For three seconds, Ethan and I stared at each other through the rearview mirror.
Neither of us moved.
Then I thought deliberately:
“If you can hear this, tap the steering wheel twice.”
Ethan’s fingers remained still.
Once.
Twice.
My stomach dropped.
His voice appeared inside my head.
“So I’m not imagining it.”
I looked out the window so Valeria, still standing beside the truck, would not see my expression.
“How?”
Ethan’s thoughts came back immediately.
“No idea.”
Then, after a pause:
“It started when you touched me.”
Wonderful.
My stepsister had given me an undercover investigator who could now hear my thoughts.
And I could hear his.
Valeria waved sweetly through the window.
Inside her mind:
“Perfect. Two weeks. That’s all I need.”
“Once Ethan finds the confidential files in Camila’s trailer, she’s finished.”
I froze.
Confidential files?
I thought:
“She plans to plant something.”
Ethan’s hand tightened on the steering wheel.
“I heard her too.”
I looked sharply at him.
He started driving.
Out loud he said coldly:
“Seat belt.”
Inside my head:
“Pretend we dislike each other.”
I almost smiled.
“This should be easy.”
His eyes flicked toward the mirror.
“Very funny.”
For the next five days, we performed.
In public, Ethan treated me like an arrogant celebrity he barely tolerated.
I complained that he walked too slowly.
He complained that I ignored security instructions.
Valeria loved every second.
Her thoughts became increasingly careless around me.
“Ethan already dislikes her.”
“Good.”
“Tomorrow I’ll put the drive in her makeup case.”
There it was.
The drive.
That night I told Ethan everything I had heard.
We were inside my trailer with the curtains closed.
He stood by the door.
“No touching,” he said.
“Afraid you’ll hear something embarrassing?”
His expression remained blank.
His mind did not.
“Extremely.”
I laughed.
Then he placed a small recording device on the table.
“Valeria’s plan is larger than framing you.”
His tone changed.
“This company has lost confidential contract bids for almost eighteen months.”
I stopped smiling.
“Production schedules?”
“Also investor negotiations, casting offers and acquisition numbers.”
“And you think someone inside the entertainment division is selling them.”
“Yes.”
I understood why an heir from one of Washington’s most powerful families had entered my life pretending to be security.
The Shaw family’s investment group owned part of the studio.
If the leaks continued, a pending acquisition worth hundreds of millions could collapse.
“And Valeria wants you to believe it’s me.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Ethan opened a folder.
Inside were copies of emails.
Anonymous tips had been sent to the Shaw investigation team for months.
Every one pointed toward me.
My travel schedule.
My assistants.
My access cards.
Even a photograph of me entering the finance floor late at night.
I remembered that evening.
“My father asked me to bring him medicine.”
Ethan nodded.
“We know.”
“You investigated me already?”
“Thoroughly.”
I folded my arms.
“And?”
His face remained serious.
His mind betrayed him.
“Annoying. Reckless. Surprisingly generous to junior staff. Not the spy.”
I stared.
He cleared his throat.
“Stop listening.”
“Then stop thinking so loudly.”
His ears turned red.
I smiled.
For the first time, working with Ethan became almost enjoyable.
Almost.
The next afternoon, Valeria entered my dressing room while I was filming.
Ethan and I watched through a hidden camera from another room.
She opened my makeup case.
Removed a small flash drive from her sleeve.
Then placed it beneath the powder compact.
My hands went cold.
Ethan whispered:
“Wait.”
Valeria did not leave.
She opened my laptop.
Entered the password.
Correctly.
I stared.
“How does she know that?”
Then I remembered.
Two months earlier, during my recovery after the accident, Valeria had stayed with me.
She had helped “organize” my accounts.
She had watched me type passwords.
On camera, she connected another device to my computer.
Files began copying.
Ethan’s expression hardened.
“That isn’t just planting evidence.”
“What is she taking?”
He enlarged the screen.
Contract drafts.
Investor schedules.
Internal production budgets.
Then Valeria’s thoughts reached me even through the thin wall.
“Tomorrow the buyer gets everything.”
“And Camila takes the fall.”
My chest went cold.
For years, I believed Valeria sabotaged me because she wanted better roles.
I had underestimated her.
She had been selling access.
The rumors.
The stolen contracts.
The missing bodyguards.
They were not isolated acts of jealousy.
They were part of a much larger pattern.
We did not confront her.
That was Ethan’s rule.
“Evidence first.”
So we let her believe the drive remained hidden.
That evening, she sent me a message:
Dinner tomorrow?
I miss my sister.
Her thoughts had already told me why.
She needed me away from the studio while someone collected the copied files.
I answered:
Of course.
The next night, I sat across from Valeria at an expensive restaurant.
She wore pink.
She looked innocent.
She reached across the table.
“You’ve seemed tense lately.”
“I’m tired.”
“Is Ethan difficult?”
I sighed dramatically.
“He hates me.”
Inside her mind:
“Perfect.”
I continued:
“He keeps asking questions about studio security.”
For the first time, fear flickered through her thoughts.
“Has he discovered something?”
Out loud she smiled.
“He’s probably just serious about his job.”
Then I asked:
“Do you think someone inside the company is leaking information?”
Her fork stopped halfway to her mouth.
“No.”
Inside:
“Shut up, Camila.”
“Stop asking.”
I leaned back.
“Strange. Dad says several confidential bids were compromised.”
Valeria laughed.
“You know how paranoid he gets.”
Then my phone vibrated.
One word from Ethan.
Done.
At that exact moment, federal investigators and corporate security were watching Valeria’s contact accept the stolen data from a courier outside the studio.
The courier was her manager.
The contact worked for a rival production group.
We had everything.
Valeria still had no idea.
She lifted her wineglass.
“To sisters.”
I lifted mine.
“To truth.”
Her smile faltered.
The next morning, the board called an emergency meeting.
My father was there.
So was Ethan.
Valeria entered twenty minutes late wearing sunglasses.
“Why is everyone so serious?”
My father looked at her.
“Sit.”
Her thoughts exploded.
“They know.”
“No. Stay calm.”
“They can’t prove anything.”
Ethan placed the first video on the screen.
Valeria entering my dressing room.
Opening my laptop.
Planting the flash drive.
Her face turned white.
“That’s edited.”
Then came the access logs.
Bank transfers.
Messages with her manager.
Copies of the confidential information sold to competitors.
And finally, photographs from the exchange the previous night.
My father looked as though someone had aged him ten years in an hour.
“Why?”
Valeria stared at me.
Not him.
Me.
“You always had everything.”
I almost laughed.
There it was.
Her explanation for years of cruelty.
“You had Dad’s name.”
“The best roles.”
“The public loved you.”
“And when I finally started becoming successful, everyone still called me Camila Moore’s stepsister.”
Her eyes filled.
“So you sold company secrets?”
“I deserved something that was mine!”
“No.”
I shook my head.
“You wanted something that was mine.”
“That’s different.”
My father whispered:
“Were you also responsible for Camila’s security team leaving that party?”
Valeria stopped.
That was not part of the corporate case.
But she had confessed it in her thoughts.
We had investigated afterward.
Payments tied to her assistant showed the guards had been deliberately redirected with a fabricated emergency.
She looked at me.
“How did you know?”
I smiled faintly.
“You became careless.”
For once, I did not tell her the whole truth.
My ability belonged to me.
I had learned that not every secret needed to become public just because someone else had abused mine.
Valeria was removed from the company immediately.
Her contracts were suspended.
The corporate theft case moved into formal legal proceedings.
My father offered to make everything disappear quietly.
I refused.
“Dad, if I had been the one caught on those videos, would you have hidden it?”
He could not answer.
“That’s why you can’t hide it for her.”
He nodded.
That mattered.
For years, he had believed peace between his daughters meant asking me to forgive first.
Not anymore.
The hardest part came later.
Valeria met me once before leaving the city.
She looked exhausted.
“Did you ever love me?”
The question surprised me.
“Yes.”
Her eyes reddened.
“Even when I was taking things from you?”
“I didn’t know you were taking them.”
She looked down.
Then whispered:
“I hated that you never seemed jealous of me.”
I finally understood.
She had spent years competing against someone who had never entered the competition.
“I hope one day you build something without needing me to lose it first.”
Then I left.
Ethan’s assignment ended three weeks later.
He came to my trailer to return the security badge.
“So you’re leaving?”
“Yes.”
Strangely, I disliked hearing that.
His thoughts appeared immediately.
“Don’t say you’ll miss her.”
I smiled.
He narrowed his eyes.
“Stop.”
“Stop what?”
“You know.”
I leaned against the table.
“What happens to our little problem?”
“The mind thing?”
“Yes.”
We had discovered that the connection weakened with distance.
Within a few meters, thoughts became clear.
Farther away, silence.
Ethan looked almost disappointed.
His mind confirmed it.
“Good. Silence.”
Then:
“Not good.”
I laughed.
“You’re terrible at lying internally.”
“So are you.”
He put the badge down.
Then said:
“For what it’s worth, I was wrong about you.”
“Which part?”
“That you were looking for problems.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“I usually am.”
His mouth almost smiled.
Then he became serious.
“You should be careful with the ability.”
“I know.”
“People’s thoughts are not always decisions.”
That stopped me.
He continued:
“People think angry things.”
“Fearful things.”
“Stupid things.”
“What matters is what they choose to do.”
He was right.
Valeria’s thoughts had warned me.
But it was her actions that proved the case.
That distinction mattered.
Months later, I returned to filming.
My career survived.
The rumors surrounding me slowly collapsed once investigators traced several old leaks back to Valeria’s network.
My father publicly corrected his earlier accusations against me.
Privately, he apologized.
“I believed whichever daughter cried first.”
I looked at him.
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry.”
For once, I did not need to fight for the sentence.
Ethan returned to the Shaw family business.
We did not become inseparable overnight.
That would have been absurd.
Occasionally he visited Los Angeles for meetings.
Occasionally I traveled to Washington.
Whenever we stood close enough, our minds immediately betrayed us.
“Her hair is different.”
“He still dresses like a funeral director.”
“I heard that.”
“Good.”
It became our joke.
But something changed too.
For years, hearing people’s thoughts had made me distrust everyone.
I learned how often kindness hid jealousy.
How often compliments hid calculation.
How often people smiled while hoping I failed.
Ethan taught me the opposite lesson.
A thought was not a promise.
A fear was not a betrayal.
A fleeting ugly impulse did not define a person.
Choices did.
Valeria had given me Ethan because she thought he would destroy me.
Instead, he helped me prove who was actually betraying the company.
And the strangest part?
She had believed the great advantage was that Ethan came from a powerful family.
It wasn’t.
The advantage was that when he learned my secret, he did not use it against me.
He simply said:
“It’s yours. Tell people when you choose.”
That was when I finally understood the difference between someone wanting access to your life…
and someone respecting the door.
My stepsister sent me a bodyguard to destroy me.
She failed.
But she accidentally gave me something far more dangerous to her plans:
someone who could hear the truth too—
and still waited for evidence before deciding who I was.
