Chapter 10 - The Suitcase Held One More Secret
When Dominic unpacked the suitcase later that night, he found one more item hidden beneath the lining.
It was small.
A folded yellow envelope.
Inside was a note in Diane’s handwriting.
**Lily,
You will be happier once you stop fighting.
Your father will understand later.
Owen can come visit if he learns to behave.**
Dominic had to sit down.
The cruelty of it was almost clinical.
Not rage written in red.
Not a hateful outburst.
A calm letter to a child meant to reframe abduction as adjustment.
He read it twice, then locked it away with the legal papers.
After the children were in bed, he stood in Lily’s doorway for a long time.
She was asleep on her side with one hand tucked under her cheek.
Owen had insisted on sleeping on the floor beside her bed in a sleeping bag.
“I’m just making sure,” he had said.
Dominic had not argued.
Now, looking at them, he understood something awful:
If he had not come home when he did, Diane might have gotten both children into that car.
Maybe she would have only taken Lily.
Maybe Owen would have fought hard enough to be forced in too.
Maybe the paperwork would have delayed things just long enough to terrify them for hours, days, longer.
The exact outcome no longer mattered.
What mattered was intent.
May you like
And the intent had been written down.
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