Chapter 1 - THE PLATE HIT HER HEADThe rice was still steaming when my wife dumped it over my mother's head.
"Eat it, you old witch," Lorena snapped. "Daniel isn't coming home to save you."
I was standing six feet away, on the other side of our kitchen door, wearing the Army uniform she'd told my mother she'd never see again.
For one second, I couldn't move.
Mom sat hunched at the table, her thin hands clenched in her lap. Hot rice slid down her silver hair and onto the faded blue sweater I'd bought her before my deployment. She didn't scream. That was what broke me. She just closed her eyes, as if she knew exactly how long she had to wait for it to end.
I shoved open the door. It slammed against the wall.
"GET AWAY FROM HER!"
Lorena spun, the empty plate rattling in her hand. "Daniel? You're not supposed to be—"
I caught her arm when she reached for Mom again and pushed her away from the table. She stumbled backward into the pantry's cheap dividing panel. The panel cracked, and boxes tumbled around her feet. I wanted to keep shouting. Instead I dropped to my knees beside Mom.
"I'm here," I said. "I'm here. Look at me."
Mom touched my sleeve with shaking fingers. Her face was red where the food had struck her. "Danny?"
"It's me. Does anything hurt?"
"Don't be angry," she whispered. "She'll make it worse."
My stomach turned. What had my wife done to make my mother afraid of being rescued?
Lorena scrambled up, already crying the tears I'd believed for three years. "She fell. I tried to help her. You scared me."
"I saw you."
Her eyes flicked toward the kitchen counter. A brown envelope lay underneath her purse. When she lunged for it, I got there first.
Across the top was a title-company logo. Below it, in clean black type, were the words PROPERTY TRANSFER — 18 WILLOW LANE.
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And beneath that was a signature meant to be mine.
The closing date was tomorrow.
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