"Adena stopped it.Morse code on the table.I just followed her lead."
Nolan's eyebrows climb."Smart woman."
"Smarter than me, apparently."I gesture to the cuff."How bad is it?"
He doesn't sugarcoat it."You were minutes away from being the legal face of Sinaloa's entire New Orleans operation—President, COO, signatory on every account, deed holder on every property.If those documents had been filed..."He shakes his head."We'd be having a very different conversation right now."
My stomach tightens."What stopped it?"
"Silas coordinated with us in real-time.We filed an emergency injunction with a federal judge—ex parte, two in the morning.Asset freeze, halt on all corporate filings tied to the marriage license."He taps the folder in front of him."Judge gave us two hours before the cartel's lawyers could challenge it."
"That's not much time."
"It was enough.We hit every bank on the transfer list—flagged the accounts, threatened federal action if they processed anything.County clerk got the same treatment.Hold everything pending federal review."
"And?"
"Most of it worked.A few transactions slipped through before we got word out, but nothing that directly ties you or Graceson to ownership.We're still cleaning it up, but you're not going down for this."
The picture forms all at once—and just as quickly, collapses.
My jaw tightens, then eases.A slow breath slips out of me before I can stop it, like my body figured it out before my head did.
Whatever that future was—whatever name I would’ve worn—it isn’t mine.
Adena ended it before it could take me.
“How did Hightower figure all this out before we did?”
Nolan has the grace to look sheepish.“Marquez’s accountant started looking harder at Adena.Specifically, her bank records and income tax.According to Silas, it was so specific they started looking for angles we’d never thought of.They found one.”
“But you contacted me this morning?”
He nods.“When he couldn’t get Adena out in time, he gave me a personal heads up.Man to man.”
“He bypassed the regular channels?”
Nolan barks a laugh.“More like he crushed them.He ignored the directive to stay clear from day one and had his own team shadowing Adena the whole time.”
While I decide whether to be irritated the DEA dropped the ball, he pauses.“Take the month,” he says, standing and smoothing out a wrinkle in his shirt.“Rest.Let the legal teams chew through the mess.When it clears, you get your life back.”
I stare at the ceiling tiles.My life.Whatever shape that is now.
A month from now, the threat levels drop.The paperwork settles.The names unspool from the files.The heat on both of us cools.
And maybe… if she’s around…
I shut the thought down before it forms.No use bleeding over things I can’t control from a hospital bed.
My hand finds the morphine buzzer.I press it, letting the edges blur again.Four weeks.Thirty days.
Long enough for someone as smart as Adena to realize annulment is the only sane option to this problem.
Adena
From inside Hightower's jet, the cabin's cream leather seats catch the morning sunlight slanting through oval windows, everything beige and neutral except the crumpled biohazard bag with my wrecked wedding dress shoved beneath my seat.
My mouth tastes like stale coffee and the granola bar someone handed me hours ago, dry and papery on my tongue.
