“They want to take the boys,” Ruth said, her voice trembling.

“They are claiming Daniel is an unfit parent.”

“On what grounds?” I asked.

Daniel looked up from the papers, his eyes filled with a new kind of fear.

“Because of you, Claire,” he said.

“They say I am housing an unrelated, unwell woman in the mansion.”

“They are using your illness to destroy us.”

I stared at the blue backing paper in Daniel’s trembling hands.

The white hospital room felt smaller, the walls pressing in around us.

The steady, rhythmic beep of my heart monitor seemed to grow louder and faster.

“An unrelated, unwell woman,” I repeated, my voice barely a whisper.

“They have been watching the house,” Ruth said, her voice shaking as she pulled her wet coat tighter around her shoulders.

“They know about your hospital visits, Claire,” she added. “They have private investigators.”

Daniel looked down at the documents, his knuckles turning white as he gripped the pages.

“They are calling you an unstable presence,” Daniel said, his voice flat with suppressed anger.