My Stepbrother's Dirty Little Secret novel Chapter 762

Chapter 762

If Gianna ever needs somewhere to run. I believe your family will still open the door.

That belief is the reason this letter exists.

Inside this envelope, you’ll find a damaged memory card. I’ve kept it hidden for longer than anyone knows.

There were moments I almost handed it to someone else. I never could. Something always stopped me.

It felt like the kind of thing a mother keeps tucked away for the day she has nothing left except hope.

I’ve been waiting for the right time. Praying I would never need it.

But Gianna’s father never stopped believing Gianna belonged to him, not because of love, but because he canno accept losing what he believes is his.

People like him don’t let go. I knew, deep down, that one day he would try to bring her back under his control. Maybe with promises, guilt or fear.

That’s why I kept this. He tried to destroy it before it reached me. The crack running through that little card wasn’t an accident, neither was the missing corner.

He believed he had ruined it beyond repair but I kept it anyway.

I never understood how to fix it but I believed someone else eventually would. If anyone in this world can bring life back to something everyone else would throw away…

It’s you.

I don’t know what you’ll find once you manage to recover it. I’ve never watched what it contains, and I never wanted to.

All I know is that everything they did to Gianna because she was different…. everything that happened inside that room was recorded in this. Well, not everything, but parts of it anyway.

Before I finish this letter, there is one last thing I want to say. It’s probably something I should keep to myself. Because mothers are always a little too hopeful when it comes to the people they love.

If that’s true…

Then let me be hopeful one last time.

If, one day, you and Gianna decide that what exists between you is worth holding onto, you will have every blessing I have to give.

I’ve seen enough to know what the two of you bring into each other’s lives. I’ve watched it happen without either of you noticing.

You steady her.

She softens you.

Neither of you takes anything away from the other. You simply make each other a little more whole.

That is a rare thing.

Please don’t let anyone convince you otherwise, not the world, and certainly not the ghosts the two of you carry.

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Whether your story lasts a lifetime or only a season, never let anyone tell you that what you felt wasn’t real.

Some people spend their entire lives searching for the kind of peace the two of you unknowingly give each other.

If you choose one another…

I will be smiling.

If there is any place beyond this life, I like to think I’ll still be watching over my children.

That includes you now.

Take care of yourself.

Take care of Gianna.

And don’t forget to let someone take care of you once in a while, too.

With all the love a mother can leave behind,

Hazel 1

ren &

I didn’t realize how long I’d been staring until my eyes burned.

The letter lay open across my hand while the damaged memory card rested in my palm. My gaze shifted between them over and over again, as if reading the same words enough times would somehow change them.

Every sentence of that letter had been written by someone who already knew she wouldn’t be there to explain herself.

Every thought collided with the next. Damage assessment. Flash memory architecture. Broken contact points. Corrupted sectors. Possible recovery methods. Chemical repair. NAND extraction. Direct chip-off recovery. Every process I’d ever learned lined itself up before me with brutal precision.

Then another thought cut through all of it.

Everything they did to Gianna because she was different?

My jaw tightened so hard my teeth hurt. I looked down at the crack running through the card.

Doctors kept records. Researchers kept records. People who experimented on human beings documented everything.

Progress.

Failures.

Results.

Observations.

My stomach turned, not because of what might be on the card but because I already knew it wasn’t going to surprise me.

It was going to confirm every suspicion I’d been trying to keep under control.

Giovanni…

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Dr. Elias Crowe.

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