Brenda gave no response, shutting her eyes as the officers escorted her into the elevator. “Brandon! Please don’t let them take me away! I still love you!”
The metal doors closed, silencing her cries, and the sudden quiet throughout the hallway somehow felt heavier than all the shouting before it.
Brandon leaned against the wall and slowly slid down until he was sitting on the floor beside the abandoned roll of unicorn wallpaper. “I brought that woman directly into our house, gave her a key to our front door, trusted her alone with my little girl, and even let her pick Chloe up from school.”
Rosalyn knelt beside him on the cold floor. “Brandon…”
“If Chloe had obeyed us and kept swallowing those drops without questioning anything, she might not be here right now,” Brandon whispered, covering his face with his shaking hands.
Chloe carefully climbed from her hospital bed and walked barefoot across the room toward her father. “Daddy?”
