Every time my brother-in-law drove me home, I would black out and wake up sore. My husband just laughed and said I was out of shape. After the fourth trip, I hid a voice recorder in my purse — and that night I heard a phone call that made me realize the blackouts had never been accidents.

First my own voice, thanking him for the water. Perfectly ordinary.

Then about eleven minutes of road noise and nothing.

And then my brother-in-law makes a call over the car’s system.

“She’s out again.”

And then my husband. The man who has slept about four thousand nights beside me.

“Good. Bring her over. Vonda’s already there. And don’t be an idiot — no marks on her this time, like the last one.”

And Aurelio laughed, nervously, the way he does. “It was barely anything.”

“It was enough to get all three of us in a room with somebody. Just do what I told you.”

The call ends.

About a minute later the car stops. I hear my own seatbelt release. I hear the seat motor run — that low hum — for about four seconds.

And then my brother-in-law says, to nobody, quietly:

“You trust us way too much, sister-in-law.”

And then there is a sound of his hand moving against fabric.