Chapter 7
The four weeks between the verdict and sentencing were the calmest I’d had in a year.
No more late nights lying awake, scared Ethan would walk free.
No more lawyers calling with bad news.
No more reporters camped outside my mom’s house, shoving microphones in my face.
It was just me, Leo, and Jake, trying to figure out what normal felt like again.
I sold the old house that month.
Got a good price for it, even with everything that had happened there.
I used the money to buy a small, cozy house on a quiet street in a town 45 minutes outside the city.
It had a big backyard for Leo to play in.
A white picket fence.
A tree swing hanging from the old oak in the corner.
It felt safe.
It felt like home.
Leo started kindergarten that fall.
He was nervous the first day, clinging to my leg, scared to go into the classroom.
Jake knelt down with him, pulling a tiny plastic paramedic badge out of his pocket.
“For you,” he said, pinning it to Leo’s shirt.
“Now you’re an honorary paramedic. You’re brave. And if you get scared, just touch the badge. I’ll be right here, waiting for you when school’s out.”
Leo touched the badge, his chest puffing out with pride.
He walked into that classroom without looking back.
I cried as we walked to the truck.
Jake wrapped his arm around me, kissing the top of my head.
“He’s going to be great,” he said.
“He’s the bravest kid I know.”
Jake had transferred to a fire station in our new town a week earlier.
Said he wanted to be close.
Said he didn’t want to miss anything.
He was at our house for dinner almost every night.
He’d help Leo with his homework.
Teach him how to throw a baseball in the backyard.
Build him a massive dinosaur castle out of Legos that took up half the living room.
Leo started calling him “Jakey” after a few weeks.
Said he was his best friend.
I was falling for Jake.
Hard.
It scared me at first.
After everything Ethan had done, I didn’t know if I could trust another man.
If I could ever let anyone get that close to me or Leo again.
But Jake was nothing like Ethan.
He was kind.
Honest.
Good.
He showed up.
Every single day.
He loved Leo like he was his own.
And he loved me, broken parts and all.
He never made me feel stupid for missing the signs with Ethan.
Never made me feel like I was too much work.
He just held me when I cried.
Laughed with me when I was happy.
Stayed.
Sentencing day arrived on a cold, rainy Tuesday in October.
We drove to the courthouse together, Jake holding my hand the whole way.
Leo was with my mom, too young to be in the courtroom for something like this.
The same jury came back to hear the victim impact statements before the judge handed down the sentence.
I went first.
I stood at the podium, looking right at Ethan, who sat in his orange jail jumpsuit, his face blank, refusing to meet my eye.
“On the night of December 14th, you tried to murder my son,” I said, my voice steady and strong.
“You drugged him. You swapped his inhaler. You sat in the next room and watched him stop breathing. You did it for money. Because you cared more about paying your gambling debts than you did about the little boy who called you Daddy. You took six years of my life. Six years of lies. But you didn’t win. Leo is alive. He’s happy. He’s thriving. And you are going to spend the rest of your life in a cell, knowing you failed. Knowing you will never hurt anyone ever again.”
Jake spoke next.
He held up a photo of Lila, bright and smiling, for the whole court to see.
“Lila was 17 when you killed her,” he said.
“She wanted to be a vet. She loved horses. She had her whole life ahead of her. You took that from her. You took her from our family. And for 15 years, you walked around free, like you had every right to. Like her life didn’t matter. But it did. It mattered more than anything. And today, finally, you pay for it.”
Tyler Reed spoke too.
Apologized to Lila’s family, to me, to Leo, for not speaking up sooner.
Said he’d live with that guilt forever.
Lila’s mom spoke last.
An older woman with gray hair and red-rimmed eyes.
She talked about the hole Lila’s death had left in their family.
About every birthday, every holiday, every milestone they’d had to celebrate without her.
“For 15 years, I thought my daughter died because of a mistake,” she said, looking at Ethan.
“Today I know the truth. You murdered her. And I hope you spend every single day of the rest of your life thinking about what you did.”
The judge spoke after all the statements were done.
He looked at Ethan, his face hard and unforgiving.
“Ethan Carter,” he said.
“You have been found guilty of some of the most heinous crimes this court has ever seen. You killed one child in cold blood. You tried to kill another. You showed no remorse. No regret. Only greed and cruelty. For the manslaughter of Lila Marlow, I sentence you to life in prison without the possibility of parole. For the attempted murder of Leo Carter, I sentence you to 40 years, to be served consecutively. For evidence tampering, 10 years, also consecutive. You will die in prison. You will never be free again. Take him away.”
The bailiffs dragged Ethan out.
He didn’t fight this time.
He didn’t scream.
He just walked, his head down, knowing it was over.
Lila’s mom hugged me and Jake tight as we left the courtroom.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“For giving my daughter justice.”
We walked out of the courthouse into the rain.
Jake pulled me close, kissing me soft in the middle of the sidewalk.
“It’s over,” he said.
“Really over.”
I smiled, leaning into him, the rain cool on my face.
May you like
For the first time in my life, I knew exactly what I wanted.
And it was standing right in front of me.
