“I don’t need to,” I told Eli.
He frowned.
“That’s not what I asked.”
I smiled.
He really did get that stubbornness from his father.
“I want you five to decide what you need. That matters more.”
Eli thought about it.
Then climbed into the SUV.
I stood outside for another few seconds.
Ten years earlier, I had driven away from this place believing the Hales had taken everything from me.
My marriage.
My reputation.
My home.
My future.
I had been wrong.
They had taken a version of my life.
Not my life itself.
The real one had been waiting for me on the other side.
Five children.
A career I never would have imagined.
A home filled with noise.
Friends who showed up without being asked.
A strength I earned the difficult way.
And eventually, peace.
I climbed behind the wheel.
As I started the engine, Sophie leaned forward from the back seat.
“Mom?”
“Yes?”
“Do you think Grandpa Warren knows we came?”
I looked through the windshield at the cemetery.
At the white tent.
At the flowers.
At Preston standing beside his father’s grave.
“I think he would’ve been very happy you did.”
Sophie smiled.
That was enough for me.
I put the SUV into drive.
Behind us, Preston remained on the Hale property with ten years of truth shaking the foundation of everything he thought he knew.
Ahead of me were the five children whose lives had never depended on whether he believed that truth.
And for the first time since I had entered that estate as a terrified young wife years ago, I left without feeling like I had lost anything.
The past had finally caught up with Preston Hale.
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