Nothing like Dominic’s enormous Philadelphia estate.
No marble staircase.
No security gates.
No housekeeper appearing before breakfast.
But
the apartment had large windows, a bright kitchen, and a little bedroom where I could keep Sophie’s belongings.
That was enough.
I placed her stuffed rabbit on the bed.
Then I carefully unpacked her yellow cardigan, her butterfly drawings, and the framed photograph from her fourth birthday.
Finally, I put the small white memorial urn on a shelf beside her picture.
For several minutes, I stood there unable to move.
“Sophie,” I whispered, “Mommy’s here.”
I had repeated those words so often during the previous weeks that they had begun to feel like a prayer.
At the hospital.
At the funeral.
In the quiet bedroom I’d shared with Dominic.
And now, in a country where nobody knew that I used to be the wife of one of Philadelphia’s wealthiest businessmen.
