Victoria's POV
I shove the notebook back in the drawer and slam it shut just as Marcus's footsteps reach the top of the stairs.
My heart pounds so loud I'm sure he can hear it.
Final phase begins tonight. Subject will not survive to morning.
I need to get out of this office. Now.
But the door is right there, and Marcus is coming down the hall. If he sees me leaving his office, he'll know I found the notebook. He'll know I know.
The footsteps stop outside the office door.
I hold my breath.
Then I hear the bathroom door open and close instead. Water runs in the sink.
I don't think. I just move.
I slip out of the office, lock the door behind me, and race down the hall to my bedroom. I hide the spare key back in its spot with shaking hands. Then I dive into bed and pull the covers up, pretending to be asleep.
My whole body trembles under the blanket.
Subject will not survive to morning.
What does that mean? Is Marcus planning to kill me tonight? How? Why?
I squeeze my eyes shut and try to breathe normally as I hear him walk past my door. He pauses. I can feel him standing there, watching. Deciding something.
Then he keeps walking to the guest room and closes the door.
I wait ten minutes. Twenty. Thirty.
When I'm sure he's not coming back, I grab my phone from under my pillow and search for the pill numbers I saw on the wrong medication.
The results make me feel sick.
It's not an antidepressant. It's a sedative. A strong one. The kind they give to people before surgery. The website says taking too much can cause confusion, memory loss, and even death.
Marcus has been poisoning me slowly for two years.
And tonight, he's planning to finish the job.
I can't stay here. I need to run. But where? I have no money of my own. Marcus controls all our bank accounts. My parents won't help me. I have no friends left.
I'm trapped in this house with a man who wants me dead.
Think, Victoria. Think.
I can't call the police. What would I tell them? That my husband wrote mean things about me in a notebook? That he switched my pills? They'd think I was crazy. Marcus would show them my psychiatric records, my prescriptions, my history of depression. He'd convince them I was paranoid and delusional.
He's a respected psychology professor. I'm a grieving widow who can barely function.
No one would believe me.
I need proof. Real proof. And I need to stay alive long enough to get it.
I lie in bed for hours, pretending to sleep, while my mind races. Around midnight, I hear Marcus leave the guest room and go downstairs. I hear the refrigerator open. The clink of glasses.
He's making something in the kitchen.
My dinner for tomorrow? Something with poison in it?
I wait until I hear him go back upstairs. Then I creep down to the kitchen as quietly as I can.
There's a glass of juice on the counter with a note: "For tomorrow morning. Drink this with your breakfast. - M"
My hand hovers over the glass. I want to pour it down the sink. But if Marcus notices it's gone, he'll know I'm suspicious.
Instead, I take a photo of it with my phone. Evidence.
Then I go back upstairs and don't sleep at all.
Morning comes too fast. I hear Marcus moving around in the guest room, getting ready for work. I force myself to get up and act normal. Act like the broken, obedient wife he thinks I am.
I go downstairs and stare at the glass of juice on the counter.
Marcus walks into the kitchen fully dressed. He smiles at me. It's the first time he's smiled at me in months, and it makes my skin crawl.
"Good morning," he says. "I made you juice. Your favorite."
Orange juice used to be my favorite. Before Daniel died. Before everything changed.
"Thank you," I whisper.
He watches me like a hawk. "Drink it. You need to keep your strength up."
My hand shakes as I reach for the glass. I bring it to my lips.
"All of it," Marcus says.
I take a small sip. It tastes normal, but I know something's wrong with it. I can feel Marcus's eyes on me, watching, waiting.
I fake a coughing fit and turn away, spitting the juice back into the glass when he can't see.
"Are you okay?" Marcus asks, but he doesn't sound concerned. He sounds annoyed.
"Sorry. Wrong pipe." I set the glass down. "I'll finish it after breakfast."
Marcus's jaw tightens. "Drink it now, Victoria."
It's not a request. It's a command.
And that's when I know for sure. The juice is poisoned. Whatever's in that glass is supposed to kill me.
"I'm not thirsty right now," I say, my voice barely steady.
Marcus steps closer. He's bigger than me. Stronger. "I said drink it."
"No."
The word surprises both of us. I haven't said no to Marcus in two years.
His face changes. The fake kindness disappears, and I see the real Marcus underneath. Cold. Calculating. Dangerous.
"You read my notebook," he says quietly.
It's not a question. He knows.
"I don't know what you're talking about," I lie.
"Don't play stupid, Victoria. You were in my office yesterday. I have cameras."
Cameras. Of course he does. He's been watching me this whole time.
"What's in the juice, Marcus?" I ask, backing away from him.
He picks up the glass and swirls it. "Just vitamins. You've been so weak lately. I thought it would help."
"Liar."
His smile is terrible. "Drink it, or I'll make you drink it."
"Why are you doing this?" My voice breaks. "I'm your wife. I loved you. We had a son together—"
"Daniel was a mistake," Marcus says, and my world stops. "I never wanted children. They were your idea. He was loud and difficult and imperfect. Just like you."
Tears stream down my face. "You killed him. You killed our baby."
"I freed us both from a burden," Marcus says calmly. "And I've been documenting your decline ever since. Your grief. Your guilt. Your slow destruction. It's been fascinating research."
"You're a monster."
"I'm a scientist." He moves toward me with the glass. "And you're a subject who's reached the end of her usefulness."
I grab a knife from the counter. My hand shakes so badly I almost drop it.
Marcus laughs. "What are you going to do, Victoria? Stab me? You can barely stand up straight. Those pills I've been giving you have destroyed your nervous system. You have maybe a week before the damage becomes permanent."
"Stay away from me."
"Or what?" He's enjoying this. "You'll call the police? Tell them your husband is mean to you? Show them your crazy paranoid theories?" He pulls out his phone. "I have two years of documentation showing your mental breakdown. Therapy notes. Medication records. Even recordings of you talking to yourself in the middle of the night."
He's been recording me too. Watching me. Studying me like a lab animal.
"Why?" I whisper. "Why did you marry me if you hate me so much?"
Marcus tilts his head. "I don't hate you. I just needed you. The perfect wife. The tragic widow. The slow descent into madness. You've been an excellent case study."
"For what?"
"My book. 'The Architecture of Psychological Destruction.' It's going to make me famous." His eyes gleam. "You should feel honored. You're going to be the star of chapter thirteen."
I feel dizzy. Sick. Everything about my marriage, my life, has been a lie.
"I'm leaving," I say, moving toward the door.
Marcus doesn't try to stop me. "Go ahead. You have no money. No friends. No family. Where will you go?"
He's right. I have nothing. I am nothing.
"But if you do leave," Marcus continues casually, "I'll just move on to my next subject. That sweet young graduate student who just joined my department. Ezra Blackwell. You'd like him. He's broken too. Lost his parents. Blamed himself for his mentor's suicide." Marcus smiles. "He'll be even easier to destroy than you were."
My blood runs cold. "You're going to hurt someone else?"
"I'm going to study someone else. There's a difference."
No. I can't let him do this. I can't let him destroy another person's life.
I lower the knife. "What do you want?"
"Drink the juice," Marcus says. "Or I start working on Ezra tomorrow. Your choice."
He's giving me an impossible choice. Die, or let an innocent person suffer.
I look at the glass of poison in his hand.
Then I look at my husband's face and see the truth. He's going to hurt Ezra anyway. Marcus won't stop. He can't stop. This is who he is.
"I'll make you a deal," I say, my voice stronger now. "I'll drink your poison. But first, you have to tell me everything. How you killed Daniel. How you destroyed my life. All of it. I deserve to know the truth before I die."
Marcus considers this. "Why?"
"Because you're proud of what you did. You want someone to know how clever you are."
He smiles. He actually smiles. "You're right. I am proud. And no one will ever know the full extent of my work." He sets down the juice. "Fine. I'll tell you everything. Then you drink."
He starts talking, confessing to two years of psychological torture. And I record every single word on my phone hidden in my pocket.
But halfway through his confession, the doorbell rings.
We both freeze.
Marcus walks to the window and looks out. His face goes white.
"Who is it?" I ask.
He turns to me slowly. "The police. And they're asking for you."