Stand In For My Sister As Mrs. Weston Chapter 12
Jodi had been unusually quiet lately.
She no longer called Raymond, nor did she stir up trouble in front of Darla.
It was as if she had vanished from our world entirely.
But I knew this was only the calm before the storm.
From what I knew of her, she was never someone who gave up easily.
The quieter she was, the more it meant she was brewing an even bigger scheme.
My instincts told me a major crisis was closing in.
I did not startle her into action.
I began making preparations in silence, just in case.
I sorted through every last item Bethany had left behind.
Her medical records — thick stacks of them — documented the entire course from diagnosis to death.
Her diary, line after line, was filled with her longing for life and her reluctance to leave the family behind.
And there was a video she recorded before she died, using the last of her strength.
In the video, she was so gaunt she hardly looked like herself; her voice was faint, yet she explained everything, word by word, with unmistakable clarity.
She knew her request was selfish — absurd, even.
But she had no other choice.
She asked me to take her place and protect this family, to protect her husband and child.
Every time I watched that video, my heart ached as if it were being torn apart.
I murmured, “Beth, don’t worry.
“What I promised you, I will do.
“No matter what I have to face, I will hold on.”
I carefully put everything away and stored it in an encrypted cloud drive.
I began preparing for the worst.
***
Meanwhile, Jodi was sitting in an upscale private testing center.
She held two sealed evidence bags in her hand.
In one bag was Bethany’s hair, which she had bought from a hospital janitor.
In the other bag was hair she had obtained by secretly sneaking into the Weston family home and taking it from a comb Kimberly had used.
She handed both bags to the technician.
“I want a kinship test.”
A few days later, a DNA report was delivered into her hands.
The results confirmed her suspicion.
The current “Bethany” and the “Bethany” who had died of illness in the hospital had non-matching genetic samples. They were two different people.
But on the last page of the report, there was also a line in small print.
“Comparison indicates the two samples are from close relatives: sisters.”
Jodi stared at the report, a feral smile spreading across her face.
Sisters?
That did not matter.
What mattered was that Kimberly was an impostor.
That was enough.
Clutching what she believed to be a sure-kill piece of evidence, she began plotting a grand “trial.”
Through Darla, she proposed hosting a family banquet.
Officially, it was to celebrate Raymond’s company project achieving resounding success.
In front of all the Weston family’s relatives and friends, she would rip off Kimberly’s mask for good.
She would ruin Kimberly’s name completely and make sure there was no coming back.
