He never once let her back in.

Chapter 17 — What Came After

They led her out into the afternoon, and the strange, ordinary quiet that follows a catastrophe settled over the house.

The contracts were voided under their own fraud clauses.

Her brother’s agency was raided, and the two of them were charged together, and the investigation — once it had a thread to pull — found more: two earlier schemes, in two earlier cities, built on fabricated debts and stolen identity documents and, I suspect, other trusting people whose mothers had not thought to put on a uniform.

In the end she took a plea: prison, restitution, a permanent fraud judgment that would follow her name for the rest of her life.

Her brother lost his business and was sentenced separately.

The machinery of the law, once it was finally allowed to see her, was thorough.

But the law was never the hard part.

My son was.