Chapter 9 - The House Becomes a Home
While they rotted in county jail awaiting trial, I went to work erasing their memory from our lives.
I hired contractors to completely demolish the back kitchen. We tore down the concrete walls and replaced it with a beautiful, sunlit greenhouse where Emily could grow her favorite orchids.
I threw away every piece of furniture Beatrice and Clara had touched. We bought bright, warm couches, painted the dark walls a cheerful yellow, and turned Clara’s massive walk-in closet into the ultimate playroom for Leo.
Slowly, the trauma began to fade.
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Leo gained weight. His cheeks filled out, and he started laughing again. I spent every single day with him in the backyard, teaching him how to throw a baseball, reminding him every day that his father was never going to leave him again.
Emily went to therapy twice a week. The shadows under her eyes vanished, replaced by the radiant, confident beauty I had fallen in love with. We spent our evenings cooking dinner together in our massive new kitchen, the house filled with music and the smell of fresh food—food that was never withheld, never rationed, and never used as a weapon.
