Page 105 of I'll Be Waiting

Anton’s voice is low and rough with emotion. I’ve heard him say it exactly that way. But where…

Our wedding video. Signing the register. Anton leaning over my shoulder, telling me he loved me.

There’s only one person who could have done this. The guy who always joked about being in the AV club at school, who videotaped every family event for posterity, from my wedding to birthdays with my niece and nephew. Endless footage to comb through and find the bits he needed to re-create Anton, reassuring and loving Anton.

I remember that night in here with Jin. How we’d both heard Anton. Then he had me close my eyes while he left notes where he’d heard the voice. While he’d removed the speakers that created the voice.

Jin had only been the first to hear Anton when he allegedly heard him laugh, which no one else had. For the recordings, he must have triggered them and then waited, only chiming in after others had. Making sure I didn’t think it was suspicious that my skeptical brother-in-law was always the first to hear Anton.

Before Jin left, he’d insisted we wait for him before doing the last séance. Because it’s hard to stage a show when you’re a hundred kilometers from the stage. Oh, this little performance would be easy enough, but the real show needs him.

Jin has spent the last eight months running intervention with my séance obsession. He knew I was going through hell, unable to stop myself, and he’d been there to help me stop.

Or had he? Libby had been the one truly running the intervention. Jin had just tagged along for moral support.

Still, he knew what I’d been through with endless con artists pretending they’d made contact. So after all that… he sets it up to seem like Cirillo contacted Anton?

I don’t understand.

The whispers from last night come back.

Why are you still here? You should be dead by now.

Anton is waiting. Isn’t that what he said? What are you waiting for?

My stomach twists. Could those have somehow been Jin?

I’d heard a noise in the basement and gone downstairs, where I heard a rustling that turned out to be a mouse, and I forgot the clangs that originally caught my attention.

That mouse wasn’t responsible for the clangs. Or for the dripping that held my attention while Jin could close the door upstairs and activate the recording.

A recording of someone urging me to join Anton. To kill myself.

Or not even a recording, but Jin himself, using his tech to disguise and throw his voice.

I rub my face. No, that’s ridiculous.

Is it?

He’s playing me clips of Anton’s voice, his laugh, his reassurance, his love.

I’ll be waiting.

Anton is right there, on the other side, waiting. Hear his voice? Remember how much you loved him? You want to be with him, don’t you?

I rub my face harder. That makes no sense. What would Jin have to gain by my death?

Money.

I don’t know my brother’s financial situation. He refuses to discuss it, which tells me it’s not as good as my own—he doesn’t want me feeling bad about inheriting my parents’ estate. I know that I make more, and my take-home pay is significantly more, since I don’t have dependents.

Libby might be a clinical psychologist, but she works for a hospital, which means she’s not bringing in private-care-level income. Neither is Jin.

My brother isn’t struggling financially. If he were, I’d be there to fill the gap. But Jin isn’t Keith, and there’s a million-dollar jackpot waiting for the death of someone who has lived longer than anyone expected her to.

More than a million now, with my personal estate doubling after inheriting from Anton. After Anton’s death, I changed my will. All the remaining trust goes to Keith, as our parents wanted, but now so does half of my estate, with the rest still divided between his two kids.

It’s a lot of money. And the only thing standing between it and Keith is me.

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