After three years of working away from home, my husband came back with a strange new habit: every night, he wrapped his arms around my waist from behind, something he had never done before.

Isabela Carmo answered on the third ring.

Her English was careful and precise, with a soft accent that placed her somewhere between formal education and long practice.

She had been expecting a call, she said.

Not from me specifically.

But from someone.

"Victor told me he had sent the documents," she said.

"He told me it was possible someone would reach out."

I was sitting in my sister Paula's guest room with the door closed.

Paula had asked no questions when I arrived the night before, just made up the bed and put a glass of water on the nightstand.

That was the kind of sister she was.

"I want to understand what happened to you," I said to Isabela.

"Only if you're willing."

A pause.

"I was twenty-five when I joined the Montevideo office," she said.

"Christopher came down twice a year for operational reviews.

He was — attentive.

Generous.

He told me his marriage had been over for years in everything but name." She stopped.

"I believed him."

"How long did it last?"

"Fourteen months.

He paid for my brother's medical treatment during that time.

My brother had been on a waiting list for two years.

Christopher made one phone call and it was arranged within a week." Her voice was steady, but only just.

"When you are watching someone you love suffer and a man offers to end that suffering, you do not ask enough questions."

"When did it end?"

"When he decided it was over.

He sent his legal team.

Two men in suits with a document already prepared.

They were very polite.

They explained that the arrangement had been funded through company accounts and that if I discussed it with anyone, I would be considered to have participated in financial misconduct." Another pause.

"I signed it.

I had no money for lawyers.

I had no proof of anything.

And my brother had just had his surgery."

I closed my eyes for a moment.

"Isabela, the agreement you signed — do you still have a copy?"

"Yes."

"Would you be willing to provide it to my attorney?

Along with a statement about what happened?"

Silence.

Longer this time.

"If I do this," she said, "what happens to me?"

"My attorney believes the NDA is unenforceable because it was signed under coercion and because the underlying conduct it was designed to conceal was itself illegal.

You wouldn't be in breach.

You'd be a witness."

"And Christopher?"

"He's going to have a great deal to answer for.

Not just to me."

Another silence.

"He told me the same thing he told you," Isabela said quietly.

"That his marriage was over.

That I was different.

That he would take care of me." She exhaled.

"I wonder sometimes about the woman after me.

Whether he told her the same things."