“Anything.”

“Do not let them near Mia without you.”

“I promise.”

“Then we have done the important part.”

After we ended the call, I stayed at the table holding my phone. From the outside, the sequence might have looked like justice arriving quickly. A report.

A house. An estate plan. Consequences. Inside me there was no victory. Only exhaustion. My family had been fractured long before South Padre Island. That week simply removed the decorations concealing the cracks.