“I don’t want him crawling through my life,” I said.
My father stood. “Then we bring the walls up.”
By evening, the apartment locks were scheduled to be changed. The building manager, who knew me as quiet tenant Ella Morris, received a formal ownership verification from Rebecca. My father’s security consultant reviewed cameras and access points. Elias’s keycard was deactivated pending legal review.
It should have made me feel safe.
Instead, it made everything real.
I had been married less than twenty-four hours, and my husband was already locked out of my home.
At eight that night, I went to my old bedroom.
It had not changed much. My father had once admitted he couldn’t bring himself to alter it after I moved out. The pale blue curtains remained. The built-in shelves still held my childhood books, though the trophies had been packed away. On the dresser sat a framed photograph of my mother and me at the beach when I was sixteen. Her hair was windblown, her smile wide and unguarded.
