After my husband boarded a plane for a business trip, my six-year-old suddenly tugged my hand and whispered, “Mom… we can’t go back home. This morning I heard Dad on the phone, talking about something that involves us—and it didn’t sound right.” So we didn’t go back.

She nodded once. “There it is. He dies your life, he collects, he pays his debts, he starts fresh. He’s ‘free.’”

Kenzo’s whisper at the airport echoed in my head.

He said he was finally going to be free.

I looked over at my sleeping child on the couch and felt something in me fracture and fuse at the same time. Love and fury braided together.

“But we didn’t die,” I said.

Attorney Okafor’s expression sharpened. “No. And he doesn’t know that yet.”

A wave of cold moved over my skin.

“What happens when he finds out?” I asked.

“He panics,” she said. “Or he tries again.”

My chest tightened. “We can’t go to the police?”

“We can,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “But not yet, and not just anywhere. Quasi has influence. He has charm. And he has time to spin this into a story where you’re unstable and he’s the grieving husband.”

Her gaze flicked toward Kenzo. “And you have a child who already knows too much.”

I swallowed. “So what do we do?”

“We build a case,” she said simply. “We stay alive long enough to do it right.”

She stood and motioned toward a small back room. “You’ll stay here tonight. It’s not fancy. But it’s locked, and it’s safe.”