“No, Samantha,” I said. “I don’t have to. You destroyed yourselves on camera.”

I carried my daughter out through the front door, knowing that securing the house was only the first step of a much longer fight.

Part Three — The Temporary Refuge

The first decision I made as a father that night was to leave my own home.

Not because Samantha was shouting at me from the hallway. Not because Gertrude was cursing as officers guided her into a patrol car, or because Valerie was calling me a tyrant, or Brenda was weeping on the porch while Jacqueline demanded a lawyer.

I left because my daughter looked up at me and asked.

“Daddy, can we go somewhere else tonight?” she whispered as we came down the steps. “I don’t want to stay in a house that smells like them.”