Outside the station, I leaned against my car and called Rachel.

She answered at once.

Her first words were not a request for details.

“I changed the sheets in the spare room.

Lily can pick the blanket she wants.”

After everything that had happened, that small offer was enough to make me cry.

I laid out the fake business trip, the secondary phone, what Lily overheard, and the recent insurance policy.

I didn’t embellish.