My voice rises. I try to check it, but I can’t. Because Owen is doing everything to protect us, even from wherever he is now. And I just don’t trust that Grady knows how to do the same.

“He has certainly helped,” he says. “WITSEC can be challenging about who they’re willing to help out, and these files plus his history underscore why he didn’t blow the whistle until now. Why he felt he had no choice but to stay on board.”

I take this in, feeling a weird mix of relief and something else. At first I think it’s irritation at Grady for withholding this, withholding that he’d heard from Owen, but then I realize it’s something more sinister. Because it’s starting to crystallize for me—what else Grady’s been withholding from me.

“And why are you sharing this information with me now?” I say.

“Because we need to be a united front when Bailey gets here,” he says. “About WITSEC, about the best way for you guys to move forward. And I know it doesn’t feel like it, but you won’t be starting over, not completely.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that money Owen left for Bailey? It’s legitimate earnings. It’s money Owen kept clean,” he says. “You’ll be entering WITSEC with a nice nest egg. Most people in our program don’t have anything close.”

“Sounds to me, Grady, that you’re saying if we decline, the money goes away…”

“If you decline, all of it goes away,” he says. “Being a family again, safely, goes away.”

I nod, knowing that’s what Grady’s trying to convince me of—that I should be on board with Bailey and me entering protection. That I need to be on board because everything is set up for Owen to join us in this new life. Everything is set up for our family to be reunited. New names, but reunited. Together.

Except this is what I can’t let go of despite Grady’s insistence, what I know Owen doesn’t want me to let go of. My doubt. My doubt when I think about the leak at WITSEC and when I think about Nicholas Bell. My doubt when I think about Owen’s hasty exit and what I know about him, which would explain it. The only thing that would explain it. Everything I know about Owen is convincing me of something else.

Grady is still talking. “We just need Bailey to understand that this is the best way to keep her as safe as possible,” he says.

As safe as possible. That stops me. Because he doesn’t just say safe. Because there is no safe. Not anymore.