Chapter 7
For the first six months of Lila’s life, everything was perfect.
Too perfect, maybe.
I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop.
For something bad to happen.
For Ethan to escape from prison.
For his parents to violate the restraining order.
For my mother to disappear again.
But nothing bad happened.
Every day was just… good.
Happy.
Calm.
I started a small business from the penthouse—designing and selling handmade baby clothes online.
It started as a hobby, just making little dresses and onesies for Lila, posting pictures on Instagram.
But within a few months, orders were pouring in.
Women loved the soft fabrics, the cute designs, the story behind it all—single mom, new baby, building something from nothing.
My mother became my biggest cheerleader.
She helped me set up a proper website, hired a small team of seamstresses, found a warehouse space, turned my little hobby into a real, thriving company.
We called it Lila’s Threads.
By the time Lila was six months old, we were making more in a month than Ethan had made in a year at his “business.”
And I did it all myself.
No husband.
No man to tell me what to do.
Just me and my mom, building something together.
Lila was the happiest baby I’d ever seen.
She smiled at everyone.
She laughed at the stupidest things—my bad singing, the dog next door barking, her own reflection in the mirror.
She had my eyes, my mother’s dimple, and a head of wild, curly dark hair that stuck up in every direction no matter what we did to it.
She was perfect.
The trouble came on a rainy Tuesday in October.
I was in the warehouse, going over inventory with the seamstresses, Lila in her stroller beside me, napping, when my phone rang.
It was the head of security my mother had hired to watch over us 24/7.
“Ms. Voss?” he said, his voice tight, urgent. “You need to listen to me very carefully. Ethan Carter escaped from prison three hours ago. He injured two guards. He’s armed and dangerous. We believe he’s heading toward the city. We have teams out looking for him, but until we find him, I need you to go straight back to the penthouse. Lock all the doors. Don’t let anyone in. Not even the police unless we confirm their identity first. We’re sending extra men to the building right now. Do you understand?”
My blood turned to ice.
Ethan.
Out.
Armed.
Dangerous.
I looked down at Lila, sleeping peacefully in her stroller, her thumb in her mouth, totally unaware.
“Y-yes,” I stammered. “Yes. I understand. I’m leaving right now.”
I hung up, grabbing the stroller, rushing out of the warehouse to my car.
My hands were shaking so bad I could barely get the key in the ignition.
I called my mother.
She answered on the first ring.
“I heard,” she said, her voice calm but tight. “I’m on my way to the penthouse now. The security team is meeting you there. Drive carefully, baby. Don’t speed. Just get here safe. I love you.”
“I love you too,” I said, my voice cracking.
The drive back to the penthouse was the longest fifteen minutes of my life.
Every car that passed me looked like it could be Ethan.
Every shadow in the rearview mirror looked like him.
I kept glancing back at Lila, still sleeping, thanking God she didn’t know how scared I was.
I pulled into the underground parking garage of our building.
Four security guards were waiting for me, big, serious men with guns under their jackets, who escorted me and Lila up to the penthouse in the private elevator.
My mother was already there, pacing the living room, her phone pressed to her ear, talking in low, sharp tones to someone.
She hung up the second the elevator doors opened and ran to us, pulling me and Lila into a tight hug.
“Thank God,” she whispered. “Thank God you’re safe.”
“Did they find him?” I asked, looking around the penthouse, my heart still hammering.
“Not yet,” she said. “But they’re closing in. They found his car abandoned twenty miles outside the city. He’s on foot. He can’t get far. The whole state is looking for him. Every police officer, every highway patrol, every federal marshal within five hundred miles. He’s trapped. He can’t get to us.”
But I wasn’t so sure.
I knew Ethan.
I knew how vindictive he was.
How stubborn.
How cruel.
If he wanted to get to me, to hurt me, to take Lila… he’d find a way.
I didn’t sleep at all that night.
I sat in the rocking chair in Lila’s nursery, holding her in my arms, watching her breathe, while my mother sat beside me, holding my hand.
Security guards patrolled the hallways outside our door.
More stood on the roof.
More watched every entrance to the building.
But still, I was scared.
At 4 a.m., we heard it.
A soft scratching sound.
At the window of Lila’s nursery.
The penthouse was on the fortieth floor.
No one could get up there.
Could they?
My mother stood up slowly, putting herself between me and the window, pulling a small gun out of the waistband of her sweatpants.
I stared at it.
I’d never known she carried a gun.
“Stay back,” she whispered to me, her eyes locked on the window.
The scratching got louder.
Then a face appeared in the dark glass.
Ethan.
His face was cut and bruised, his clothes torn and dirty, his eyes wild, insane.
He was hanging from the window washing platform, swaying in the wind forty stories up.
He saw me.
He smiled.
A terrible, mad smile.
He raised his fist and slammed it hard against the glass.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
The glass cracked.
I screamed, clutching Lila tighter to my chest, she woke up and started crying too, scared by my fear.
“GET AWAY FROM HIM!” my mother shouted at me, aiming the gun right at his face through the glass. “MOVE!”
I scrambled back, pressing myself against the far wall, covering Lila’s body with my own.
Ethan slammed his fist against the glass again.
The crack spread.
One more hit and it would shatter.
And then we heard it.
The sound of running footsteps in the hallway outside the nursery.
Shouting.
A loud, sharp crack—gunfire.
Ethan’s head snapped to the side.
For half a second, he looked confused.
Then his grip on the platform slipped.
He fell.
Silently.
Into the dark.
Forty stories down.
I closed my eyes, holding Lila tighter, rocking her, whispering over and over again that it was okay, that she was safe, that Mommy was here.
My mother ran to the window, looking down, then turned to me, her face pale.
She dropped the gun on the floor.
“It’s over, baby,” she said, her voice shaking. “He’s gone. It’s really over.”
The police came ten minutes later.
The SWAT team.
The detectives.
Everyone.
They told us the shot had come from one of the snipers positioned on the roof across the street.
He’d had no choice.
Ethan was armed.
He was seconds from breaking through the glass.
It was a clean shot.
Instant.
No pain.
I didn’t feel sad.
I didn’t feel guilty.
I just felt… relief.
So much relief I thought I might pass out.
He could never hurt us again.
Never.
The sun came up an hour later, pink and gold, streaming through the cracked nursery window.
Lila had fallen back asleep in my arms, her little face peaceful, no memory of the terror of the night before.
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My mother sat down beside me, wrapping her arms around both of us.
We sat there together, watching the sun rise, knowing that the very last of the darkness was finally gone.
