Chapter 12
The court papers arrived the very next day.
Then came the asset freeze.
A legal notice was pasted across the door of Mrs. Watson’s condo.
The moment Bobby realized the home was really going to be taken, he packed up in the middle of the night, grabbed whatever cash was left in the apartment, and disappeared without saying a word to his mother.
Just like that, Mrs. Watson became truly alone.
That was when she finally broke.
She began camping outside my door every day. Gone was the swagger, the shrill confidence, the shameless entitlement.
Now she cried. She begged. She knelt. She banged her forehead against the floor.
“Lily, I was wrong. I know I was wrong now. Please help me. Please ask Mr. Vega to lower the amount. Or lend me some money. I’ll repay you in the next life if I have to.”
I stood behind my security door and looked at the tears and mucus running down her face.
All I felt was disgust.
If I hadn’t fought back, if I hadn’t kept evidence, if I had been exactly as soft as she believed I was, then the one kneeling there crying might have been me.
Would she have spared me?
Of course not.
She would have stepped over my body and smiled while counting the money.
“Mrs. Watson,” I said through the door, my voice flat, “some mistakes can’t be fixed. And if you keep harassing me, I’ll call the police.”
Then I did exactly that.
The police took her away once.
But even that wasn’t the end.
Victor’s men began lingering near the entrance to the building every day. Whenever Mrs. Watson appeared, they followed her.
They didn’t hit her.
They didn’t yell at her.
They just watched.
That kind of pressure is worse than violence. It peels the mind apart one layer at a time.
The woman who had once strutted through the building like she owned it became a neighborhood ghost.
She tried collecting recyclables for money, but other collectors chased her off.
She tried staging fake accidents for payouts, but the second anyone saw tattooed men shadowing her, they paid her a little money just to leave, and that money was immediately taken by Victor’s people toward the debt.
That was what the end of the road looked like.