The door clicked shut with a definitive, metallic softness, leaving Gwendolyn Preston alone in the dim light of the guest room. She didn't turn on the lamp. Instead, she moved toward the bed with the careful, hesitant steps of someone who still expected the floor to vanish beneath her. Outside, the rain had intensified, a rhythmic, drumming downpour that blurred the world beyond the glass into a smear of grey and black.
She lay back, the high-thread-count sheets feeling like a foreign luxury against her skin. For two days, she had slept in snatches on plastic bus station chairs or leaned against cold brick walls. Now, the silence of the apartment felt heavy—not with threat, but with the sudden, crushing weight of relief. As she listened to the rain, she covered her face with her palms and
