He Made Me Financially Dependent So I’d Never Leave — He Forgot I Used to Be a Risk Analyst, and I’d Been Preparing for Eleven Months

That, in the end, was the real preparation.

The suitcases were easy.

Believing myself was the work.

Chapter 13 — The Phone Call

That first night, in the temporary apartment Victoria had arranged, Lucas stood at the window looking out at a skyline he had never seen, and Amelia asked, with a four-year-old’s magnificent priorities, whether anyone had remembered dinner.

Victoria had ordered food.