Chapter 1

01

The year I turned twenty-eight, I got pregnant, and my husband died in a car accident.

The night we buried him, my in-laws sat me down with the funeral ledger to split the accounts.

"You and Wilfred Acevedo were married four years, no kids. The house goes to you. The funeral money was paid for with Willie's life, so we're keeping it for our old age."

"You're young. There's no way you'll stay a widow for Willie, and we won't make things hard for you. You can leave whenever you want."

My tears weren't even dry, my throat parched and burning, and I watched the kind faces of my in-laws turn ugly.

I said nothing. I only pressed my hand hard against my belly.

From the moment Wilfred was declared dead, right up until a minute ago, I had planned to keep this child.

But now it seemed there was no point.

...

Before I'd even finished taking in what my mother-in-law had said, my sister-in-law shoved my luggage out at me.

"They say a woman only marries into a family because of her husband. My brother's gone now, so I don't imagine you'll want to stick around here."

I looked at Norma Acevedo through my tears, remembering how, since the day I'd walked into this family, I had always treated her decently.

Now I'd gotten a full taste of how cold every one of them could be.

I didn't take the suitcase. Instead I threw my mother-in-law's own words back to shut Norma up.

"Mom just said it. The house is mine."

My voice came out hoarse, my throat searing with every word.

Norma faltered, and just as she was about to square off with me, my mother-in-law, Angela Finch, grabbed her arm.

"Don't fight her over it. The mortgage isn't even paid off. Let her have it."

Norma dropped her sure-of-herself posture, shot me a look, and kicked my suitcase sideways on her way past.

"Fine. We're leaving."

She hooked her arm through Angela's and swaggered out.

My father-in-law, Theodore Acevedo, glanced at me one more time before he left.

The moment the door shut, my world finally went quiet.

I lifted my eyes to Wilfred's memorial photo on the wall and gave a bitter smile.

"See that, Wilfred? That's your family."

I wiped my eyes and stood. His own family wasn't grieving anymore, so there was no reason for me, an outsider, to keep breaking my heart.

I was lying on the couch crying when the phone rang. It was Angela. I answered.

Only after I hung up did I get up from the couch.

I went into the bedroom and took out the property deed.

That's right. The deed to this very house, the one Angela had just said still had a mortgage to pay.

It used to. But last month I paid the balance off early.

Angela didn't know that. The two-thousand-plus-square-foot floor she hadn't wanted was mine now.

I knew I couldn't hide it for long. I had to get this house sold as fast as I could.

I found an agent, sent over the actual photos of the place, and told them to sell it quickly.

Then there was something more important to do. Go to the hospital.

I stroked my belly, looking at Wilfred's photo, and still couldn't stop the tears.

"I never told you, did I, Wilfred? I'm pregnant. I'm carrying our baby."

"From the day of the accident until I laid you in the ground, all I could think was that I wanted to keep this child. It's the only part of you left."

"But I don't want to keep it now. You heard them just now. I'm not the one leaving. Your mother, your sister, they drove me out."

By the time I'd said it all I was sobbing beyond words. It wasn't that Wilfred and I had never loved each other. But things had come this far, and what choice did I have left?

I didn't linger in the house. Once I left, I went straight to the hospital to book the abortion.

When I saw that tiny black cluster on the ultrasound, I signed the papers through my tears.

Sitting outside the operating room, waiting, I couldn't keep my hands from shaking. It would be a lie to say I wasn't afraid.

I scrolled through my contacts and couldn't find a single person to come sit with me.

Then my eyes passed over Nelson Shepherd's name, and I stopped.