I close my mouth and wait.
"You stole my mother's jewelry." She says it flatly, like she's reading from a police report. "The only thing I had left of her. The necklace she wore on her wedding day. The necklace that survived the fire because she always kept it in a box by the bed."
Each word is a knife. I feel them sink in, one by one.
"I was four when that fire happened. He pulled me out of that house while our parents burned." Her voice cracks, just slightly, before she gets it back under control. "That necklace was all I had. All I had to remember what she looked like, what she smelled like, what it felt like to be her daughter."
"Leah, I'm so?—"
"And you took it." She steps closer, her eyes blazing. "You took it and you sold it for what? A few hundred dollars? A few hours of getting high? You traded my mother's memory for poison."
I don't have a defense. There is no defense. Everything she's saying is true.
"I know," I whisper. "I know what I did. I can't—there's nothing I can say that makes it okay. There's no apology big enough."
"You're right. There isn't."
We stand there, the silence stretching between us.
Garrett hovers in the doorway, his face a mask of pain.
He loves us both—his sister and his wife—and right now, we're tearing each other apart.
"I was sick," I say finally. "I know that's not an excuse. Addiction isn't an excuse. But I need you to know that the person who stole from you—she wasn't me. Not really. She was a monster wearing my face, doing whatever it took to feed the hunger."
"And now?"
"Now I'm trying to be someone else. Someone better." I meet her eyes, letting her see everything—the shame, the guilt, the desperate hope. "I can't give you back what I took. I can't undo the hurt. But I can spend the rest of my life trying to be worthy of your forgiveness. Even if you never give it."
Leah stares at me for a long moment.
I can see the war playing out behind her eyes—the anger and the grief and something else.
Something that might be the first fragile seed of understanding.
"I'm not ready to forgive you," she says finally. "I don't know if I ever will be."
"I know."
"But..." She takes a breath. "Garrett loves you. And you're carrying my niece or nephew. So I'm willing to try. To give you a chance to prove you're different."
It's not forgiveness. But it's a door left open. A possibility.
"Thank you," I say. "That's more than I deserve."
"Yes. It is." She turns to leave, then pauses. "Don't make me regret it."
And then she's gone, and I'm left standing in the kitchen with my husband and the weight of everything I've done.
Garrett crosses the room and pulls me into his arms.
I bury my face in his chest and let the tears come.
"You okay?" he asks.
"No," I admit. "But I will be."
The OB appointment is on a Thursday, two weeks after I get home.
