“Nine o’clock, Madeline. Do not be foolish.”

She opened the door, stepped out into the cold night air, and pulled it shut behind her.

The lock clicked back into place.

I stood in the silence of the dining room for a long moment, staring at the thick stack of paper on the table.

The house was completely still.

Then, the hallway door creaked open.

Clara stepped out, her face pale, her arms wrapped around her chest.

“Mom?” she whispered. “Was that her?”

“Yes,” I said.

She walked to the table and looked down at the document.

“Did she… did she offer us money?”

“She offered us thirty-five million dollars,” I said.

Clara gasped, her hand flying to her mouth.

She looked at me, her eyes filled with a mixture of shock and sudden, desperate hope.

“Thirty-five million?” she repeated. “We could go away? We could be safe?”

I looked at my daughter, seeing the pain and fear that had hollowed out her cheeks over the last year.

It was a staggering amount of money.

It was enough to disappear forever, to buy the best security, to live in luxury anywhere on earth.