Chapter 25

Kayna’s POV

The attic was far too quiet. Dust floated in the thin strip of light from the single bulb, and my heart beat so loudly I wondered if the whole house could hear it. I didn’t know if I should run or see through what I had just started.

I stared at the stack of envelopes in the box before me, my hands hovering like I was afraid they might bite. My father’s handwriting covered some of them—jagged, sharp strokes I recognized from old birthday cards and notes he used to leave tucked into my lunchbox when I was a little girl.

I really wished that those days had lasted longer.

It all smelt of dust and memory. I sat cross-legged on the creaky floorboards, the box of letters between my knees, staring at them as though opening one might change everything I thought I knew about my father.

Seeing it now, after all these years, was like being punched in the chest. It had been years since I’d seen his writing.

And now here it was. Waiting.

The envelopes were yellowed with age, corners curling, but his handwriting still carried the same sharp edges.

I traced the letters with a finger, my breath catching.

I reached for the first envelope.

I pulled the first envelope free, my hands trembling. The paper was brittle, the ink faded around the edges. For a moment, I hesitated. What if the words inside weren’t what I wanted to hear? What if they confirmed the worst of what Mateo had told me—that my father had been tangled in things far darker than I could imagine?

But I had come this far. I had to know.

Carefully, I unfolded it, smoothing the creases with my trembling fingers.

My Dearest Lila,

If this reaches you, then it means the prison guards haven’t torn it to pieces. I don’t trust these walls or the men who watch us. They read more than they deliver. They know more than they should. But I’m writing anyway, because not speaking to you is worse than any risk I might take.

By the time you read this, I’ll have been here a hundred nights. A hundred nights of silence broken only by shouts and chains. I dream of you every night—your voice, your hands, the sound of the children’s laughter. I stopped marking the days on the wall after the first thirty—something about watching the lines multiply made it harder, not easier. But I know because the man in the next cell scratches his own tally every night like it’s his only prayer, and I’ve counted alongside him, even if I don’t draw the marks myself.

I want you to know that not a single one of those nights has passed without me thinking of you and the children.

Lila, I have to tell you what I can, though there’s much I cannot. I know what they say about me. About the deals. About the shipments. But remember this: not every man locked away here is guilty of what the world believes. And not every guilty man is a monster.

Not everything that put me here is what they say. Yes, I broke laws. Yes, I walked too close to fire. But there are things in motion beyond my control, names that can’t be spoken in letters because letters are never as private as they should be.

What I did, I did because there were men with teeth at our door. Because there are circles in this city where mercy doesn’t exist, and if you don’t take their hand, they take your life. I chose to play their game long enough to keep them from swallowing us whole. That’s the truth. Believe it or not, that choice kept you and the children safe.

If you’ve heard whispers about what I was dealing in, about the shipments, know this: it wasn’t about greed. It was about survival. About protection. You may never understand it, but every move I made, every risk I took, was to make sure you and the children would never be at the mercy of men far worse than me.

I cannot tell you the names. Not here. Not now. But know this: if anyone ever comes asking questions about me,say nothing. Nothing will keep you safer than silence.

Yours always,

Elijah

The words blurred as tears welled in my eyes. I pressed the letter flat against my knees, reading it again, slower this time, every line cutting deeper.

He remembered my humming. He remembered the sound of my childhood. And yet between those tender fragments lay truths that twisted my stomach.

Shipments. Deals. Men with teeth.

I had imagined my father as flawed, maybe reckless, maybe desperate. But not this. Not someone who had stepped into shadows with men who didn’t believe in mercy.

My hands shook as I refolded the letter.

I wanted to believe him when he said he wasn’t guilty of everything they claimed. I wanted to hold on to the part of him who remembered my humming. But I couldn’t ignore what I had just read.

The father I had loved had been involved with dangerous men. Maybe for us. Maybe because he had no choice. But the danger hadn’t disappeared with him. He’d warned my mother to say nothing, warned her to keep us far away.

And here I was, knee-deep in the truth I wasn’t supposed to touch.

As I slid the letter back into its envelope, the box shifted. A smaller envelope slipped free, landing faceup on the dusty floorboards.

My breath caught.

It wasn’t addressed to my mother.

It was addressed to me.

My name. Written in his hand.

A thousand thoughts crashed into me at once. Why would he write to me? What could he possibly have to say to a daughter he’d left behind, a little girl too young to understand why her father never came home?

My fingers hovered above it, but I couldn’t bring myself to touch it, let alone open it. Not tonight.

I shoved the envelope back into the box, closed the lid with shaking hands,  pushed it into the darkest corner of the attic.

Not now. Not yet.

My chest rose and fell quickly as if I’d just run a mile. I didn’t know what the letter contained, but I knew one thing with absolute certainty:

Whatever answers my father had left for me—they weren’t going anywhere. But if I opened them tonight, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to breathe under the weight of it.

I needed time.

I climbed down the attic steps, closing the hatch behind me. The house felt different now, heavier. The silence pressed against my ears, and no matter how I tried, I couldn’t push my father’s words out of my head.

Men with teeth at our door. Say nothing. Keep them away from this world.

Too late.

The shadows he had warned about were already here.

And I had just found proof that my father had left me something I wasn’t sure I was ready to unpack.