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$2.80The Story
Ryan Simmons thought he had found the perfect tenant for his family's isolated lake house-a quiet, young woman named Ruby Hayes who paid cash and asked no questions. He needed the income to keep his struggling architectural firm afloat and to maintain the fragile peace with his estranged sister, Stella, who co-owned the property. The arrangement was simple, distant, and exactly what he required to bury his own recent failures and grief. But when strange noises begin echoing across the water at night and Ruby's meticulously curated online presence proves to be a complete fiction, Ryan's casual oversight curdles into unease.
His investigation starts with small trespasses: peering through windows, digging through trash, and questioning wary neighbors like the reclusive Dennis Brooks. Each discovery deepens the mystery instead of solving it. Ruby has no past, yet someone from hers is clearly watching the house. When a local woman, Bella Hughes, is found dead in the woods, the police, led by Detective Joseph Rivera, begin asking questions that point toward the lake house. Ryan realizes he has inadvertently harbored a stranger whose secrets are lethal, and his own complicity is now a trap closing around him.
The lines between protector, predator, and prey blur as Ryan is drawn into Ruby's meticulously constructed world. To save himself and those he cares for, including his niece Mia, he must unravel the truth of who she really is and what happened the night she arrived. But some doors, once opened, cannot be closed, and the most dangerous secret of all might be the one he has been keeping about himself.
Description
Ryan Simmons thought he had found the perfect tenant for his family's isolated lake house-a quiet, young woman named Ruby Hayes who paid cash and asked no questions. He needed the income to keep his struggling architectural firm afloat and to maintain the fragile peace with his estranged sister, Stella, who co-owned the property. The arrangement was simple, distant, and exactly what he required to bury his own recent failures and grief. But when strange noises begin echoing across the water at night and Ruby's meticulously curated online presence proves to be a complete fiction, Ryan's casual oversight curdles into unease.
His investigation starts with small trespasses: peering through windows, digging through trash, and questioning wary neighbors like the reclusive Dennis Brooks. Each discovery deepens the mystery instead of solving it. Ruby has no past, yet someone from hers is clearly watching the house. When a local woman, Bella Hughes, is found dead in the woods, the police, led by Detective Joseph Rivera, begin asking questions that point toward the lake house. Ryan realizes he has inadvertently harbored a stranger whose secrets are lethal, and his own complicity is now a trap closing around him.
The lines between protector, predator, and prey blur as Ryan is drawn into Ruby's meticulously constructed world. To save himself and those he cares for, including his niece Mia, he must unravel the truth of who she really is and what happened the night she arrived. But some doors, once opened, cannot be closed, and the most dangerous secret of all might be the one he has been keeping about himself.
