“We’re going.”
He looks up sharply. “Elena—”
“We’re going to the overlook.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“She’ll kill us.”
“She’ll try.”
He stares at you.
For thirty years, you were an elementary school teacher. You taught children how to read, how to raise their hands, how to share crayons, how to say sorry and mean it. People mistook that softness for weakness all your life.
Your daughter made the same mistake.
You walk to the hallway closet and pull out the small fireproof box where you keep birth certificates, insurance papers, and the old emergency cash Arturo insisted on hiding after the 2008 recession. Beneath the papers is Diego’s high school watch, the one you could never bring yourself to give away.
You take it out.
Then you open the bottom compartment.
Arturo looks at you, confused.
Inside is a small digital recorder.
His eyes widen.
“When did you buy that?”
“After Lucía asked for power over our accounts the third time.”
He stares at you.
You look back.
“You weren’t the only one keeping secrets.”
The next morning, you drive to Richmond and meet a lawyer named Grace Whitman in an office that smells like paper, raincoats, and expensive patience. She is a woman in her sixties with silver hair and the steady eyes of someone who has heard every kind of family lie.
You tell her enough.
Not everything.
Not yet.
You tell her Lucía is pressuring you to change your will. You tell her about the accounts. You tell her you fear for your safety. Arturo sits beside you, pale and silent.
Grace listens without interrupting.
