Chapter 6 - THE WOMAN WHO WORE DIANE’S FACE
Diane Hayes had an identical twin sister.
Her name was Diana.
The family told everyone she died at seventeen.
She had not.
She entered a private psychiatric institution after accusing their father of abuse.
Diane signed papers supporting the commitment.
Diana vanished from public records.
Years later, she resurfaced under the name Anna West.
She worked with Natalie.
Not as a friend.
As an investigator.
Natalie found her while tracing the origins of the Hayes surveillance network.
Their father created the first system inside family-owned hotels.
Diane expanded it.
Preston modernized it.
Diana wanted to expose them.
The shot in the parking garage came from her gun.
But why silence Preston?
Brooke answered.
“Because he knows where Natalie is.”
Preston survived surgery under police guard.
He refused to speak.
Diane demanded release and claimed Diana was framing her.
Elena found Anna West’s apartment.
Inside were files on every Hayes client.
Photographs.
Bank records.
Victim statements.
And one recent image.
Natalie walking into a grocery store six months earlier.
Alive.
She had changed her name.
Diana helped her escape from Blackwater Cabin after three weeks.
Then convinced her to remain hidden until they built a federal case.
Natalie refused to come forward because Diana said Preston’s network reached police, judges, and hospitals.
She had been waiting four years.
Then I married him.
Natalie wanted to warn me.
Diana stopped her.
They needed Preston confident enough to continue operating.
I had become bait without consent.
Again, people decided risk for someone else.
Elena traced the grocery store.
Natalie lived nearby under the name Lauren Shaw.
We found her in a small rental house.
She opened the door and saw Brooke.
Neither spoke.
Then Brooke began crying.
“I’m sorry.”
Natalie looked at me.
“You married him.”
“Yes.”
“Did he record you?”
“Yes.”
“Did he hit you?”
“He tried.”
Something softened in her face.
Inside, Natalie told us the truth.
Preston drugged her.
Diane and Brooke moved her to the cabin.
Brooke thought she was helping.
Diana entered at night and freed her.
The car was buried to make everyone believe Natalie died or left.
Diana collected evidence for years.
But she changed.
Obsession replaced justice.
She began manipulating events.
Sending warnings.
Triggering confrontations.
Using victims as pieces.
The shot at Preston was meant to kill him before he revealed Diana’s role in an earlier death.
“What death?” Elena asked.
Their father.
Harold Hayes died twelve years earlier after falling from a hotel balcony.
Diane inherited the business.
Diana claimed accident.
Natalie believed Diana pushed him.
The twin sisters were not hero and villain.
They were two survivors who chose different forms of control.
Then Natalie gave Elena the master client list.
Judges.
Executives.
Doctors.
Developers.
One name shocked me.
Detective Elena Morris.
A payment had been made to her husband’s company three years earlier.
Elena stared.
“I didn’t know.”
Her husband installed security systems.
Preston’s company subcontracted him.
That did not prove Elena was compromised.
But it gave the defense a weapon.
She removed herself from the case immediately.
A federal team took over.
Special Agent Marcus Hale questioned all of us.
Before leaving, Elena handed me one warning.
“Diana will contact you.”
“How do you know?”
“She needs someone the public will believe.”
“Why me?”
“Because you fought back on camera.”
That night, a package appeared outside my temporary apartment.
Inside was the original dining-room camera.
May you like
And a note.
YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO KILL HIM.
