MY SEVEN-YEAR-OLD GRANDDAUGHTER CLUTCHED MY HAND AND WHISPERED, “GRANDPA… MOM PUTS SOMETHING IN MY JUICE.” I THOUGHT IT WAS JUST A CHILD’S FEAR—UNTIL A MEMPHIS DOCTOR READ HER TESTS, FROZE, AND WENT SILENT FOR FOUR LONG SECONDS.

Brandon Cole cooperated immediately when investigators contacted him. He handed over text messages, hotel receipts, calendar records, everything that made him look less like a participant and more like a fool. Cowards will always trade loyalty for self-preservation. Sometimes that serves justice.

Daniel moved into a rental house closer to my neighborhood.

Three bedrooms. A tiny fenced yard. A kitchen too small for the number of people who ended up standing in it. Ruby called her new room “the yellow one” before any furniture was even in it because of the afternoon light.

I helped paint.

My knee hated every second, but I climbed ladders anyway because some pains are worth aggravating.

Ruby picked pale green for her walls. “Like sea glass,” Dr. Harper had said in one of their sessions, encouraging her to choose a color that felt calm. Ruby didn’t know what sea glass was, but she liked the sound of it and held onto that shade card like a winning lottery ticket.

The first night in the new house, Daniel tucked her in on a mattress still on the floor because the bed frame hadn’t arrived.

“Do you like it?” he asked.