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“What happened to me isn’t your fault,” I tell her. “You couldn’t have known.”

“But we should have,” Darren says. “Like Bella said, you were always reliable. We should have realized something was off.”

“No one was hanging around the house?” Maverick questions, his hand still on mine.

Darren shakes his head. “Once Captain Leopold called us, I pulled all the security footage for the last six months. I scoured through it, but I couldn’t find anything off.”

“How did someone come into her place and take all of her things without you seeing?” Maverick asks.

Darren and Bella share a look.

“There was a power outage that day. The entire block went down, and when it came back up, she was already gone. Darren went to check on her because he thought she’d overslept since she always used an old-fashioned alarm clock,” Bella says with a smile. “It was one of the few things she left behind. It’s in Carry’s room now. She wanted something to remember you by,” she adds.

The hit to my heart is more than I’m ready for. The eight-year-old—one of twins—always clung to my hip.

“Anyway, that’s the only missing footage.”

“No battery backup?” Maverick questions.

Darren shakes his head. “There’s going to be one now, I can tell you that much.” He turns to me. “The place is still yours, Sadie. As is your job. We cannot wait to have you back.”

Taking care of our Sadie.

We cannot wait to have you back.

And then it hits me. This was never about checking in on me. It’s about bullying me into coming back. Because I made their lives easier.

Maverick stiffens beside me.

“I’m not coming back,” I reply coolly. Every bit of guilt I had at breaking their hearts vanishes. I feel terrible for the kids, of course, but these two have no real regard for me and what I went through.

They are only looking out for themselves.

“What?” Bella stares at me, then looks over at Darren before turning back to me. “Why not? You’re family, Sadie. We can’t survive without you.”

I do my best to level out my breathing. Bella is sweet, but she’s always been one to fight tooth and nail to get her way. This is one battle she won’t win because there is nothing in this world that could tear me away from the man beside me.

Darren looks from me to Bella.

“Honey, I know you’re hurting,” Bella says. “But don’t you think coming home is what’s best? All the books say you should find your routine again. This is not your routine.”

I tighten my grip on Maverick’s hand. As much to give him comfort as to give me strength. I may not have known him long, but I know that God brought me here for a reason. And I’m not leaving.

“I’m not coming back, Bella. For what it’s worth, I wasn’t even going to let you know anything was wrong. I didn’t want to hurt you all over again, so I was just going to let you think I’d quit.”

Her gaze turns furious. “How could you do that to us? To our kids? They love you!”

Breathe, Sadie. “And I love them. But it’s been three months, Bella. I would be more than happy to talk to them sometimes⁠—”

“Talk to them?” Bella shakes her head, anger taking over her expression. “You won’t be talking to them unless it’s as their nanny.”

I swallow against the lump in my throat. “That’s your choice, and I respect it.”

“Bella, you’re not being fair,” Darren says, trying to be the voice of reason. “Sadie has been through a horrific event. You can’t expect her to want to slip right back into routine. Not right away, at least.”

I offer him a tight smile, hoping he can see just how much I appreciate the support, but holding it together is becoming impossible.

For seven years, I slaved away for these people. I cooked, cleaned, did laundry, drove the kids to school, soccer practice, ballet…yet, when I went missing, they didn’t even bother to second-guess the suspicious circumstances surrounding it.