Chapter 2

I left university.

The criminology textbooks felt like a joke.

Professor Davies called, his voice full of concern.

I didn't answer.

What could I say?

I moved back into the house.

The police finished their work, but the silence they left was worse.

Every room held ghosts.

I remembered family dinners, Dad laughing so hard tears ran down his face.

Michael, so proud, talking about medical school, about the research fellowship he'd put on hold.

Grandma Rose, humming in the kitchen, always kind, always there.

And Mom.

Eleanor.

Her gentle hands, her soft smile.

She' d been so sick. Dad spent everything, the 401k, all their savings, on those experimental treatments.

Michael donated bone marrow.

We all prayed.

And then she got better.

A miracle.

Only to do this?

I walked through the house, touching things.

Dad's nightstand still had Mom's medication schedule, a complex list of pills and timings.

He' d managed it all.

Mom's dresser.

A framed photo of Dad and Michael on a fishing trip, smiling, sunlight on their faces.

She loved that picture.

How could the woman who cherished these memories, these people, become a monster?

There was no motive.

No anger, no fight I knew of.

Only love.

I saw only love in every corner of this house.

It made the violence, the bloodstains they couldn't fully clean from the floorboards, utterly incomprehensible.

I had to understand why.

I had to.