Her mouth opened.
“But I didn’t mean—”
“You said the cameras didn’t cover the backyard.”
The yard went silent.
And I felt something inside me shift.
Because that was the first time I realized something important.
They weren’t just afraid of the police.
They were afraid of what else might come out.
The sirens appeared in the distance less than five minutes later.
Five minutes.
That’s all it took.
Five minutes for the entire world they had built around me to collapse.
My husband stepped back from the dirt.
His mother grabbed his arm.
“Don’t say anything.”
That sentence.
Those four words.
They were the first thing she said when she realized they were in trouble.
Not:
“Are you okay?”
Not:
“Get her out.”
Not:
“What have we done?”
Just:
“Don’t say anything.”
The officers rushed through the gate.
One of them immediately moved toward me.
