“The second time. He found me.” Tears slid down his nose. “He crouched down, just like you. He said it was a grown-up secret. He said if I told anyone, they’d put Grandma in a place with locked doors. A place called Brookhaven. And I’d never see her again.”
My hands curled into fists on my knees.
“He said it was our secret, Mom. ‘Our little secret, bodyguard.’”
I couldn’t speak.
I thought about every day he’d followed Craig up those stairs.
I thought about the way I had scolded him, in my tired voice, in my own kitchen.
He was eight years old, and he had been guarding his grandmother’s door for two weeks with nothing but a pillow and a blanket and a promise.
“I thought if I stayed right here,” Wyatt said, “he couldn’t do it again.”
I pulled him against my chest.
