Vanessa stepped off the elevator onto the fourth floor, her sister’s car still nagging at the back of her mind, and nearly collided with a hotel housekeeper wheeling a cart of towels. She asked, as casually as she could manage, whether a family by Derek’s last name had checked in. The housekeeper glanced at her badge notes and confirmed the room number, adding almost apologetically that the “whole group” had requested extra towels for six guests, not four.
Six guests. Derek had told her it would just be him and his parents, three people. Vanessa’s hands were shaking as she walked down the hallway, and when she reached the door, she didn’t knock. She used the spare key she’d taken from the small dish by their front door months ago, the one Derek didn’t know she still carried out of habit.
Inside, the room was a chaos of open suitcases, room-service trays, and laughter drifting from the balcony. She stepped through slowly, and there, sitting beside Derek’s mother with a mimosa in hand, was her sister, Chloe. Not visiting. Not passing through. Fully settled in, sunglasses pushed up into her hair, looking as though she belonged there completely.
Derek turned first, his face draining of color as he saw his wife standing in the doorway of a vacation he’d sworn was strictly “family only.” His mother froze mid-sentence. Chloe’s mimosa nearly slipped from her hand. Vanessa’s eyes moved slowly across the room, piecing together what her stomach had already suspected the moment she saw that car in the parking lot: this wasn’t a family trip. It was a trip built around hiding something, and her own sister had chosen a side that wasn’t hers.
“Derek,” she said quietly, her voice steadier than she expected, “I think you have some explaining to do. Starting with why my sister is on a plane ticket you paid for.” Nobody in that room spoke for a long moment. Derek’s mother looked away first, and that alone told Vanessa everything she needed to know: this wasn’t the first time this family had known something she hadn’t. She wasn’t leaving Miami until she had the whole truth, no matter how long it took to pull it out of each of them.
