Ismael Kubas

The chill of the night air clung to me as I made my way through the darkened streets. The wind whispered against my skin, sharp and cold, as if it carried with it the weight of what was coming. Every step felt heavier than the last, the shadows stretching long and deep across the cobblestones beneath my feet. It was late, but I couldn't wait any longer.

I had to stop the killer. Gracie's murderer.

In the future timeline—before this strange twist of fate had thrown me back into the past—her death had shattered everything. Gracie had been more than just a member of the family. To me, she had become the heart of it, the quiet force that had somehow held us together in the wake of my father’s death. But when she was taken from us, brutally murdered, everything collapsed. The children were lost, confused, devastated. And I… I was consumed by guilt, and a burning need for revenge.

Carlo and I had launched a full-scale investigation, determined to find out who had killed Gracie. She hadn’t deserved to die like that, alone and defenseless at the edge of the estate. I could still see her, lying in a pool of her own blood, the knife lodged deep in her back, her eyes wide and empty. The memory haunted me. It drove me.

Carlo, always the strong one, had thrown himself into the investigation. He couldn’t forgive himself for the way he had treated her in life, for not seeing the abuse she had suffered under Fritz, and for not making amends sooner. I had been the one to tell him and Carlyn the truth about their father’s cruelty, hoping it would soften their hearts toward her. But it had come too late.

Gracie had already been taken from us by the time we were ready to make amends.

The investigation dragged on, but we couldn’t stop. We gathered evidence—painstakingly piecing together every lead, every whisper, every clue that pointed us in the right direction. It had been slow at first, almost agonizingly so. But soon, a pattern began to emerge, a thread that tied the murders in the nearby towns to our very own estate. The killer wasn’t a random stranger passing through. They were closer than we’d imagined.

The chilling realization came to us late one night, as Carlo and I sat pouring over the evidence we had collected. The pieces began to click together. The way the murders followed a twisted pattern, each victim stabbed in the same brutal manner, each one connected in some way to the Kubas family. The killer wasn’t just targeting strangers. They were targeting us.

And then it hit us—the killer was likely someone within the Kubas household or someone nearby.

The thought chilled me to the bone. It meant that all this time, we had been living alongside a monster. Someone who had walked the same halls, shared the same meals, laughed with us, all while harboring the darkest of intentions. It made me sick to think that Gracie’s murderer had been watching us, waiting for their moment to strike.

We didn’t have enough proof to make an accusation, but we were close. So close that I could feel it.

That night, as I made my way back to the estate, I carried with me a sense of urgency. I needed to speak with Carlo, to finalize our plans. We had gathered enough evidence to make a case, to corner the killer and force them to reveal themselves. The future of the estate—and the safety of the children—depended on it.

But as fate would have it, I never made it.

The attack came swiftly, silently. One moment I was walking through the outskirts of the estate, and the next, I was thrown to the ground, my vision blurring as pain ripped through me. The world spun, and for a brief, terrible moment, I thought I was having some kind of nightmare.

But it was real.

The blade struck again and again, cold steel cutting through flesh and bone, and I felt my strength leave me with every agonizing blow. I struggled to fight back, but the figure was quick, precise—too well-practiced to be anything but a killer. My vision darkened as the blood pooled beneath me, my body betraying me as consciousness slipped further and further away.

I wanted to scream, to shout for help, but my voice wouldn’t come. The only sound that filled the air was the ragged breath of my attacker and the soft crunch of their footsteps as they stepped away, leaving me to die alone in the dirt.

I knew then, with a sinking certainty, that I would never see Carlo again. I would never get the chance to tell him what we had discovered. The killer had been one step ahead of us all along. They knew we were close to figuring it out, and they had struck before we could act.

As my vision faded, my thoughts returned to Gracie. Her smile, her laugh, the way she had looked at me with kindness even when I didn’t deserve it. I had failed her. I had failed the children. And now, I was dying just like she had—alone, in the dark, with no one to save me.

But fate had a twisted sense of humor.

I had died that night, but somehow, I was back. I had been given a second chance, a chance to change things—to prevent Gracie’s murder, to protect the children, to bring the killer to justice. I wouldn’t fail this time. I couldn’t.

In this timeline, the investigation hadn’t yet begun. Gracie was still alive, and the children were still oblivious to the darkness that lurked just beneath the surface of our lives. But I knew better. I knew what was coming, and I had to stop it.

I couldn’t let the killer slip through my fingers again.

As I stood in the dimly lit hallway of the Kubas estate, my mind raced with possibilities. Who was the killer? Why had they targeted Gracie? And how could I stop them before they struck again?

There were too many unanswered questions, too many shadows hiding the truth. But I would find it. I would root out the darkness and tear it apart, piece by piece, until there was nothing left.

I couldn’t let the same tragedy unfold again. Gracie’s life depended on it. My own life depended on it.

The echoes of the future haunted me every day, reminding me of what I had lost and what I could never get back. But this time, I would fight. I would fight for Gracie, for the children, for the justice that had been denied us in the past.

Revenge burned in my chest like a flame, and I knew that I couldn’t rest until the killer was brought to justice. They thought they had escaped, that they were safe in the shadows. But they were wrong.

I was coming for them. And this time, I wouldn’t stop until I had their blood on my hands.

As I walked toward the study where Carlo was waiting for me, I steeled myself for the battle ahead. We would find the killer. We would tear them from their hiding place and make them pay for what they had done.

This was my second chance. And I wasn’t going to waste it.

The past was a ghost, haunting me with its mistakes and failures. But this time, I had a chance to lay those ghosts to rest.

And I would do whatever it took to make sure Gracie lived to see another day.