“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.

Gabriel pulled up a text message on his phone and showed me a brief update from his investigator.

The envelope had been carefully hidden under the lower shelf of the table.

The outer seal was unbroken, and within was a folded sheet of notebook paper.

“Where is that envelope now?“I said.

“It’s being held by the forensic police unit,” Gabriel explained.

“They’re running it through the fingerprint and digital scanner.”

Proof.

It was surreal and terrifying hearing my own handwriting called forensic evidence.