로그인They spent all day strategizing.Called Marcus. Explained the situation.“Extortion is a crime,” Marcus said. “We can report it. Get the police involved.”“And risk Viktor retaliating before they catch him?” Penking asked. “No. Too dangerous.”“Then pay him. Half a million is a lot but not worth your family’s safety.”“Paying sets a precedent. Next year he’ll want more. And more. It never ends.”“So what’s your alternative?”Nobody had an answer.That night, Amelia found Penking in the garage.Looking at old tools. Old equipment. Things he’d used in his previous life.“What are you doing?” she asked.“Remembering. How I used to solve problems.”“Those solutions don’t work anymore.”“Don’t they? Viktor’s threatening our kids. The old me would have handled that in an hour. Permanently.”“And the new you?”“The new me is useless. Can’t protect anyone. Can’t do anything except wait for Viktor to make good on his threats.”She sat beside him. “The new you built a life Viktor can’t touch. A
With Ellie gone, the house felt emptier.Sam was a senior now. Busy with basketball. College scouts. SATs. His own life.Hope was twelve. Middle school. Growing up too fast.Amelia and Penking had more time alone. Dinners without kids. Quiet evenings. Space to breathe.It should have been romantic. Peaceful.Instead, it felt strange.“We don’t know how to be just us anymore,” Amelia said one night.They were sitting on the couch. TV playing something neither watched.“What do you mean?”“We’ve been parents for so long. Our whole relationship has been about the kids. Protecting them. Raising them. And now. They’re leaving. And I don’t know who we are without that.”Penking muted the TV. “We’re the same people who fell in love. We’re just older. Greyer. More tired.”“Are we though? We fell in love in chaos. In survival mode. Now it’s just. Normal. And I don’t know if we work in normal.”“You think we only work when things are hard?”“I think we’re good in crisis. Great even. But day to
Summer came fast.The kids were out of school. Lazy days. Pool time. Boredom complaints.Normal kid stuff.Ellie turned seventeen. Got her license. Immediately wanted the car all the time.“No,” Amelia said for the hundredth time.“Why not? I’m a good driver.”“Because we need the car too. And you just got your license. You can use it when we don’t need it.”“That’s never.”“That’s parenthood.”Ellie stomped off.Penking laughed. “She’s exactly like you.”“I was never that dramatic.”“You absolutely were. Just in different ways.”“Name one time.”“When I first brought you here. You threw a contract at my head and called me a bastard.”“That was justified.”“Still dramatic.”She threw a pillow at him. “Shut up.”He caught it. Grinned. “See? Dramatic.”They were happy. Comfortable. The kind of couple who teased and laughed and fit.It had taken years. So many years. But they’d gotten here.To normal. To good. To right.One afternoon, Amelia got an email.From a producer. About her book.
The move happened in June.Hot. Humid. Exhausting.Boxes everywhere. Movers hauling furniture. Kids running around getting in the way.Chaos.But also possibility.The new house was bigger. Yard for the kids. Quiet street. Neighbors who smiled and waved but didn’t ask questions.Perfect.Ellie got her own room. Actually her own. Not shared with Hope anymore.She decorated it immediately. Posters. Lights. Her space.Sam got the basement. Turned it into his own apartment basically. Basketball hoop outside. Friends welcome.Hope got the room with the window seat. Sat there for hours reading. Content.They settled in.New schools. New routines. New normal.Nobody knew them here. Nobody knew Penking’s past. Nobody cared.It was freeing.Ellie made friends quickly. Girls who liked the same music. Same shows. No questions about family history.Just friendship. Simple. Easy.Sam joined the basketball team. Made varsity as a sophomore. Coaches loved him.Nobody connected him to Kael Penking. H
Hope was different from her siblings.At ten years old, she didn’t ask questions about Penking’s past. Didn’t seem bothered by what other kids said.She just loved him. Simply. Completely.“Why doesn’t it bother you?” Ellie asked one day. “What Dad did. What people say.”Hope shrugged. “Because he’s Dad. That’s all that matters.”“But he killed people.”“That was before. I only know him now.”Ellie stared at her little sister. “You’re either really wise or really naive.”“Maybe both.”It was wisdom, Amelia thought. The kind that came from innocence. From not overthinking.From just loving without conditions.She wished she could bottle it. Give it to Ellie and Sam when the weight got too heavy.But some lessons couldn’t be taught. Only lived.One afternoon, Hope came home from school excited.“We’re doing family tree projects. I need to interview you and Dad about our family history.”Amelia’s stomach dropped. “Okay. What kind of questions?”“Where you were born. How you met. What job
Two years later, Ellie was fifteen.And she had questions. Real questions.She came to Amelia one afternoon. Serious. Determined.“I want to know everything,” she said.“Everything about what?”“About Dad. About his past. About what he really did. Not the sanitized version. The truth.”Amelia’s chest tightened. “Why now?”“Because I’m old enough. Because kids at school keep talking. And I don’t want to hear it from them. I want to hear it from you.”“What specifically do you want to know?”“How many people did he kill?”The question hung heavy.“I don’t know the exact number.”“Guess.”“Ellie—”“Mom. Please. I need to know what I’m defending. What I’m living with.”Amelia sat down. “Five. Maybe six. That he was directly responsible for. More if you count people who died because of his operations. But he wasn’t the one who actually. Who pulled the trigger or whatever.”“Five or six people. He murdered five or six people.”“Yes.”“And you married him anyway.”“I married him after he ser
She went to meet Olivia.The decision made itself somewhere between morning coffee and noon. She couldn’t stay trapped in the penthouse counting failed strategies while Devon rotted somewhere and Penking tightened his grip day by day.She needed options. Information. Anything.At 2:45 PM, she told
Amelia stared at her phone. January twenty third. Two weeks ago. The night at the club. The night Penking showed up during his rut. The night everything changed. She remembered him dragging her out. Remembered the car. The hotel room. But after that? Blank. She pressed her fingers to her temp
The lie slipped on a Thursday.Four days into way three. Four days of careful honesty layered over careful deception. Four days of sitting in his office, eating with him, reading his books, learning his silences.It was working. She could feel it.He was softer around her. Not soft. Never soft. But
The apartment looked smaller than she remembered.Amelia stood in the doorway, staring at the cramped space she’d called home for the past five years. Peeling wallpaper. Cracked tiles. A couch with springs poking through the fabric. It smelled like mold and cheap cleaning spray.She’d hated this pl







