I read her file with steady hands, and I thought about a cedar-smelling man crouched in front of a cell telling me no one likes a proud woman in a cage.

He had been so sure he was ending my story.

What he had actually done — and he understands it now, I think, somewhere behind the concrete walls where he has seven years left to understand it — was lock a woman who knew exactly how his money moved in a quiet room, with nothing to distract her, and give her two years to read.

“Tell Sandra to come in,” I said, and reached for my blazer.

“And tell her she doesn’t have to fight them alone.”

THE END.