“This isn’t over,” he said quietly, venom threading through his tone.

“It isn’t,” I replied. “But Friday is.”

Something flickered across his face—uncertainty, just for a heartbeat—because he understood exactly what I meant. The clean version of his plan, the one he imagined smooth and final, was gone.

He walked past the deputy and Natalie into the cold morning air. The door closed behind him.

Silence filled the house.

The locksmith handed me the new keys. They felt heavier than they should, a tangible weight of ownership and assertion.