He shook his head violently, tears already pooling. “No. Please. We can’t. Something bad is going to happen.”
A few people glanced our way. I gently pulled him closer.
“Kenzo, baby, listen to me. You’re safe. Daddy’s just on a trip. Nothing bad is going to happen.”
“Mama, please,” he said, his voice breaking. “This time you have to believe me.”
This time.
The words stung because they were deserved.
A few weeks earlier, he’d told me about a dark car parked in front of our Buckhead house late at night. I’d brushed it off. Another time, he mentioned hearing his dad talking in his office about “fixing things for good.” I’d told him grown-up conversations weren’t for kids.
Now he was shaking in front of me, begging.
I took a breath. “Okay,” I said quietly. “Tell me what you heard.”
He leaned close, lips brushing my ear.
“This morning,” he whispered, “I woke up early to get water. Daddy was in his office on the phone. He said tonight something bad was going to happen while we were sleeping. He said he needed to be far away. That we wouldn’t be in his way anymore.”
The world tilted.
I pulled back and searched his face. “Are you sure, baby?”
He nodded, frantic. “He said people were going to take care of it. His voice was scary, Mama. Not like Daddy.”
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