Chapter 8
The first two weeks were a whirlwind.
We got the kids into therapy.
Twice a week.
They talked about the warehouse.
About Vanessa.
About Sarah.
Jake was angry.
Lila was confused.
But slowly—slowly—they started to heal.
Daniel went back to work part-time.
I took a leave of absence from the hospital.
Someone had to be home with the kids.
Someone had to make sure they ate three meals a day.
That they took their medicine.
That they didn’t wake up screaming from nightmares.
I moved into the guest room.
It was practical.
Nothing more.
At first.
But the house was big.
And quiet after the kids went to bed.
Daniel and I would sit in the kitchen, drinking coffee, talking.
About everything.
About nothing.
About the future.
We didn’t put a label on what we were.
We didn’t need to.
Everyone else already had.
Mia came over one night with wine and takeout.
She sat across from me at the kitchen island, grinning like an idiot.
“So,” she said. “You’re a mom now. And a girlfriend. To a rich, hot construction guy who adores you. And two perfect kids. How does it feel to live in a romance novel?”
I threw a napkin at her.
“It’s not like that,” I said. “It’s complicated. The kids just went through hell. Sarah’s in jail awaiting trial. Daniel’s still dealing with all of that. And I’m just—helping.”
“Uh-huh,” Mia said. “Helping. Sure. That’s why you’re wearing his shirt. That’s why there’s a toothbrush with your name on it in the master bathroom. That’s why you haven’t been to your own apartment in three weeks.”
She leaned forward.
“Emily, I’m serious,” she said. “This is good. You’re good for him. You’re good for those kids. And they’re good for you. You’ve been lost since nursing school. Like you were waiting for something to matter. This matters. Don’t overthink it.”
She was right.
Of course she was right.
That night, after Mia left, I found Daniel in the living room.
He was going through a stack of legal papers.
Bail hearings.
Custody filings.
Divorce papers.
“Sarah’s lawyer called today,” he said, not looking up. “She’s asking for supervised visits. Once a week. Says she’s ‘working on herself’ and ‘deserves a chance to make amends.’”
I sat down beside him.
“What did you say?”
“I told her to go to hell,” Daniel said flatly. “The judge will throw it out anyway. No judge in the state of Tennessee is going to give that woman unsupervised—let alone supervised—visitation after what she did. Not when there are police reports. Hospital records. Vanessa’s testimony. The kids’ own statements.”
He threw the papers down.
“I just want it to be over,” he said. “I want to stop talking about her. Stop thinking about her. I want Jake and Lila to forget she exists.”
“They will,” I said. “Eventually. Kids are resilient. They live in the now. Right now, their now is full of you. And school. And soccer practice. And too much ice cream after dinner. Sarah is just a bad dream they’re starting to wake up from.”
Daniel turned to me.
He took my hand.
“What about you?” he said. “Are you going to wake up from this one day? Decide it’s too much? Too messy? That you want your old life back?”
I looked at him.
At the man who’d moved heaven and earth to find his children.
At the man who cried at Disney movies and sang off-key in the shower and let the kids eat cereal for dinner on Saturdays.
At the man I’d fallen in love with without even noticing it happening.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I said. “This is my life now, Daniel. You. The kids. This crazy, messy, perfect life. I don’t want the old one. I want this one.”
He kissed me then.
Longer this time.
Deeper.
No kids waiting to interrupt.
No hospital alarms beeping.
Just us.
In the house we were building together.
“Marry me,” he said against my lips.
I froze.
He pulled back, looking at me seriously.
“Emily, I know it’s fast. I know we haven’t been doing this that long. But what we have—this isn’t normal. We didn’t meet at a bar and go on dates for six months. We met in the middle of the worst thing that ever happened to me. We pulled two kids out of hell together. We fought for them. We cried for them. I know you better than I know myself. And I love you. I love you for who you are. For what you did for my family. For staying when everyone else left.”
He reached into his pocket.
He pulled out a small velvet box.
My breath caught.
“I bought this three days ago,” he said. “I’ve been carrying it around waiting for the right moment. But there is no right moment. There’s only now. And I want all my nows to be with you. Emily—will you marry me? Will you be my wife? Will you be the mother my children deserve?”
He opened the box.
A simple, perfect diamond ring.
I didn’t hesitate.
Not even for a second.
“Yes,” I said. “A thousand times yes.”
He slipped the ring on my finger.
It fit perfectly.
We kissed again.
And again.
Somewhere upstairs, a toilet flushed.
We pulled apart, laughing.
“Not a word to the kids,” Daniel said. “I want to do it right. Saturday. At the park. With a picnic. The whole thing.”
“Okay,” I said. “Saturday.”
But the universe had other plans.
My phone rang at two a.m.
I fumbled for it on the nightstand.
An unknown number.
“Hello?”
“Emily?”
It was Linda.
Sarah’s sister.
She sounded panicked.
Breathless.
“Linda? It’s two in the morning—what’s wrong?”
“Sarah made bail,” she said.
I sat straight up.
Daniel woke beside me.
“What?”
“Someone posted her bond,” Linda said, her voice cracking. “I don’t know who. A lot of money. She got out three hours ago. And Emily—she’s not alone. Marcus is with her. The boyfriend. They picked him up from the airport this afternoon.”
Cold fear ran down my spine.
May you like
“Linda—what are they going to do?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “But I heard them on the phone. Sarah was screaming. She said Daniel took everything from her. She said if she can’t have the kids—nobody can.”
