The Wrong Daughter

Caitlin confirms that her windows are barred and searches unsuccessfully for weapons. The wardrobe contains numerous dresses in her size and style, suggesting long-term imprisonment. She finds no shoes. Looking outside, she sees vast, isolated grounds with a lake and an island statue, but no neighboring houses, which triggers a panic attack.

When Bryony returns to escort her downstairs, Caitlin notices a wedding band and engagement ring on Bryony’s left hand, along with a long scar running from wrist to elbow. Bryony confirms that she’s married to Heath. She insists on handcuffing Caitlin again, and her demeanor shifts from patient to stern when Caitlin resists, warning that Heath will be angry if she doesn’t comply.

As she’s led through the corridors, Caitlin observes that the house is a stately home with at least seven bedrooms, several secured with external deadbolts. In the main hall, Caitlin considers fleeing through the front door, but Bryony pleads with her not to try, fearing that she’ll be blamed. They pass through an opulent sitting room and enter a large library. There, Bryony uses a cable tie to secure Caitlin’s ankle to an armchair, warns her not to anger Heath, and leaves. When the door opens again, Caitlin recognizes the woman who enters and screams.

The woman who impersonated Olivia rushes to silence Caitlin’s screams. She insists that she’s the real Olivia, proving it by recounting private childhood memories and details from the night of the abduction, including the DNA test, the lock of hair, and their book code. Caitlin’s instinct confirms that this is truly her sister.

Olivia explains that her memory lapses and the bits of planted evidence were deliberate mistakes designed to make Caitlin appear unstable. Heath orchestrated this plan to ensure that no one would search for Caitlin when she disappeared. Though Olivia claims that she did this for Caitlin because their family and friends never truly loved her, Caitlin is devastated by the betrayal and the pain Olivia caused.

When Caitlin begs to escape together, Olivia refuses, revealing that she loves Heath and wants them all to be a family. Caitlin realizes that her sister is, understandably, exhibiting signs of “Stockholm syndrome” after 16 years of captivity and manipulation. Heath then enters wearing his abduction mask. He and Olivia share a tender moment before he slowly removes the mask, revealing his face to Caitlin. She recognizes him, and her understanding of reality fractures.

The novel reveals that Heath had been pretending to be Gideon Temple, Caitlin’s supposed therapist. He sends Olivia upstairs and methodically explains his deception while pouring whisky. His Irish accent and staged death in the woods were contingency plans to discredit Caitlin, had she escaped. He details his scheme to fake her death by suicide by leaving her belongings on a bridge and planting a typed note on her laptop, while Olivia would send letters making her own departure seem voluntary.

Heath was never a real therapist but house-sat for the actual Dr. Temple while he traveled. He orchestrated everything, watching both Caitlin and Oscar for months, following Oscar to publishing meetings, breaking into her home, and engineering the murder of Simon Briggs, whom he framed for Olivia’s abduction, with poisoned whisky. He came for Caitlin because, after 16 years, Olivia wanted her sister back. The elaborate scheme allowed him to evaluate whether Caitlin was a good fit and to test Olivia’s loyalty.

He cuts the cable tie restraining Caitlin to the chair but refuses to remove her handcuffs. When Caitlin calls him a predator, he insists that he loves Olivia and hasn’t forced himself on anyone. She spits at him. Enraged, he slaps her hard, throws her over his shoulder, and carries her upstairs while ordering Olivia back to her room. He pins Caitlin against her bedroom door, claims that she belongs to him, and shoves her inside.

The next morning, Bryony brings breakfast and unlocks Caitlin’s handcuffs. When Caitlin breaks down, Bryony offers quiet support. She shares that Heath abducted her at 14 while she was sneaking out to a party. Her surname is Danvers, and she has a younger sister named Lucy. Caitlin doesn’t recall news coverage of her disappearance.

Bryony suspects that Heath murdered his sister, Elinor. She explains that Heath has nightmares about Elinor and sometimes mistakes Bryony for her, suggesting an incestuous relationship. He chose Bryony and Olivia because they resemble Elinor; Heath is collecting substitutes to prove that he can love without destroying, which Caitlin recognizes as the ultimate test of control.

Seven years ago, Bryony pretended to fall for Heath to access the tin of keys he kept in his bedroom. She almost escaped, but Olivia caught her on the stairs and screamed for Heath. After recapturing her, Heath stalked Bryony’s sister, Lucy, and threatened to harm or abduct her if Bryony ever disobeyed him again. Despite Caitlin’s pleas for help and her defense of Olivia’s “Stockholm syndrome,” Bryony refuses, consumed by hatred for Olivia and fear for Lucy’s safety. She threatens to alert Heath if Caitlin asks again.

Caitlin showers and finds Heath waiting in her bedroom. He apologizes for hitting her and presents an enormous bouquet of white roses and aureolin sunflowers that Olivia picked from the garden. Caitlin recalls that Olivia previously used sunflowers as part of the scheme to reveal Oscar’s infidelity.

Heath moves close, reminding Caitlin of the attraction she felt when she knew him as Gideon. He trails a rose along her skin, and a thorn nicks her wrist, drawing blood. He catches the drop on his thumb and stares at her with intense desire before leaving. Enraged and disgusted, Caitlin hurls the vase against the door.

When Bryony brings lunch and sees the scattered flowers, she angrily cleans up. She explains that Olivia experiences severe depressive episodes that have worsened over the past year, sometimes lasting months. When Olivia told Heath that having her sister back was the only thing that would help, he finally agreed to the dangerous plan.

Caitlin finds a folded note under her sandwich in which Olivia writes that she misses her. Bryony snatches it, delighted that Olivia has disobeyed Heath’s order to stay away from Caitlin. Fearing that Bryony will use the note against her sister, Caitlin begs her not to tell Heath, arguing that the note proves that Olivia still cares and can potentially be convinced to help them all escape. After weighing her options, Bryony reluctantly agrees to pass a message to Olivia that Caitlin wants to see her.

The following morning, Olivia visits Caitlin’s locked door while Heath is out posting one of the fabricated letters to Caitlin and Olivia’s parents. Speaking through the door, Olivia repeats Heath’s lies: that their parents had planned to send her to boarding school and that Bryony was an unhoused runaway whom Heath rescued. When Caitlin challenges these claims, Olivia defends him.

As Olivia prepares to leave, she cryptically warns Caitlin not to trust Bryony, claiming that Bryony is responsible for Olivia being at Ledbury Hall. After Olivia walks away, Caitlin screams into a pillow in primal rage.

At lunch, Caitlin confronts Bryony about the accusation. Bryony admits that as a frightened teenager, she suggested that Heath find another girl if she wasn’t what he wanted, naively hoping he would release her. She never imagined that he would actually do it. Bryony explains that Heath first saw Olivia while she was on a school trip to York and followed her all the way back to Bath. When Olivia arrived at Ledbury Hall, Bryony felt relieved at no longer being alone. She confirms that Heath forced her to lie about her past to make himself appear heroic rather than monstrous. The conversation ends with Bryony expressing the premonition that not everyone survives imprisonment.

Disobeying Heath again, Olivia enters Caitlin’s room the next morning while he’s away. She shares elaborate fantasies of their future (gardening, mixing cocktails, swimming in the lake, and eventually growing old side by side). Caitlin realizes that her sister is too deeply manipulated to assist in an escape knowingly and formulates a new strategy.

She asks Olivia for a tour of the house. Olivia hesitates, revealing that Heath plans to give Caitlin a tour after their wedding. Horrified but careful to hide her reaction, Caitlin manipulates her sister by claiming that she can’t agree to marry Heath without first seeing where she would live. She suggests that they conduct the tour secretly while Heath is gone.

Olivia wavers but eventually agrees, excited that Caitlin is taking an interest in her impending marriage. However, she warns Caitlin not to tell Bryony, claiming that Bryony is jealous of Olivia being Heath’s favorite and would want Olivia dead.

Caitlin tells Bryony the entire plan despite Olivia’s warning. They repeatedly review Ledbury Hall’s layout, and Bryony describes the exact location of the brass key tin in Heath’s bedroom. The escape strategy requires that Caitlin lock Olivia in a room, retrieve the tin, free Bryony, and then force Olivia to leave with them.

During the tour, Olivia carries the brass tin of keys, needing them to unlock each room. In Heath’s bedroom, Caitlin sees a large, framed photograph of Elinor, who bears a striking resemblance to Olivia. In the sitting room, she discovers the wedding dress she chose (while shopping with Olivia) hanging by the fireplace, and she realizes that the dress was never intended for her wedding to Oscar, but for her forced marriage to Heath.

Caitlin manipulates Olivia into descending to the wine cellar. While browsing bottles, she deliberately drops and shatters one. As Olivia kneels to clean the mess, setting down the tin, Caitlin snatches it and races up the stairs. Olivia chases her, grabbing at her dress, but Caitlin kicks free and locks her sister in the cellar.

At Bryony’s door, Caitlin discovers that the keys are numbered rather than labeled by room. Panicking as Olivia screams below, she pockets an ornate skeleton key she believes opens the front door and pushes the remaining keys under Bryony’s door for her to try from inside. She returns to the library, where Olivia’s screaming suddenly stops. Before Caitlin can react, she hears a key turning in the front door: Heath has returned home early.

Heath bursts into the library as Olivia screams from the locked cellar. When he charges at Caitlin, she grabs a brass candlestick to defend herself. Desperate to stall until Bryony escapes, she taunts him about his murdered sister, asking where he buried Elinor’s body.

Enraged beyond control, Heath slams Caitlin against the bookshelves and wraps his hands around her throat, choking her. As her vision darkens, her fingers close around a heavy marble bust on the shelf. She swings it with all her strength, striking him in the temple. The impact fractures his skull. Heath’s grip loosens, and he collapses to the floor, blood pooling from the wound. Caitlin stares at his lifeless body and vomits.

Caitlin unlocks the cellar door and releases Olivia, who sees Heath’s body and collapses in grief-stricken sobs. When Caitlin tries to convince her to leave, Olivia’s anguish transforms into rage. She accuses Caitlin of murder and attacks her violently.

Caitlin throws her off and runs, with Olivia in pursuit. Bryony remains locked in her room, still struggling with the keys. Caitlin races up the stairs and through a bolted door onto the roof terrace, where she’s trapped. Olivia tackles her in the rain, strangling her on the wet stone. Just as Caitlin is losing consciousness, Olivia’s fury fades: She seems to recognize her sister, and her grip loosens. Before she can speak, Bryony appears and shoves Olivia over the balustrade.

Caitlin watches in horror as her sister falls to the gravel driveway below. She pushes past Bryony, runs downstairs, uses the skeleton key to unlock the front door, and runs outside into the rain. Kneeling beside Olivia’s broken body in the driveway, she holds her dying sister and desperately tells her she loves her. Olivia’s brilliant blue eyes become sightless, and she dies in Caitlin’s arms.

A year later, Caitlin sits in an airport departure lounge, writing in a journal addressed to Olivia. She’s in therapy with Harriett, a legitimate therapist who suggested the journal. Though grief remains ever-present, she has learned to see it as glittering reminders of her sister rather than suffocating soot.

Caitlin reconciled with her parents after her father confessed his guilt over leaving them alone the night of the abduction. She’s estranged from Florence and from Oscar; her parents nearly sued him over his best-selling book about the case. The police discovered two sets of remains buried on the Ledbury Hall grounds: Elinor Ledbury, buried near the lake, and the Ledburys’ uncle, Robert Brent, in the woods, both murdered two decades ago.

Both women were cleared of murder charges. Bryony claimed that she thought Caitlin was in mortal danger when she pushed Olivia, but Caitlin knows Bryony wanted Olivia dead. Her therapist helps her accept that she isn’t responsible for Bryony’s actions or for trusting the wrong person.

Before leaving for a six-month solo journey around the world, Caitlin visits the wildflower meadow. There, she accepts that she lost Olivia twice (once to Heath’s abduction and again on the rooftop) and resolves to honor her sister’s memory by living boldly. In a vision, young Olivia performs a cartwheel and says goodbye. Caitlin finds peace in knowing that her sister will always be part of her.