Chapter 1 - The Person Rosie Pointed At
The glass exploded against the doorframe inches from my daughter’s head.
I turned my body before I even heard it break, pressing Rosie’s face against my chest while shards scattered across the hardwood behind us.
“Robert, what the hell?”
My father stood beside the dining table with his arm still extended.
My mother, Margaret, had one hand twisted into the back of my sweatshirt.
And my older sister Bethany was holding her cheek where I’d slapped her after she called the bruises on my four-year-old daughter “a little joke.”
Rosie’s arms were locked around my neck.
Finger-shaped red marks circled both of them.
A purple bruise darkened her left cheek.
I had arrived at my parents’ house outside Cincinnati expecting to pick her up after one overnight visit.
Instead, I’d found her crying in an upstairs guest room.
“Daddy…”
“I’ve got you.”
I pulled free from Mom.
“We’re leaving.”
Then Rosie lifted her head.
Her wet eyes moved past Bethany.
Past my parents.
Toward the far end of the dining table.
“Daddy…”
She raised one shaking finger.
“Aunt Bethany didn’t come alone.”
I followed her hand.
Someone was sitting partially hidden beyond the doorway to the breakfast room.
He stood.
I knew him immediately.
“Jason?”
My ex-brother-in-law looked almost as uncomfortable seeing me as I was seeing him.
Jason Reed had been divorced from Bethany for nearly two years.
He wasn’t supposed to be here.
More importantly, he had no reason to be anywhere near Rosie.
“What are you doing in my parents’ house?”
Jason glanced at Bethany.
She stopped touching her cheek.
That tiny reaction told me more than an answer would have.
Rosie buried her face against me again.
Then she whispered into my sweatshirt.
“He was downstairs with Grandma.”
I looked at Mom.
Her grip loosened.
“What downstairs?”
Nobody answered.
May you like
Rosie did.
“The room they told me not to tell you about.”
