The highway stretched ahead like a promise I no longer believed in. I sat in the passenger seat of Ethan's SUV, my leather notebook open in my lap, pen resting against blank paper. I hadn't written anything in an hour. Behind me, Angelique's voice filled every available silence.

"Remember that summer at the Cape?" she said, her hand drifting forward to rest on Ethan's shoulder. Her nails were painted coral. I watched them in the rearview mirror. "When we snuck out to the beach at midnight and your mom thought we'd been kidnapped?"

Ethan laughed. The sound made my chest tighten.

"God, she called the police," he said. "I was grounded for a month."

"Worth it though." Angelique's fingers squeezed gently. "Best night of that whole summer."

I'd never heard this story. I'd never heard any of these stories. Three days before we left, Ethan told me Angelique would be joining us. Not asked. Told. "She's going through a rough time," he'd said. "It's just for a few days. You understand."

I understood plenty.

My phone buzzed in the cup holder. I picked it up. The screen showed a text from Margaret: *Someone broke in. Call police. Please hurry.*

Attached was a photo. The brownstone's back door, glass scattered across the kitchen floor like ice. The door frame splintered. Dark beyond it.

My stomach dropped.

I dialed 911. The line rang once.

"Ethan," I said. "Turn around. Now."

He glanced at me. "What?"

"Your mother. Someone broke into the house. We need to go back."

Angelique leaned forward between the seats. She was close enough that I could smell her perfume. Something expensive. Something I'd complimented once before I understood what she was.

"Oh, here we go," she said. Her voice dripped sympathy the way poison drips from a needle. "Ethan, she's doing it again."

The 911 operator answered. "911, what's your emergency?"

"There's been a break-in," I said quickly. "At 447 Willow Place in Brooklyn Heights. The homeowner texted me. She's still inside. Please send—"

Ethan snatched the phone from my hand. I grabbed for it. He held it out of reach.

"What are you doing?" I said.

"Ma'am?" The operator's voice came tinny from the speaker. "Ma'am, are you there?"

Ethan ended the call.

"Give it back," I said. My voice was steady. I was proud of that. "Give me the phone, Ethan."

"She's playing the hero card," Angelique said. She settled back into her seat like she was watching a play she'd already seen. "She can't stand seeing you happy around another woman. So she invents a crisis."

Ethan's jaw tightened. Not at her. At me.

"That's insane," I said. I kept my eyes on him. "Your mother sent me a photo. Look at it. Just look."

"I don't need to look at anything." His knuckles were white on the steering wheel. "You've been acting jealous since the day we left. You can't handle me having friends."

"Friends don't sit in the backseat of someone's honeymoon," I said.

Angelique laughed. It was a soft sound. Delicate. "See? Obsessive."

I pulled up the home security app on my phone. My hands were shaking. I hated that they were shaking. The feed loaded. Two figures in ski masks moving through the ground floor. Flashlight beams cutting through the dark. One of them opening drawers in the kitchen. The other heading toward the stairs.

I held the screen in front of Ethan's face.

"Look," I said. "Look at it."

He looked. For three seconds. Then he grabbed the phone out of my hand.

"This is fake," he said.

"It's not—"

"It's AI-generated garbage. You made this to frame Angelique. To ruin this trip."

He rolled down the window. Wind roared into the car.

"Ethan, don't—"

He threw my phone out the window. I watched it tumble through the air and disappear into the highway behind us. Seventy miles per hour. Gone.

I screamed. I didn't plan to. It tore out of me.

"Your mother is in that house! She texted me for help! What is wrong with you?"

His right hand came off the wheel. I saw it coming. I didn't have time to move.

He hit me across the face with the back of his hand. My head snapped sideways. Pain exploded across my cheekbone. I tasted copper. My lip was bleeding. I touched it. My fingers came away red.

The car didn't slow down.

Angelique said nothing. I looked at her in the rearview mirror. She was staring out the window. Smiling.

I pressed my notebook against my mouth. The blood soaked into the paper. I watched the highway markers pass. We were three hours from Brooklyn. Margaret was alone in that house with two intruders and no phone call coming.

I sat very still. My hands flat on my lap. My breathing slow.

I was already deciding what I was going to do.

Twenty minutes later, Ethan pulled off at a rest stop. The sign said Delaware Memorial Bridge. I watched it slide past the window. My face still throbbed where he'd hit me. I kept the notebook pressed against my lip. The blood had stopped but the paper stuck to my skin when I pulled it away.

Angelique got out without a word. She walked toward the restrooms. Ethan stayed in the driver's seat, both hands on the wheel, staring straight ahead.

I tried one more time.

"Your mother needs help," I said. "We can still call the police. We can still—"

"Stop," he said. "Just stop."

I stopped.

Angelique came back ten minutes later. Her face was pale. She walked slowly, one hand pressed to her stomach. When she reached Ethan's window, she leaned down.

"I got my period," she said softly. "I wasn't expecting it. I ruined my skirt."

She turned slightly. There was a stain on the back of her cream skirt. Dark red. Centered perfectly. The fabric around it was dry.

I looked at it for three seconds. Then I looked at her face.

She met my eyes. She didn't blink.

Ethan got out of the car. "Oh my God. Are you okay?"

"I'm so embarrassed," she said. "I don't have anything to change into."

He turned to me. "Give her your clothes."

I didn't move.

"Shiloh," he said. "Now."

"No."

He opened the passenger door. He grabbed the collar of my blouse with both hands and pulled. The fabric tore. Buttons scattered across the seat. I grabbed his wrists. He shoved my hands away and yanked the blouse down my arms. Then he reached for my skirt.

"Stop it," I said. "Stop—"

He pulled the skirt down to my ankles. I kicked at him. He caught my leg and held it. I was wearing a bra and underwear. Nothing else. The parking lot was full of people.

"Get out," he said.

I got out.

He handed the clothes to Angelique. She took them with both hands.

"Thank you, Ethan," she said. Her voice was soft. Grateful.

He walked to the trunk. He came back with a blanket. It was gray and stiff. It smelled like oil and old rain. He threw it at me.

"Stop making everything about yourself," he said.

Angelique took the clothes into the restroom. Ethan got back in the car. I stood in the parking lot holding the blanket. It had a hole near the center. The edges were frayed.

I wrapped it around my body. It didn't cover much. My legs were bare from mid-thigh down. My feet were bare. The asphalt was hot.

I walked toward the main building. There was a convenience store. A Subway. Restrooms. Families sitting at picnic tables. A group of truckers near the gas pumps. College kids with backpacks.

They all looked at me.

A woman with two children stared. One of the kids pointed. The woman pulled him close and turned away.

A trucker said something to the man next to him. They both laughed.

The college kids had their phones out. I heard the camera clicks. I kept walking. My hands were flat against my sides. My breathing was slow. I counted my steps. Thirty-seven to the restroom door.

Inside, I locked myself in a stall. I sat on the closed toilet lid. The blanket smelled worse in the small space. I pressed my palms against my knees. I looked at the tile floor. Someone had written *JENNA WAS HERE 2019* in Sharpie on the stall door.

I stayed there for six minutes. I counted them.

Then I stood up. I washed my face in the sink. The blood came off. The split in my lip was small. It would heal.

I walked back to the car. Angelique was in the front seat wearing my blouse and skirt. The blouse was unbuttoned one button lower than I ever wore it. She'd rolled the skirt's waistband to make it shorter.

She smiled at me through the windshield.

I got in the back seat. The blanket bunched around my waist. I pulled it up. It slipped down. I gave up.

Ethan started the engine.

"Okay," he said. "We'll head back. Happy now?"

I said nothing.

We drove for forty minutes. Then Angelique made a sound. A small gasp.

"What?" Ethan said.

"My earrings," she said. Her hand went to her ear. "The pearls you gave me. They're gone."

"What?"

"I must have lost them at the rest stop." Her voice broke. "Ethan, I'm so sorry. I know how much they cost. I know you picked them out yourself."

"Hey, it's okay," he said. "We'll get new ones."

"I can't just replace them. They were from you. For my birthday."

She started crying. Soft, shaking sobs.

Ethan reached over and took her hand.

"There's a jewelry store in Philly," he said. "We'll stop. I'll get you the same ones."

"Are you sure?"

"Of course."

I looked at the clock on the dashboard. Four thirty-seven. We were two hours from Brooklyn. Maybe less if we didn't stop.

Angelique turned in her seat. She looked back at me. Her eyes were dry.

She smiled.

I looked out the window. I watched the highway markers pass. I flattened my hands on my thighs. I slowed my breathing.

I was still deciding what I was going to do.

But the list was getting longer.

The brownstone looked wrong from the curb. Yellow tape stretched across the front door. Two squad cars sat at angles in the street. Their lights were off but the radios crackled.

Ethan pulled up behind the second car and killed the engine. He sat there for three seconds. Then he got out.

I stayed in the back seat. The blanket had slipped again. I pulled it up. The hole in the center was getting bigger.

Angelique got out slowly. She smoothed my skirt over her thighs. She walked around the car and stood next to Ethan. Her hand found his.

A detective came down the front steps. He was in his fifties. Gray suit. Tired eyes. He looked at Ethan, then at Angelique, then at me through the car window.

I opened the door and got out. My bare feet touched the sidewalk. It was cold.

"Mr. Reed?" the detective said.

"Yes." Ethan's voice was tight. "What happened? Is my mother—"

"I'm Detective Brennan. I'm sorry to tell you that your mother was killed during the break-in. The intruders beat her when she refused to hand over valuables. She died at the scene."

Ethan made a sound. Not a word. Just a sound. He dropped to his knees on the front steps. His hands went to his face. He sobbed. The sound was raw and animal.

Angelique knelt beside him. She wrapped both arms around his shoulders. She pressed her face against his neck.

"She was trying to call Shiloh for help the whole time," Angelique said. Her voice was soft but it carried. "And Shiloh did nothing. She wanted this."

Detective Brennan's gaze shifted to me. He took in the blanket. The split lip. The bare feet. He pulled a notebook from his jacket.

"Ma'am," he said. "I'm going to need to ask you some questions."

I nodded. I didn't trust my voice yet.

Ethan looked up at me from the steps. His face was wet. His eyes were red. But underneath the grief was something else. Something cold.

"You killed her," he said. "You let her die because you were jealous."

I said nothing.

Detective Brennan wrote something in his notebook.

---

Forty-eight hours later, Ethan still wouldn't speak to me. He slept in the master bedroom. I slept in the office. Angelique slept in the guest room. Her suitcases were unpacked. Her toiletries lined the bathroom counter.

On the second day, Ethan gave an interview to Channel 7. I watched it on my laptop in the Tribeca office. Kimber sat across from me. She didn't say anything. She just watched.

Ethan sat on the brownstone's front steps. The interviewer was a blonde woman in a red blazer. She held the microphone with both hands.

"There was tension in the marriage," Ethan said. His voice broke. "My mother was afraid of Shiloh's temper. She told me that. Multiple times."

"Did your wife have any reason to resent your mother?" the interviewer asked.

"My mother was protective of me. Shiloh couldn't handle that. She wanted to be the only woman in my life. She said that. Those exact words."

The interviewer nodded. "And on the day of the break-in, your wife received a distress text from your mother?"

"Yes. She showed it to me. Then she destroyed the evidence. Threw her phone out the car window. She didn't want anyone to know she'd ignored the call for help."

I closed the laptop.

Kimber leaned back in her chair. "He's building a narrative."

"I know."

"We need to build ours."

I opened a new file on my desktop. I labeled it *Reed v. Barnes — Defense*. I started typing. Kimber watched the cursor move.

"How long have you been planning this?" she asked.

"Since the wedding," I said.

She smiled. It was the first time I'd seen her smile in two days.

---

Two weeks after Margaret's murder, a courier arrived at the Tribeca office. He handed me a manila envelope. I signed for it. He left.

I opened the envelope at my desk. Kimber was on the phone with a forensics contact. She ended the call when she saw my face.

"What is it?"

I handed her the papers.

She read them in silence. Her jaw tightened. When she finished, she set them on the desk.

"Conspiracy to commit murder," she said. "Represented by Victor Garrison. Angelique's deposition as the centerpiece. Theory is you hired the intruders to kill Margaret during the honeymoon to establish an alibi. Motivated by a long-standing feud over Ethan's affections."

I nodded.

Kimber picked up the papers again. She flipped to the last page. "They're asking for a Manhattan venue. Criminal court."

She looked at me. Her eyes were sharp.

"They just handed us the venue," she said.

I opened the Reed v. Barnes file. I pulled up the evidence inventory. Seventeen items so far. Financial records. Phone logs. Security footage. Background checks.

I added a new line: *Prosecution filing — conspiracy charge.*

Kimber stood up. She walked to the window. The street below was crowded. Lunch hour. People moving fast.

"When do you want to move?" she asked.

"Not yet," I said. "Let them think they're winning."

She turned around. "How long?"

I looked at the screen. At the list of evidence. At the gaps still waiting to be filled.

"Until we have everything," I said.

Kimber nodded. She sat back down. She picked up her phone.

"I'll call Rosa Alvarez," she said. "See if her Ring camera caught anything the week before the break-in."

I didn't ask how she knew about Rosa's camera. Kimber always knew.

I went back to the evidence file. I added a new section: *Angelique Campbell — Financial History.*

I started typing.

Outside, the city kept moving. Inside, I built the case that would end this.

One line at a time.