I insisted on being discharged as soon as they were legally able to release me, signed the paperwork with an unsteady hand, and arranged for a private car.
By the time I arrived home, I could barely move without putting most of my weight on my cane.
Martha was sitting in my kitchen.
Wyatt had prepared a peanut butter sandwich for Harper.
My seven-year-old looked at me, doing his best to seem brave.
That nearly shattered me.
Despite the pain, I carefully lowered myself onto my knees and pulled both children into my arms.
“I’m sorry.”
Wyatt whispered, “It’s okay, Dad. I took care of her.”
“No,” I told him. “You should never have had to.”
I held them close until Harper stopped trembling.
Later that night, after the children were asleep, I sat at the kitchen table and opened Preston’s social-media page.
There it was.
A heavily edited photo taken inside a luxury tailor.
Preston stood in front of a mirror wearing a dark wool suit.
Behind him, Mom and Dad were seated on a velvet couch, each holding a crystal glass of sparkling wine.
The caption read: Mom and Dad funding the $1,000 look for the new empire.
I checked the timestamp.
1:00 p.m.
At that exact time, my five-year-old daughter had been crying outside a locked house while her brother was trying to comfort her.
I saved the photograph.
For the first time, I had evidence against my own parents.
Then I looked at the blue folder I had put together to keep my children safe.
It had started as an emergency plan.
Now it was going to become evidence.
For the first time in thirty-two years, I wasn’t trying to make my parents understand what they had done.
I was deciding how much access they would have after doing it.
CHAPTER 2
Wednesday morning, I hired a residential security contractor.
He replaced every exterior lock. New brass deadbolts were installed, the garage keypad was reset, and the old access code was gone.
I watched from my cane.
Under normal circumstances, taking security precautions against my parents would have seemed ridiculous.
