Brenda is confused when the late son’s wife says she doesn’t know her, and she is shocked when she goes to visit her son’s grave and sees her daughter-in-law’s headstone nearby. Brenda asks her son’s best friend for help, but because he seems suspicious, Brenda has to figure out the puzzle on her own.
Christopher died in a terrible accident when he was only 27 years old. His mother, Brenda, is still deeply sad about his death. His death cast a dark shadow over her life, and her health got worse.
Now that Brenda had been in a clinic for a year, she had driven hundreds of miles to see her son’s grave. With so much sadness that words can’t describe it, she got off the metro in the city where Chris had lived, died, and been buried.
As Brenda walked out of the station, she saw Harper, her widowed daughter-in-law, among the crowd. Brenda was going to meet Harper after going to the graveyard, so she quickly ran after the girl to surprise her.
“Harper! Harper’s? “Hold on!” From behind, she gave the woman a pat on the shoulder.
No, I’m not Harper. “Lady, you have me wrong!” With haughty pride, the young woman brushed Brenda’s hand off and ran off.
That’s not right! Brenda had an idea. My eyes couldn’t be fooling me. She has the same voice, eyes, and hair color. Her name is Harper!
I looked for the woman, but she was no longer there. Brenda called a taxi outside of the train station and went to the graveyard. During the ride, the meeting kept coming back to her, and she couldn’t figure out why Harper had acted so strangely.
“Ma’am…”The cab driver stopped at the graveyard gate and said, “We’ve arrived.” This woke Brenda up from her thoughts.
As Brenda looked through the row of graves for Christopher’s, the silence was eerie. It made her feel a lot of different things when she found it. As she touched Christopher’s gravestone with her shaking hands, she broke down in tears.
When Brenda’s eyes moved to the nearby grave, shock washed over her.
The inscription on the gravestone scared her.
Harper S. was loved and will be missed.
From January 8, 1995, to December 3, 2020
Will always be loved and missed.
Peace out.
“Oh my God…”Harper died last week, but no one told me? Brenda gasped because she couldn’t believe what she saw.
Right away, a scary thought came to her: “If Harper is dead, then who was the girl at the subway?”
Hearing someone rake dry leaves woke Brenda up from her thinking. The groundskeeper for the cemetery was working close. Brenda went up to him and asked him to tell her about Harper’s funeral.
The man lit up a cigarette, let out a sigh, and a puff of smoke. “It happened last week.” It was weird… There were no attendees; only people working at the funeral home. They brought the box, buried it, put up a simple headstone, and then they left. There wasn’t even a proper service.
“Did anyone go to her grave after that?” Brenda made a face.
“Not that I know of, Ma’am,” he said. “I live on the grounds and work here all day.” I always watch the cemetery, and I haven’t seen anyone go to that woman’s grave.
Brenda said, “Okay, thanks,” and then she turned around. She couldn’t figure anything out.
Brenda chose to meet Jake, her late son’s best friend and business partner, in order to find out what happened to her daughter-in-law and why she died.
Jake was surprised when the mother of his best friend showed up on his door step and smiled at him. He asked Brenda to come in, but she could tell he was uncomfortable.
Brenda saw bags in the living room when she walked in and asked Jake right away about his trip plans.
“Mrs. Sutton, I’m leaving this state.” “It’s been a rough year since Chris died,” Jake said, his face showing a mix of sadness and fear. “The business went out of business, so I chose to move far away from all the trouble I’ve been in.”
“Jake, how can the business be broke?” Brenda gave me a strange look.
“What’s going on?” I saw Harper’s grave next to my son’s. I wasn’t even told she died! Tell me…Where is my daughter-in-law now? “How did she pass away?”
“Mrs. Sutton, I… I didn’t mean to bother you.” Following Chris’s death, you were deeply upset and sad. “When I heard you were going to be in the hospital for a year, I was afraid that hearing about the company’s financial problems and what Harper did would make your condition worse,” Jake said, making Brenda feel even worse.
I asked Jake, “What did Harper do?” Brenda asked her. “Tell me everything.”
Jake took a deep breath. The company belonged to Harper after Chris died, but she didn’t want to run it because she didn’t know anything about it. Because I was already Chris’s business partner, we both agreed that I should run the company.
“To be honest, the company hit rock bottom when your son died.” “We were about to file for bankruptcy when Harper suggested that we get investors and loans to bring the business back to life,” Jake said.
Brenda said, “But…you said Harper refused to have any say in the business.” This made her suspicious.
“Yes, but we all wanted to save the business so badly.” We agreed with Harper’s plan. But Harper took back the $5 million loan money and ran away just a week ago. The cops began to look for her.
“Oh my God!” Harper took the money from the loan?” Brenda let out a gasp of shock. It was too painful to believe that the late son’s wife had ruined all of his hard work after he died.
Jake added, “We didn’t think she would betray us in this way, but she did, and she paid the price.” “Police found a burned-out car that had crashed into a cliff near some trees.” Harper owned that car. She was in a terrible accident and died right away.
Thanks to pexel
Thanks to pexel
“What?” “Oh my God…” Brenda screamed.
“Police found a woman’s completely burned body with Harper’s gold letter “H” pendant on it.” There were burned-up pieces of hundred-dollar bills. Everything else was burned…The case was dropped because the death was an accident.
“Jesus…”Harper messed up everything,” Brenda said. “But wait, what about all of Christopher’s work?” It doesn’t make sense that the business failed after he died.
Jake told Mrs. Sutton, “I understand how upset you are.” The situation got out of hand, though. Harper got what she deserved for what she did, and her funeral was a proper one. A lot of people came, and everyone was sad about her death, even though she did something bad to all of us.
“Harper’s church funeral?” Brenda started to doubt things. The groundskeeper at the cemetery told her that no one came to Harper’s funeral. Brenda thought that something was very fishy. Jake’s worry and restlessness, along with his sudden choice to leave the city, made her questions even stronger.
“Uh, Jake, when is your flight?” Brenda asked her.
“Early tomorrow morning, at 6 a.m.,” he said.
“May I spend the night here?” Brenda asked, making plans in her head. “I don’t want to book a hotel room by myself in a strange city tonight.”
Jake gave it some thought, but in the end he agreed and led Brenda to the spare room. Brenda turned off the lights, but she never went to sleep. She was instead very excited for Jake’s bedroom lights to go out so she could look for a sign that would help her figure out what was going on.
Brenda went to the living room and looked through Jake’s bags after he was asleep. It was a mix of worry and fear that made her hands shake. Why would Jake lie about being asleep? What if he saw her looking around? Brenda was haunted by what happened. But she was set on finding out the truth.
When Brenda found two fake passports hidden in a secret compartment, her search turned into her worst fear. One had a picture of her daughter-in-law Harper, who was said to be “dead,” but with a different name.
“Sarah?” Who do you think you are, Harper?” Brenda made a noise.
“John?” When Brenda saw Jake’s picture in the other passport under a different name, she became suspicious. “What’s going on here?” Are they interested in something more…something I can’t even think of?”
Then she found two plane tickets to London that were booked under the fake names. Brenda felt something strange in her gut.
Jake and his partner, Sarah, whose real name was Harper, were up to no good. There was a need for action.
She quickly put her bags back where they belonged and ran to the store at the end of the lane. After a few minutes, she went back to Jake’s house with sleeping pills.
Jake ran downstairs quickly at 5 a.m. while Brenda was already making food.
“Hello, Jake! Before you go on the trip, eat breakfast!” Brenda gave a warm smile. “This is orange juice for you.”
“That’s very nice of you, Mrs. Sutton.” Jake drank from the glass that Brenda gave him. “Uh…it tastes…nice.”
After about twenty minutes, Jake fell asleep on the couch, just as Brenda had hoped. Now that Harper had to call or text Jake because she couldn’t fly without a passport and plane ticket, Brenda had to wait for her.
“Why is she taking so long?” “It’s 5:30,” Brenda said in a low voice.
Jake’s phone rang out of the blue, breaking the silence in the room. The name of the caller, “Sarah,” showed on the screen. Brenda didn’t pick up the phone, though. Eventually, a message alert showed up.
“Stupid, how could you sleep in too late? Did you forget that we have a flight today to London? I’m calling a cab and will be at your house soon.
“Come…”I’m ready for you…”HARPER!”
Brenda hid behind the front door with a mean smile on her face. After about thirty minutes, Brenda looked out the window and saw a cab pull up. She called the police right away.
Harper walked in when the door opened with a squeak. When Brenda saw her face, she couldn’t believe it. Her daughter-in-law was still living!
“Jake! Don’t you get it? “Get up,” Harper barked at Jake, who was asleep on the couch. Then she was startled when a voice she knew came from behind her.
“HARPER, ARE YOU LOOKING FOR SOMEONE?” Heather said as she hit Harper over the head hard with a vase.
Harper passed out and fell to the ground, shocked. Soon after, Brenda heard police sounds and ran outside quickly. She told the police what was going on and showed them the fake papers and plane tickets. Jake and Harper were taken to the hospital and then taken to the police station to be questioned.
Jake wouldn’t admit what he did, but Harper told the truth when she learned that if she did, her sentence would be cut short.
“We paid a morgue worker to steal the body of a homeless woman.” I wore my gold chain when we put the body in the driver’s seat of my car and set it on fire…Then we hit the car from behind and made it fall off the cliff to make it look like an accident.
“What about the money you took?” The cop looked Harper straight in the eye.
“The five million has been sent to our new bank accounts…”We thought we could handle anything…things like the trip, the new passports, and the bank accountsJake and I were sure we could get away with it. But… Harper stopped and pulled her head down into her cuffed hands.
