“Come get your worthless daughter and take her back,” my mother-in-law shouted my father as I lay broken at the bottom of the stairs after my husband shoved me down. “Your family will answer for it if she has even a scratch,” was the sole warning Dad offered her. They had no notion who my father really was, so they made fun of him.

Dad reached out and took my hands.

He looked at me with nothing but love, no judgement.

“Listen to me, Rachel,” Dad said with utter conviction.

Never apologise for having a good heart.

“The shame is on those who betrayed your trust.

I cried softly, ‘I should have known.’

“No,” Dad corrected me softly.

“You deserved a marriage built on honesty, not a criminal conspiracy.”