My name is Kemet Jones, and at thirty-two years old, if anyone had asked what my life was like before that Tuesday morning, I would have said it was mundane to the point of being suffocating. My husband Zolani was the director of a small construction firm in Atlanta, Georgia—my first love, the only man I’d ever been with. We’d been married five years and had a three-year-old son, Jabari, who was my sunshine, my entire world compressed into forty pounds of sticky fingers and infectious laughter.

Since Jabari’s birth, I’d quit my job at a medical billing company to dedicate myself full-time to caring for him, managing the house, and building our little nest in a modest neighborhood on Atlanta’s outskirts where the streetlights flickered and the sidewalks cracked but rent was affordable. Zolani handled the financial side with the authority of someone who believed knowing about money made him inherently superior to those who didn’t. He left early and came home late, and even on weekends he was busy with clients and closing deals, driving all over Metro Atlanta in his pickup truck that smelled of coffee and ambition.

I felt sorry for my husband working so hard and never complained, telling myself I needed to be his unconditional support, his soft place to land after battling the cruel world. Sometimes Zolani got irritated from the pressure—snapping at me for minor things like dinner being too salty or Jabari’s toys cluttering the living room—but I stayed silent and let it go. I figured every couple had their ups and downs. As long as they loved each other and cared about the family, everything would be fine.

Our savings were practically nonexistent because Zolani claimed the company was new and all profits had to be reinvested. I trusted him without question, the way I’d been taught good wives should trust their husbands, even when that voice in the back of my mind whispered that maybe I should ask more questions.