Chapter 8 - The Cost of Justice
While Gwen and the baby,
whom we named Leo,
recovered in the hospital,
the legal machine ground forward.
The story had hit the national news,
and "The Socialite Starver" was the headline on every tabloid.
Brenda tried to play the victim from her jail cell,
claiming I had "brainwashed" Gwen.
But the evidence was insurmountable.
The surveillance footage from the hidden cameras I had installed (and forgotten about) in the basement was the final nail.
It showed Brenda slapping Gwen when she didn't clean the floor fast enough.
It showed Gavin laughing as he ate a steak in front of her.
The public outcry was so great that the DA refused to even discuss a plea deal.
I sat in the courtroom for the preliminary hearing,
watching my mother and brother behind bulletproof glass.
They looked different without the designer clothes and the wine.
They looked small.
They looked like the hollow people they had always been.
My lawyer told me that they were facing twenty years each for kidnapping,
felony neglect,
and financial fraud.
I didn't feel a sense of victory.
I only felt a deep,
aching sadness that people I had loved could be so devoid of humanity.
Gavin tried to catch my eye,
muttering "sorry" through the glass,
but I looked away.
There is a point where "sorry" is just a word used by a caught predator.
I had spent the week transferring all of my mother’s assets into a trust for Leo.
I sold the house in Crestview Estates.
The ground was tainted.
I bought a modest farmhouse three hours outside of the city,
surrounded by trees and silence.
No marble,
no chandeliers,
no crystal.
Just wood,
and stone,
and room to breathe.
I spent my days at the hospital,
learning how to change tiny diapers and watching the color return to Gwen’s face.
She was eating now—
real food,
served on a tray,
by a husband who would never let her kneel again.
The first time she held Leo,
the world seemed to reset itself.
She looked at him not with the trauma of the past,
but with the fierce love of a survivor.
"He's beautiful,
Lucas,"
she said,
her voice stronger than I had heard it in months.
"He's going to be strong,"
I promised.
May you like
"And he will never,
ever know the people who tried to stop him from coming."
