1
KNOX
When I woke up in the concrete box that had been my home for fourteen years, I had no idea that in a matter of two hours, I’d beat another inmate at Coldwater Penitentiary within an inch of his life.
Hell, the last thing I intended to do was to jeopardize my parole with a fight.
But here’s the thing about plans. They don’t account for monsters.
They also don’t account for the ghosts that follow you into your cell every night.
I sat on the edge of my bunk and scrubbed a hand over my stubbled jaw, trying to shake the dream that still clung to me like smoke. Pigtails bouncing in sunlight. A tiny voice screaming, “Daddy,” as I was hauled away in handcuffs from that courtroom.
She’d been four years old.
Now she was eighteen. A whole person I didn’t know anymore.
Did she still have that dimple on the left side of her face? Did she still have rosy cheeks with freckles dusting her nose? It hadbeen ages since I had seen her last, and I wondered, painfully, every single day what she might look like now.
I’d missed fourteen years.
Her first day of kindergarten, standing at the bus stop with a backpack bigger than she was. Birthday parties with cone hats and balloons and a cake she probably helped frost with crooked little letters. Christmas mornings tearing into presents while the tree lights blinked and hot chocolate went cold because she was too excited to drink it.
I wasn’t there to teach her to ride a bike. Wasn’t there to pick her up when she fell and put a Band-Aid on her knee and tell her she was brave. Wasn’t there for the nightmares, the school plays, the first heartbreak.
Someone else got those moments. Or worse, no one did.
And I would never get them back.
What I wouldn’t give for just one visit from her. Or hell, I’d settle for a phone call.
Calls to my ex, her mother, stopped going through years ago. For a long time, I resented the hell out of that. I wanted to co-parent and be part of Gwen’s life in whatever way I could. But it wasn’t long before my ex cut ties.
I could’ve gotten Ryker involved. My best friend was a damn good attorney now, and he’d offered more than once to make some calls.
But as much as I hated what my ex was doing, she had always been a good mom. And I wondered if maybe she knew better than I did what Gwen needed.
Still, it was fucking heartbreaking, having the one person in the world I cared about more than anyone, the one person I’d sat in this concrete cage to protect, go through her life without me in it.
Maybe she was better off without me. That’s what I’d been telling myself for years.
And yet I still wrote the letters.
Still wondered what her life looked like. She would’ve graduated high school by now. Was she off to college? What did she want her career path to be?
Did she ever think about me?
It was pathetic to have those thoughts though. A stronger father would only care about her well-being. A better man wouldn’t feel like his chest was being cracked open every time he imagined her easily living without him.
Enough.
I forced myself to breathe. To focus.
One goal. That’s all I had. Make parole this year. Get out. Find her. Even if she refused to speak to me, I would contribute something meaningful to her life. I’d get a job, give her every paycheck. Every cent. I’d live with a hundred roommates, walk to work, survive on canned soup. I didn’t care.
Every dollar belonged to her. I’d help her pay for college, buy a home, start a business, allow her to travel. Whatever she needed to jump-start her adult life, I’d give her everything I had.
It was the least I could do for missing the last fourteen years of her life. Hopefully, she’d let me be there for her in more ways than financially too.
