“I interviewed in February with St. Bartholomew’s. Head of pharmacology research. I was going to turn it down because Brett said long distance was ridiculous and because he couldn’t leave his market and because—”
“Because you were engaged to a parasite,” Cassie supplied.
I laughed again, but this time there was shape to it.
“I never responded,” I said. “The recruiter followed up last week.”
Cassie’s grin turned dangerous. “London is perfect. Different country. Different number. Different everything. Sell the house. Take the job. Burn the bridge while they are over the Pacific.”
It sounded impossible. Then it sounded clean.
We worked until after two in the morning. I changed passwords, froze cards, transferred the remaining wedding funds into an account Brett could not access, and printed every screenshot twice. Cassie called my locksmith, her ex-brother-in-law, and left him a message that simply said, Emergency. Bring your drill. I called in sick to the pharmacy for the next day, the first unscheduled sick day I had taken in over five years. When Cassie finally left, she hugged me hard in the foyer.
“Do not answer them if they call,” she said. “And Val?”
“Yeah?”
“This ends with you safe. Not polite. Safe.”
After she drove away, I walked through the house turning off lights. The storm had moved east. Oak Street glistened under the lamps, quiet and scrubbed. Upstairs in my bedroom, I stripped the sheets off the bed because suddenly all fabric in the house felt compromised. I did not sleep. I lay on top of a blanket and watched the ceiling until dawn, replaying my life like a crime scene I had once mistaken for a home.
There had always been signs.