Another pause. Her voice wavers, then hardens.
"Don't you dare threaten me. I'm not the same woman you married, Jack. I'm not scared of you anymore."
My hand is on the doorknob before I realize I've moved.
I don't turn it.
Because an ugly feeling is spreading through my chest, a thing that feels like jealousy mixed with doubt.
I never considered this.
I tracked her finances, her employment history, her medical records. I knew about the debt, the custody battle, the years of manipulation. I cataloged every bruise, every flinch, every way that bastard broke her down.
But I never asked the most important question.
Does she still love him?
She stayed with him for years. People don't stay that long unless something keeps them tethered. Unless some part of them still believes in the person they married.
Maybe she's not talking to Jack because she hates him.
Maybe she's talking to him because she can't let go.
The thought makes me want to put my fist through the wall.
I've watched men in my world destroy themselves over women who couldn't choose them. Soldiers who compromisedoperations because their girlfriends were still texting their exes. Made men who turned informant because the women they loved went back to the men who hurt them.
I swore I'd never be that pathetic.
But here I am, standing outside a woman's door with my jaw clenched so tight my molars ache, listening to her say another man's name while I imagine all the ways I want to kill him.
This is exactly what you were afraid of.
This is why you don't let people in.
Kristen
The audacity of this man.
Jack's voice slithers through the phone like poison, asking questions he has no right to ask. "How did you even get a job there, Kristen? Did you sleep with someone? Is that your new thing now?"
My fingers tighten around the phone. The old Kristen would have stammered. Would have apologized. Would have shrunk.
That Kristen died somewhere between the third loan payment Jack stole and the moment I watched my daughter's face light up in this compound.
"Fuck off, Jack."
The door swings open.
I spin, phone still pressed to my ear, and there's Nico. Dark eyes blazing. Jaw carved from granite. He heard. Of course he heard.
"I have to go," I say into the phone, but Jack's still talking, still demanding, still being Jack?—
I hang up.
Nico steps into the room. The door clicks shut behind him with a sound that feels final.
I back up instinctively. One step. Two. My calves hit the bed frame and I lose my balance, tumbling backward onto the mattress. Before I can scramble up, Nico is there, hands planted on either side of my head, body hovering over mine.
