Part 4 — After the accident, my husband demanded my signature, but when the investigator appeared in the room, Victoria’s smile disappeared

Before Elena finished speaking, the investigator switched off the phone and ordered the police officers to take Andrei away.

Andrei turned around at the door again.

“Marika, believe me, I was not against you.”

I looked at him.

“Then why did you need me to die?”

This time he had no answer.

His footsteps sounded in the corridor, and soon the heavy elevator door closed. And I felt a strange emptiness. Twelve years do not disappear in one moment. They simply change their face.

That same night the investigator called the bank, the company’s legal department, and the city road service.

The telephones rang continuously.

Andrei’s lawyer tried several times to contact me, but Elena answered every call.

“My client wants to speak with his wife personally,” the lawyer said.

“Your client can speak with the investigator,” Elena replied.

“This is a family matter.”

“Brakes are not a family matter.”

The next morning the lawyer himself went to the department. Two hours later he came out without having a contract with Andrei anymore.

Later I learned why.

The investigator made Andrei listen to his own words. The recording was played in a small room where sound did not reflect from the walls.

“When the brakes fail, control of the trust will move to the next stage. When the auditors come, it will already no longer exist.”

Andrei lowered his head.

“This has been taken out of context,” he said.

“Which part?” the investigator asked. “‘Brakes,’ ‘it will no longer exist,’ or ‘control of the trust’?”

For the first time Andrei heard his own voice as others heard it.

He fell silent.

Then for hours he tried to regain control. He called board members, sent messages, and threatened to freeze the shares.

But the bank suspended the accounts.

The company’s board temporarily removed him from his position.

And Victoria gave testimony.

She admitted that Andrei had forced her to prepare the documents and told her that I had already agreed.

“I thought he was only speeding up the process legally,” she said to the investigator. “Then I learned that some device had been installed in the car.”

“Who installed it?” the investigator asked.

Victoria lowered her eyes.

“I do not know. But Andrei told me that he would find a specialist for it.”

We opened the safe two days later.

It was in the company’s old building, at the end of the basement, behind an iron door. The door smelled of oil and damp paper.

Elena used one key, and I had to insert the other, although both my hands were still in casts.

The investigator helped me.

The key entered the lock.

The door opened.

Inside were the originals of the transfers, forged signatures, the invoice for purchasing the car device, and one note that proved to be the heaviest evidence against Andrei.

It was not about another person.

It was his letter, written in his own hand.

“If Marika survives, we must convince her that the accident was accidental. If she does not survive, the share-transfer document will take effect.”

Elena let the paper fall from her hand.

And I was no longer crying.

Sometimes the truth is so large that it leaves no tears either.

The documents and recordings taken from the safe finally changed the case. Andrei was charged with attempted murder, financial fraud, and document forgery. Victoria remained a witness and left the company. She did not become my friend, but once she called me and said only this:

“I know it is late, but I am sorry.”

“It is late,” I answered. “Though you still heard the apology.”

My physical recovery proceeded slowly.

Three weeks later I moved my left finger slightly.

Four weeks later I managed to hold a glass myself.

When I did not spill the water for the first time, the doctor smiled at me.

“You are still the same woman who came in here,” he told me.

“No,” I replied. “I am no longer exactly the same.”

On the day I left the hospital, the sky was clear. Elena drove me to my new apartment, which I rented on the other side of the city, near a small park.

There was no Andrei’s office there.

Nor the smell of his shirts.

Nor documents scattered in front of the door.

On the first evening the rooms seemed so empty that the sound of my own footsteps frightened me.

I placed a small table by the kitchen window. On it I arranged a blue ceramic cup, painkillers, and the leather case in which I had hidden the recording device.

The case had been torn in the accident. A small crescent-shaped scratch remained in its corner.

I looked at it for a long time.

This object once meant fear.

Now it reminded me that I had not abandoned my own voice completely.

Two months later I went to the first hearing of the trial. Andrei looked much smaller in the courtroom than he did in my memories.

He was no longer wearing an expensive watch.

Nor did he have his confident smile.

When he looked at me, he nodded.

I nodded only once in reply.

I did not feel hatred.

That was the most unexpected thing.

I realized that the person I had loved for so many years already lived in the past. And I was no longer going to return there.

Several weeks after the hearing, my niece, little Nino, came to me. In her hand she held a sheet of paper colored with pencils.

“Aunt, I drew this for you,” she told me.

On the paper there was a small house with yellow light at the windows. A woman stood in front of the house, holding something round in her hand.

“What is this?” I asked.

“Your shield,” Nino answered. “Mom told me that you protected yourself.”

I laughed.

“It is not a shield, but a phone case.”

“It is still a shield.”

I attached the paper to the refrigerator.

In the third month I began working as an audit consultant at Elena’s company. At first I only checked documents. Then I created my own team from people who had previously been silent and obeyed other people’s decisions.

Our first rule was simple too: not one signature instead of trust.

Every document was checked twice.

Every word was recorded.

Every person had the right to say “no.”

On the first winter morning snow came to the city. It laid a white layer on the windowsill and muffled the voices of people walking in the park.

I made tea in the kitchen. With my right hand I held the cup, and with my left hand I picked up the phone case.

At that same moment I received a message.

It was from Andrei.

“Could we meet at least once? Now I understand everything. I know that I lost you. But we had twelve years.”

A second message followed immediately.

“I still love you.”

I looked at the screen for a long time.

Then I wrote a reply.

“We had twelve years. You decided that my life was worth less than your affairs. Now my life belongs to me. Do not contact me again.”

I pressed the send button and put the phone on the table.

Neither were my hands trembling.

Nor did my heart hurt.

I went to the window. Snow was still falling. Nino’s drawing hung on the refrigerator, while the torn leather case lay on the table.

Its crescent-shaped scratch glittered in the morning light.

I took the case into my palm and thought for the first time that it was no longer the evidence of that day.

It was the key to my new life.

And this time I opened the door myself.