A sob builds in my chest, but I swallow it down. I can't fall apart. Not now. Not in front of Anna.
"Mom?" Anna's small voice pulls me back. "Is Daddy going to find us again?"
The innocence in her question, the resignation behind it...At five years old, my daughter already knows the pattern. We run. He finds us. We pay the price.
"No, baby," I say, reaching out to smooth her hair. "Not this time."
"You promise?" Her blue eyes, so like her father's that sometimes hurts to look at them, search mine for reassurance.
Before I can answer, the door to the office opens, and Jenny emerges with Tank behind her. His face is unreadable, but something in Jenny's posture gives me hope. She walks straight to me, takes my hands in hers.
"They're going to help us," she says, her voice steady but her eyes shining with unshed tears. "Tank says we can stay here where it's safe while they... handle things."
"Handle things?" I repeat, glancing up at the massive man now standing at the edge of our little group.
"Your ex-husband won't be a problem much longer," Tank says, his deep voice steady. "First step is getting you both somewhere secure. We have a safe house about twenty miles from here. Remote. Defensible. No paper trail connecting it to the club."
"And then?" I ask, afraid to hope but unable to stop myself.
His eyes meet mine, and I'm struck by how much they resemble Jenny's—same shape, same shade of brown, but where hers hold warmth, his hold something colder. Something dangerous.
"And then I pay a visit to Riverbrook."
A shiver runs down my spine. There's no threat in his voice, no bravado. Just calm certainty.
"He's a cop," I remind him, as if he could have forgotten. "He has friends. The entire department backs him up."
"I was a cop too, once," Tank says, surprising me. "I know how they think. How they operate."
"What... what are you going to do to him?" I ask, conscious of Anna's presence.
Luna seems to sense my concern. "Hey Anna, want to see if we can find some ice cream for dessert?"
Anna's face lights up, and she eagerly hops down from her chair to follow Luna into the kitchen, leaving us adults to speak freely.
"We're not going to kill him, if that's what you're worried about," Tank says once Anna is out of earshot. "Not unless we have to."
"Then what?"
"We're going to make sure he never comes near you or Anna again." He pauses. "But I need to know everything. How long were you married? When did the abuse start? Who are his friends on the force? What's his patrol schedule? Everything you can tell me."
The clinical way he asks these questions should be comforting. He’s a professional gathering information, but instead, it unleashes something in me. All the fear, all the pain, all the hopelessness I've been carrying bubbles up until I can't contain it anymore.
"Eight years," I say, my voice breaking. "We were together eight years. He was charming at first. So charming. The perfect gentleman. It wasn't until after we were married that he changed. Or maybe he didn't change, maybe he just stopped hiding who he really was."
The words pour out of me now, unstoppable. "It started with little things. Checking my phone. Questioning where I'd been. Getting angry if dinner wasn't ready when he got home. Then it escalated. Grabbing my arm hard enough to leave fingerprints.Pushing me against walls. Telling me no one would believe me if I reported him."
I'm crying now, tears streaming down my face, but I can't stop. "After Anna was born, it got worse. He'd say I was a terrible mother. That I was lucky to have him. That if I ever tried to leave, he'd take Anna and I'd never see her again. And I believed him because I've seen what he can do."
Jenny puts her arm around my shoulders, anchoring me as the storm of words continues.
"The first time he hit me, really hit me, Anna was two. I dropped a plate, and he backhanded me so hard I fell. I had to tell everyone at work I slipped on a wet floor. Last month, he broke two of my ribs because I got home late from work. I told the ER doctor I fell down the stairs."
I lift my gaze to meet Tank's, no longer caring about the tears or how pathetic I must look. "Three days ago, he came home drunk and threw Anna's stuffed bear in the trash because she left it on the couch. When she cried, he grabbed her by the arm so hard it left bruises. That's when I knew we had to leave. I could take whatever he did to me, but not my baby. Never my baby."
My voice finally fails me, and I collapse against Jenny, sobs wracking my body. All the terror and shame I've been carrying spills out in an ugly, messy torrent. I cry for the woman I used to be. For the mother I'm trying to be. For all the times I should have left but was too afraid.
Through my tears, I see something change in Tank's expression: a crack in his stoic facade. For just a moment, raw fury blazes in his eyes before he banks it down again.
