The garden had always been a quiet escape – one of the few places where Rose still found a sliver of peace. The overgrown hedges, the worn stone path, and the gentle sway of wildflowers had a stillness she understood. It didn't ask her to speak. It just let her be.
Jake had coaxed her outside that evening. The sun was low, dipping behind the trees, casting long golden shadows across the grass. She walked slowly beside him, bare feet brushing against the earth, her pale dress fluttering with the wind. For a moment, things felt... lighter.
Jake talked to fill the silence. Nothing too heavy – just small memories, old jokes, stories of their childhood when Rose used to laugh without hesitation. She didn't respond, but she listened, and he could tell. There was something almost calm in the way she tilted her head to the sky, letting the breeze carry across her face.
Then she stopped.
Her body froze, and she stared ahead, eyes locked on something by the edge of the garden, near the bushes that bordered the woods.
Jake followed her gaze – and felt his blood run cold.
There, half-buried beneath a thorny tangle of vines and leaves, lay her sketchbook. The one she had lost the day Mr. Whitlock attacked her. The one she hadn't stopped thinking about.
But it didn't look the same.
Jake moved quickly and knelt down, gently pulling it free from the brush. The edges were charred, curled inwards from heat. The leather cover was cracked and blackened, like it had been scorched then left in the dirt.
Rose stepped back, her breath catching.
Jake flipped it open carefully. Most of the pages were singed, smudged in ash. But in the center – where her most recent sketches had been – one page remained nearly intact, and something was written across it.
But not by her.
It wasn't pencil. It was something darker, smeared – almost clawed into the paper with a strange, reddish-brown stain.
Four words.
"YOU SHOULDN'T HAVE SEEN."
Jake stared at the page, his jaw clenched. His stomach twisted. The handwriting wasn't Rose's. It was jagged, frantic, and hateful. The words seemed to pulse from the page, like they had been written in a rush… or in a warning.
Rose's knees buckled slightly, and she dropped to the ground, her eyes wide, hands trembling. She didn't need to say a word – her whole body screamed fear.
Jake threw his arm around her instantly. "it's okay. I've got you," he whispered, but his voice was shaky. Because he didn't believe that anymore.
Someone had found her sketchbook. Someone had tried to destroy it. And worse – they had wanted her to know.
Someone knew she remembered.
But what??
And they weren't done with her yet.
Later that night, Jake stood in the dim kitchen, the sketchbook placed on the table beneath a single hanging light. He hadn't told Aunt Marian – he no longer trusted the still way she moved through the house, her quiet glances, her sudden absences.
Instead, he called the only person he believed might actually listen.
Detective Crane arrived within the hour.
He stepped into the kitchen, his coat damp from the night rain, his expression grim. Jake didn't say anything. He just slid the burned sketchbook toward him.
Crane opened it slowly, his eyes scanning every scorched page until he reached the message. He stared at it for a long time. Too long.
Jake finally spoke, his voice low. "Someone tried to burn it. Then left that."
Crane nodded once, then closed the book with a quiet snap.
"This confirms something I feared," he said. "This wasn't just a random attack, Jake. Someone wanted her silent. Badly."
Jake's hands curled into fists at his sides. "So what do we do?"
Crane looked at him carefully. "we will protect her. And we'll digged deeper."
He picked up the sketchbook carefully and slid it into a plastic evidence sleeve.
"I've seen things like this before," he said quietly. "Not the words. Not the burning. But the intent. This is a warning."
Jake swallowed hard. "From Whitlock?"
Crane didn't answer immediately. He walked to the window, looking out into the darkness beyond the trees.
"Maybe," he finally said. "But something tells me… Whitlock isn't the only one hiding something."
Jake followed his gaze out the window. The trees swayed gently, but beyond them, the shadows moved like they were watching. Listening.
Inside her room, Rose sat on her bed, knees pulled to her chest, eyes fixed on the sketchpad Crane had given her days earlier. She hadn't touched it yet. Not until tonight.
Now, her fingers hovered over the blank page.
Because what had once been a way to speak... now felt like a target.
And in the silence, she could still hear it – those four words etched in fire and fear:
"You shouldn't have seen."