The apartment smelled like burnt coffee and bad decisions when I woke to find Marcus gone. Again.

His note sat on the kitchen counter: Meet me at the lighthouse. Midnight. Come alone.

Same damn lighthouse where my sister disappeared three years ago. Where the police found her jacket but nothing else. Where I'd sworn I'd never return.

I crumpled the note, hands shaking. Marcus knew better than to play games about Sarah. We'd been dating six months—long enough for him to understand that subject was off-limits, that wound still raw.

This has to be important, I thought, staring at his messy handwriting. He wouldn't do this without a reason.

The day crawled past. I taught my morning classes on autopilot, deflected questions from coworkers about why I looked like death. By evening, I'd convinced myself not to go. Marcus could wait until tomorrow to explain himself, preferably somewhere that didn't make my stomach turn.

Then my phone buzzed at 11:47 PM.

Unknown number. A photo attachment loaded slowly on my screen—grainy, dark, clearly taken at the lighthouse. Someone stood at the edge of the cliff, silhouetted against the beam's rotation.

I zoomed in and my blood went cold.

The figure wore Sarah's jacket. The one the police had bagged as evidence. The one that should have been locked in a storage facility downtown.

My car keys were in my hand before I could think. The lighthouse was twenty minutes away, less if I ignored speed limits. The rational part of my brain screamed this was a trap, that I should call the police.

But the image of that jacket, Sarah's jacket, shut down every rational thought.

I drove.

The lighthouse parking lot was empty when I arrived at 12:03 AM. No Marcus. No cars. Just the rhythmic sweep of light across dark water and the crash of waves against rocks below.

"Marcus?" My voice barely carried over the wind.

Nothing.

I pulled out my phone to call him. No signal—of course. The lighthouse had always been a dead zone.

Movement caught my eye near the tower entrance. The door, usually locked and chained, stood ajar. Warm light spilled from inside.

This is stupid, I told myself, even as my feet carried me forward. This is how people die in horror movies.

The door creaked when I pushed it wider. Stone stairs spiraled upward into darkness above, but the light came from below—from the basement level I'd never known existed.

"Hello?" I called down the stairwell.

A voice drifted up. Female. Familiar in a way that made my knees weak.

"I've been waiting, Jen. We need to talk about what really happened that night."

My hand gripped the railing as recognition slammed into me.

That voice belonged to my dead sister.

#serialfiction #mystery #suspense #lighthouse