Updated Oct 1, 2025 • ~11 min read
Morning came too bright, too early.
Juliette—Grace, she had to remember to think of herself as Grace now—woke disoriented in the unfamiliar bedroom. For a moment, she forgot where she was. Then reality crashed back. Idaho. Witness protection. A new name. A new life.
Roman’s side of the bed was empty but still warm.
She found him on the porch, coffee in hand, staring at the mountains. He’d barely slept—she could see it in the tension of his shoulders, the dark circles under his eyes.
“Hey,” she said softly, not wanting to startle him.
“Hey.” He didn’t turn. “It’s beautiful here. Peaceful.”
“You hate it.”
“I don’t hate it. I just—” He finally looked at her. “I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop. For someone to recognize us. For Nico’s people to show up. For it all to fall apart.”
“Me too.” She moved to stand beside him, taking his free hand. “But maybe that feeling goes away eventually. Maybe we learn to believe we’re actually safe.”
“Maybe.” He didn’t sound convinced.
They spent the morning exploring River Falls properly. It wasn’t much—a main street with a handful of shops, a library the size of Juliette’s old apartment, a diner that seemed to be the social hub of the entire town. Everyone stared at them. Small town curiosity, probably harmless, but it set Roman’s teeth on edge.
“New folks?” an older woman asked at the grocery store. “Haven’t seen you around.”
“Just moved in,” Juliette—Grace—said, practicing the story they’d memorized. “My husband got a job at the school. IT department.”
“Oh, how wonderful! I’m Lila Peterson, by the way. Run the library. You’ll have to come by—we do a book club every Thursday.”
“I’d like that,” Juliette heard herself say, even though the thought of small talk with strangers made her want to hide.
This was her life now. Grace Mallory. Book clubs and grocery stores and neighbors who wanted to know your business.
She wanted to scream.
Monday arrived with brutal efficiency.
River Falls Elementary was exactly what it sounded like—a small brick building with fifty students total, kindergarten through fifth grade. Juliette’s classroom held twelve first-graders who stared at her with wide eyes.
“Class, this is Mrs. Mallory,” the principal—a stern woman named Mrs. Whitaker—announced. “She’ll be your new teacher. Please make her feel welcome.”
“Hi, Mrs. Mallory!” the kids chorused.
Juliette forced a smile. “Hi, everyone. I’m so excited to be here.”
The lie tasted like ash.
She taught them math. Reading. The basics of being six years old in a world that made sense. And all the while, she felt like a fraud. Like any moment someone would realize she didn’t belong here, didn’t belong anywhere.
At lunch, the other teachers tried to be friendly.
“So, Portland?” a young woman named Hana asked. “What brought you all the way out here?”
“Fresh start,” Juliette said, the rehearsed answer rolling off her tongue. “We wanted small-town life. Slower pace.”
“Well, you found it. Not much happens in River Falls.” Hana laughed. “Biggest excitement we’ve had in months was when Old Man Delaney’s cow got loose and ended up in the church.”
Everyone laughed. Juliette laughed too, hollow and mechanical.
This was normal. This was safe.
This was slowly killing her.
Roman had it worse.
The school’s IT department was him. Just him. One room full of ancient computers and a network that barely functioned. His “job” was to fix technology that should have been replaced a decade ago while pretending he knew what he was doing.
“The printer’s jammed again,” a teacher complained on his second day.
“I’ll take a look,” Roman said, having no idea how to fix a printer.
He figured it out eventually—YouTube videos saved on his phone, watched in the supply closet where no one could see him fumbling. But every interaction felt like walking on glass. Every question about his background was a landmine waiting to explode their cover story.
“Seattle, huh?” the principal asked over lunch. “Seahawks fan?”
Roman had no idea what that meant. “Sure. Big fan.”
“Did you see that game last season? The one against the Rams?”
“Uh, yeah. Incredible.”
“I know, right? That last-minute field goal. Unbelievable.”
Roman nodded, having no context whatsoever. He made a mental note to research the Seahawks. And the Rams. And anything else that might come up in small talk that normal Nathan Mallory from Seattle would know.
He was exhausted by noon.
That evening, back at the house, they collapsed onto the couch together.
“How was your day, dear?” Juliette asked with exaggerated sweetness.
“Terrible. You?”
“Also terrible.” She laughed without humor. “I taught six-year-olds about vowels while dying inside.”
“I fixed printers while pretending to know what a Seahawk is.”
“A what?”
“Football team, apparently. From Seattle. Where I supposedly lived.”
“Oh God.” Juliette pressed her face into his shoulder. “We’re so bad at this.”
“Spectacularly bad.” He wrapped his arm around her. “But we’re trying. That counts for something.”
“Does it?”
Before he could answer, his phone rang. The burner phone, the one only Agent Marlowe had the number to.
His stomach dropped. “Yeah?”
“Roman. It’s Marlowe. We have a situation.”
“What kind of situation?”
“Kade Mercer. The witness who disappeared before trial? We found him.”
Roman’s blood turned to ice. “Where?”
“Dead. In a motel outside Boise. Single gunshot to the head, execution-style.” She paused. “Roman, Boise is three hours from you.”
The room tilted. “You think—”
“I think Nico’s people found him. And if they found him, they might know about the other witnesses. Which means you and Juliette could be next.”
“We’re in protected identities. Different names. How would they—”
“I don’t know. But I’m not taking chances. I’m putting additional surveillance on your location. And Roman?” Her voice went hard. “Stay vigilant. Don’t deviate from your cover story. And if you see anything suspicious—anything at all—you call me immediately.”
She hung up.
Roman sat staring at the phone, his mind racing. Kade was dead. Found and executed. Three hours away.
“What happened?” Juliette asked, her face pale.
He told her. Watched her process it, watched the fear bloom in her eyes.
“So we’re not safe,” she said flatly. “Even here. Even with new names. We’re not safe.”
“We don’t know that. Kade might have been careless, used his real name, something—”
“Or Nico’s people are hunting down everyone who testified against him. And we’re next.” She stood, pacing. “This is never going to end, is it? We’re going to spend the rest of our lives waiting for someone to find us.”
“Juliette—”
“Grace,” she corrected sharply. “I’m Grace now, remember? Juliette’s dead. And maybe that’s what we should be too. Maybe we should have died in Chicago instead of living like this.”
“Don’t say that.”
“Why not? It’s true!” She was crying now, angry tears streaming down her face. “I miss my family. I miss my life. I miss being a person instead of a ghost. And now you’re telling me it might all be for nothing? That they might find us anyway?”
Roman crossed to her, tried to pull her close, but she shoved him away.
“This is your fault! Your past, your enemies, your—”
“I know,” he said quietly. “I know it’s my fault. I’m sorry. I’m so goddamn sorry, Juliette.”
The use of her real name broke something. She collapsed against him, sobbing, and he held her while she fell apart.
“I can’t do this,” she whispered. “I can’t be Grace. I can’t pretend. I can’t—”
“Then don’t. Not with me.” He tilted her face up. “When it’s just us, you’re Juliette. Always. And I’m Roman. And we’re the people we’ve always been, just trying to survive.”
“What if surviving isn’t enough?”
“It’s all we have.” He pressed his forehead to hers. “But Juliette—if you want out, if you want to leave, go somewhere on your own where I can’t drag you into danger—”
“Don’t you dare.” She grabbed his shirt. “Don’t you dare try to martyr yourself again. I’m not leaving you. I’m just—I’m scared and angry and I needed to fall apart for a minute.”
“Fall apart all you want. I’ll catch you.”
They stood like that for a long time, holding each other in their fake house with their fake names, trying to believe that survival was worth it.
The next few days were tense.
Every car that drove past their house slowly. Every stranger who looked at them twice. Every phone call that might be bad news. They jumped at shadows, saw threats everywhere.
“This is paranoia,” Juliette said on the fourth day. “We’re losing our minds.”
“Better paranoid than dead.”
But he was right—the hypervigilance was exhausting. They couldn’t live like this forever.
A week after Marlowe’s call, Roman came home from school to find Juliette sitting at the kitchen table with papers spread everywhere.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“Research.” She looked up, and her eyes were fierce. “If Nico’s people are hunting former witnesses, we need to know who else is at risk. Who else might be targets.”
“Juliette—”
“There were six witnesses at trial besides us. Kade’s dead. That leaves five. If we can warn them, if we can help them—”
“We’d be breaking cover. Putting ourselves at risk.”
“We’re already at risk! At least this way we’d be doing something instead of just waiting to die.” She stood. “Roman, I can’t live like this. Can’t spend every day waiting for a bullet. I need to fight back. Even if it’s just warning people.”
He studied her—this woman who’d married him for money and become his entire world. She was right. Waiting was killing them as surely as a bullet would.
“Okay,” he said. “But we’re smart about it. Anonymous warnings. Nothing traceable. We don’t blow our cover.”
“Deal.”
They spent the night drafting messages. Warning the other witnesses to be careful, to stay vigilant, to watch for threats. Sent them through encrypted channels that couldn’t be traced back to Idaho.
It wasn’t much. But it was something.
It was fighting back.
Two weeks into their new life, something shifted.
Juliette found herself actually enjoying teaching. The kids were sweet, eager to learn, uncomplicated. She started to remember why she’d wanted this—working with children, shaping young minds, making a difference in small ways.
Roman made a friend. Another teacher, Malik—ironic name, given his friend in prison—who was also into tech and didn’t ask too many personal questions. They grabbed beers at the local bar, talked about nothing important, and Roman felt almost normal.
They started having dinner on the porch every night, watching the sunset paint the mountains gold. Started making inside jokes about their fake backstory. Started building a life that felt less like hiding and more like living.
“I think I might actually like it here,” Juliette admitted one evening. “Eventually. Maybe.”
“Yeah?” Roman pulled her close. “Because we can leave. Get reassigned somewhere else if this isn’t working.”
“No. I think—I think this might be working. Slowly. But working.”
“Good. Because I’m starting to like being Nathan Mallory. IT guy. Married to Grace the teacher. Living in the middle of nowhere.”
“Liar.”
“Okay, yes, I’m lying. But I’m trying to like it. That counts.”
She laughed—the first real laugh he’d heard from her in weeks. “You’re ridiculous.”
“You married me.”
“Twice.”
“Want to make it three? We still need to renew our vows. Be Nathan and Grace getting married for real.”
“Are you proposing to me right now?”
“I’m saying—when we’re ready, when this place feels like home—let’s do it. Get married again. Make it official in this life too.”
Juliette looked at the ring on her finger—her grandmother’s ring, the only piece of her old life she’d kept. “Okay. When we’re ready. When it feels safe.”
“Deal.”
That night, lying in bed, Roman’s phone buzzed with a text from an unknown number.
Found you.
His heart stopped.
He showed Juliette, watched her face go white.
“Who is this?” he typed back.
The response came immediately.
An old friend. Don’t worry. I’m not here to hurt you. I’m here to warn you. They’re coming. You have 48 hours. Run.
Then the number disconnected.
Roman and Juliette stared at each other in the darkness.
“You’re my wife,” he said quietly. “That’s forever.”
She nodded, unable to speak.
And they started packing.
Because whoever had found them—friend or enemy—one thing was clear.
River Falls was no longer safe.
And neither was anywhere else.
Reader Reactions