Phó Đình Thâm learned that I was dead at 11:17 the next morning.

Until then, he still believed I was punishing him.

He sat behind his desk at the law firm, reading the same paragraph of a contract for the fourth time.

His phone lay beside his hand.

No messages from me.

No missed calls.

Nothing.

That silence finally began to bother him.

His colleague, Trần Minh, noticed first.

“Still fighting with your wife?”

Đình Thâm did not look up.

“We’re not fighting.”

“Then why have you checked your phone every thirty seconds?”

He frowned.

“I haven’t.”

Trần Minh laughed.

“You definitely have.”

Before Đình Thâm could answer, the receptionist appeared at the door.

Her face was strange.

“Lawyer Phó… there are two police officers asking for you.”

His hand stopped over the keyboard.

“For me?”

“They said it concerns your wife.”

I was standing beside his desk.

For the first time since dying, I saw genuine fear enter his eyes.

He stood immediately.

The officers were waiting in the conference room.

One of them asked:

“Are you Phó Đình Thâm, husband of Khương Ninh?”

“Yes.”

“Can you confirm this?”

The officer placed my identity card on the table.

Đình Thâm stared at it.

My photograph.

My name.

My birth date.

His expression went blank.

“Where did you get that?”

The officer hesitated before answering.

“Your wife was involved in an incident last night.”

Đình Thâm’s face tightened.

“Where is she?”

Neither officer answered immediately.

He repeated:

“Where is my wife?”

The older officer spoke quietly.

“Mr. Phó, I’m sorry.”

That was all it took.

“No.”

Đình Thâm stepped backward.

“You’re mistaken.”

“We confirmed her identity this morning.”

“No.”

“She was found in an alley near Huaihai Road.”

“That’s impossible.”

His voice suddenly rose.

“My wife was at home yesterday.”

The officer looked at him.

“What time?”

Đình Thâm opened his mouth.

Then stopped.

I watched him remember.

Me standing in the kitchen.

Strawberries on the counter.

The cake box.

His coat in his hand.

My voice asking:

“What if I were the one who was afraid?”

And his answer.

You and her are not the same.

His lips lost their color.

“She…”

He swallowed.

“She called me.”

The younger officer checked his notes.

“Three times.”

Đình Thâm stared at him.

“How do you know?”

“We recovered part of her phone.”

Something seemed to collapse inside him.

He sat down.

The officer continued.

“According to the estimated timeline, those calls were made shortly before emergency services arrived.”

Đình Thâm slowly took out his phone.

Three missed calls.

They were still there.

He had never deleted them.

8:43 p.m.

8:45 p.m.

8:48 p.m.

Then his own message.

Don’t use this again to force me to come home.

His fingers started trembling.

“Was she…”

He struggled to finish.

“Was she conscious when she called?”

“We believe so.”

Đình Thâm closed his eyes.

For several seconds, nobody spoke.

Then he asked the question that destroyed whatever was left of him.

“How far away was she?”

The officer looked down at the file.

“Approximately one hundred eighty meters from your residential building.”

Đình Thâm’s eyes opened.

“One hundred… eighty?”

“Yes.”

He laughed once.

A horrible, empty sound.

“I was nearby.”

I knew.

Of course I knew.

That was the cruelest part.

While I was trying to reach him, his car had passed the intersection at the end of the street.

I had seen the headlights through the alley entrance.

For one stupid second, I thought he had come for me.

But the car turned right.

Taking Lục Vi home.

The police officer slid another item across the table.

A transparent evidence bag.

Inside it was a piece of cardboard stained by rain.

The corner of my cake box.

The words were blurred but still readable.

For Phó Đình Thâm.

His breathing stopped.

“That…”

His hand reached toward it but froze before touching the plastic.

“She made that?”

“Yes.”

I almost smiled.

Of all the things that could finally make him understand, it was a ruined cake.

Not my calls.

Not my silence.

A cake.

The conference room door suddenly opened.

Lục Vi stood outside.

She had apparently come to speak with him.

The moment she saw the police, she stopped.

“Đình Thâm?”

He looked at her.

I had never seen him look at anyone that way.

Not angry.

Not yet.

Simply empty.

Lục Vi stepped inside.

“What happened?”

Nobody answered.

Her eyes fell on my identity card.

Then the evidence bag.

Her face changed.

“What is that?”

Đình Thâm whispered:

“Khương Ninh is dead.”

Lục Vi covered her mouth.

“Oh my God.”

She stepped toward him.

“I’m so sorry.”

He moved away before she could touch him.

That surprised her.

“Đình Thâm…”

“What time did you call me last night?”

She blinked.

“What?”

“What time?”

“About eight thirty.”

“Were you actually in danger?”

Her face stiffened.

“I told you my ex-husband had been threatening me.”

“That isn’t what I asked.”

His voice became colder.

“Was he there?”

Lục Vi said nothing.

Đình Thâm stood.

“Was your ex-husband anywhere near your apartment last night?”

“I was scared.”

“Yes or no?”

“No.”

The room became silent.

She immediately added:

“But he had sent me messages before. I didn’t know whether he might come.”

Đình Thâm stared at her.

“So you called me.”

“I didn’t have anyone else.”

“You called the police?”

She lowered her eyes.

“No.”

“Building security?”

“No.”

“Your brother?”

“No.”

His jaw tightened.

“You called me.”

Tears appeared in Lục Vi’s eyes.

“Because I trusted you.”

I expected him to soften.

For years, her tears had always worked.

But this time he only looked at the three missed calls on his phone.

Then he whispered:

“And while I was comforting you, my wife was dying two streets away.”

Lục Vi turned pale.

“You couldn’t have known.”

That sentence should have comforted him.

Instead, it destroyed him.

Because I had tried to tell him.

Three times.

He had chosen not to know.

One of the officers interrupted.

“There is something else.”

Đình Thâm turned sharply.

The officer placed a small memory card on the table.

“A nearby shop had an exterior camera. It captured part of the incident.”

My husband’s face went rigid.

The officer continued carefully.

“We also recovered audio from your wife’s damaged phone.”

Đình Thâm stared at him.

“Audio?”

“She appears to have accidentally activated a recording function after the second call.”

I didn’t know that.

Even I moved closer.

“There’s a voice in the recording,” the officer said.

“The suspect’s?”

“Possibly.”

The officer looked at Lục Vi.

Then back at Đình Thâm.

“But there is something unusual.”

“What?”

“The attacker repeatedly asked your wife about a legal document.”

Đình Thâm frowned.

“What document?”

“We hoped you could tell us.”

“I don’t know.”

The officer opened his notebook.

“The recording contains one clear sentence.”

He read it slowly.

“Where did your husband hide the original?”

Đình Thâm went completely still.

I stared at him.

Because suddenly I remembered.

Three weeks earlier, I had found a sealed file inside our home safe.

I had never opened it.

Đình Thâm had returned unexpectedly and taken it from my hands.

For the first time in our marriage, he had shouted at me.

“Never touch that file again.”

I thought it was confidential client material.

Now his expression told me otherwise.

The officer noticed too.

“Mr. Phó?”

Đình Thâm didn’t respond.

Lục Vi took a small step toward the door.

Only one.

But the younger officer saw it.

“Miss Lục, please remain here.”

She froze.

Đình Thâm slowly turned toward her.

Something in his face changed.

“Why are you nervous?”

“I’m not.”

“You knew I had documents at home.”

She shook her head immediately.

“No.”

“You used my study before your divorce case.”

“That was months ago.”

The officer’s phone suddenly rang.

He answered.

“Yes?”

His expression sharpened.

“Send it now.”

A few seconds later, he received an image.

He looked at it.

Then at Lục Vi.

Then at my husband.

“We enhanced the security footage.”

Đình Thâm grabbed the phone.

The attacker’s face was partially hidden.

But the vehicle waiting at the end of the alley was visible.

A black sedan.

Its license plate was clear.

Lục Vi’s knees nearly gave way.

Because I recognized that car.

So did Đình Thâm.

He had driven it many times.

It belonged to the law firm.

More precisely…

to his senior partner.

The man who had handed him the Young Lawyer of the Year award only hours before my death.

Đình Thâm looked up slowly.

The officer spoke.

“Mr. Phó, we need you to come with us.”

But my husband wasn’t listening anymore.

He was staring at the photograph.

Then he whispered a name.

“Chairman Tần…”

And suddenly I remembered the last thing I had heard before everything went dark.

The attacker had crouched beside me, searching through my bag.

His phone rang.

He answered.

And a man on the other end had said only one sentence:

“Make sure Phó Đình Thâm never learns that his wife found the file.”

My husband thought my death was the punishment for choosing another woman over me.

He still had no idea that I had been killed because of a secret hidden inside his own office.

And the person responsible was already watching him.