken over the family estate and finances after her mother's death. He was the man waiting at the end of the aisle right now to give her away.
