Page 41 of Pocket Wife

Helix sent offers during the storm.

Private offers.

Not to the council. Not to the cooperative. To individual families.

Jessa slaps one notice down. “Triple relocation compensation if signed within forty-eight hours.”

Torren drops another beside it. “Debt forgiveness.”

Samuel sets down a third. “Medical transport guarantees.”

That one quiets the room.

I read the names at the top. Odell. Venn. Marris. Pell. Families with children. Families with elders. Families who held out through ships, hearings, the broken irrigation tower, drone surveillance, and the ridge road sabotage.

Helix has stopped trying to frighten the whole valley at once.

Now it’s buying fear one household at a time.

Nara Venn stands near the back, both hands clenched around her offer. Her youngest boy needs off-world treatment twice a year. Everyone knows it. Helix knows it too.

“I’m not a traitor,” Nara says before anyone accuses her.

No one answers quickly enough.

Nara’s face twists. “This pays for treatment. I can be brave. I cannot gamble with my son’s blood.”

A man near the windows mutters, “If enough people sell, there won’t be a valley left to defend.”

Nara turns on him. “Then feed my child your principles.”

The room erupts.

I strike the table with my palm. Pain shoots up my ribs. I swallow it. “Enough.”

The shouting fades.

Rethan stands near the archive crates, mud still on the hem of his ruined coat, Westline evidence locked at his side. He doesn’t interfere. He watches me, and the bond answers that attention with a warmth that makes me want to lean toward him even from across the room.

That scares me almost as much as Helix.

Not because I doubt him.

Because I’m beginning not to.

I chose him in a shelter while danger waited outside, and afterward the world demanded evidence, bruises, and now a room full of people deciding whether survival requires surrender.

I grip the table edge. “No one here gets to call a parent a coward for wanting medicine for their child.”

Several faces drop.

“And no one gets to pretend Helix is being generous. These offers are not kindness. They are pressure dressed as rescue.”

Nara wipes at her cheek. “Then what do I do?”

I want to say stay.

Instead, I turn to the medical guarantee. “You tell us what your son needs. We put it on the board. We solve it as a valley before anyone signs alone.”