“She said if we told you, you’d send us away to a boarding school.” And I pulled both of my daughters into a tight, desperate embrace, and held them as though I could undo, through sheer force, every month I had left them unprotected.

Chapter 12 — I Will Never Send You Away

As I held them, a memory surfaced that I would have given anything to erase.

Months earlier, Valeria had tried to tell me that Chloe yelled at them when I was away.

And I had dismissed it.

I had told her she just needed to give Chloe a chance, that Chloe was adjusting to being part of our family, that the girls were only missing their mother.

I had not investigated.