“How should I know? Maybe she needed cash urgently.”
Darius nervously extinguished the cigarette on the windowsill.
“Kiki, I don’t know. She wrote that it was a misunderstanding, that they accused her of attempted fraud. It’s nonsense.”
Kiana nodded.
“I see. And whose card was she trying to use?”
He froze, looking at her with a long, scrutinizing gaze.
Something flashed in his eyes—fear, suspicion, despair.
“Hers, probably. Whose else?”
“I don’t know. You know best.”
The silence stretched on.
They stood facing each other, and the air between them was so thick it could have been cut with a knife.
“I don’t know anything,” Darius finally choked out. “Absolutely nothing. It’s some kind of mistake.”
Kiana smirked.
“A mistake, of course.”
She turned and headed for the kitchen.
She turned on the light and put the kettle on.
Her hands were calm and steady.
Darius followed her, stopping by the table.
“Kiki,” he began cautiously, “did you, by any chance, change the PIN on your card?”
She turned around, raising an eyebrow.
“Yes. I did. Day before yesterday. Why?”
His face fell.
“Why?”
“For security. You were the one who said we need to be careful. So I decided to protect myself.”
He was silent.
Kiana could almost see him frantically trying to figure out what had gone wrong.
The kettle boiled.
She poured water into a mug and dropped in a tea bag.
“And I left the old PIN on my other card,” she continued calmly, stirring her tea. “The spare one. It only has three dollars on it, but the card is active.”
Darius turned even paler.
“Three dollars?”
“Mhm. But the card is linked to the bank’s security service. You know that thing? If someone tries to withdraw a large sum, the bank immediately blocks the operation and calls security. Convenient, right?”
Silence.
It was so heavy that she wanted to open the window and let in some fresh air.
Darius stood with his mouth agape, looking at her as if she were a ghost.
Then he swallowed and ran a hand over his face.
“Did you… did you do that on purpose?”
Kiana sipped her tea.
“Of course I did it on purpose. Did you think I didn’t hear your conversation with your mother in the kitchen about getting the PIN and withdrawing the money?”
He backed away as if she had struck him.
“I… we… It’s not what you think.”
“It’s not?”
Kiana smiled sadly.
“Darius, I heard every single word. Your brilliant plan to steal my money, split it fifty‑fifty, and blame it on scammers. Clever plan. I’ll give you that.”
He tried to say something, but his voice broke.
“Kiki, Mom came up with it. I was against it, honestly. She just pressured me, saying she had nothing to live on, saying you were greedy—”
“Stop.”
Kiana raised her hand.
“Don’t try to pin everything on your mother. You agreed to it. You just dictated the PIN to her half an hour ago. I heard everything, so don’t lie.”
Darius slumped into a chair, burying his head in his hands.
“God, what’s going to happen now? What’s going to happen now?”
Kiana finished her tea and put the mug in the sink.
“Now your mother is sitting at the bank explaining to the security service why she was trying to withdraw over a hundred thousand dollars from someone else’s card. They might transfer the case to the police if they want to. It depends on whether I file a report.”
He looked up quickly.
“You won’t file one. Please don’t. That’s my mom. They’ll arrest her.”
Kiana looked at him for a long, scrutinizing moment.
There he sat, pathetic and scared, begging for mercy for his mom—the same person who had tried to clean out his wife an hour earlier.
“I don’t know,” she said finally. “I haven’t decided yet.”
Darius jumped up and stepped toward her.
“Kiki, please understand. This was just a stupid mistake. We didn’t want to hurt you. We just needed the money.”
“Money is always needed,” she interrupted. “But normal people earn it. They don’t steal it from their wives.”
He fell silent, standing with his hands hanging uselessly at his sides, his face etched with complete despair.
Somewhere deep down, Kiana felt a faint pang of pity—but it was just that.
A faint, very faint pang.
“Go to bed,” she said tiredly. “We’ll talk in the morning.”
“In the morning?”
“Yes, in the morning. I’ll tell you what I’ve decided. For now, go.”
Darius nodded, stunned, and shuffled off to the bedroom.
Kiana remained standing in the kitchen, looking out the window.
Dawn was breaking outside, the gray pre‑dawn sky slowly pushing back the darkness.
The city was waking up slowly, reluctantly.
Darius’s phone vibrated again in the hallway.
Kiana walked out and picked it up from the floor.
Another message from Ms. Sterling.
Darius, they’re questioning me. They’re saying this is attempted felony theft. What should I do?
Kiana smirked and put the phone back down.
Let Darius deal with his mother himself.
She had played her part.
She returned to the kitchen and sat by the window.
Streetlights were still on, even though the sky was already light.
A few pedestrians hurried about their business.
A truck rumbled in the distance.
An ordinary morning.
Only for her, this day was a turning point.
Kiana pulled her phone from her robe pocket and texted her friend Shauna.
Hey, can I come over today? I need to talk.
The reply came almost instantly.
Of course. What happened?
I’ll tell you when I see you. I’ll be over around ten.
Kiana put her phone away and leaned back in her chair.
Inside, she was calm.
