That was the part I would savor for a long time.

I did not plot a revenge.

I did not scheme or manipulate or set a trap.

I simply declined to absorb the harm they aimed at me, and stepped out of the way, and let their own scheme complete its arc and crash into the wall they had built for me and then, in my absence, hit head-on themselves.

The Halbrooks were the authors of their own ruin from the first line.

They chose to marry a woman for her father’s network.