They buried me up to my neck in the backyard dirt for days while I was pregnant, pouring water and insects over me as “punishment for disobedience.”

By the following week, the grand jury had returned a twelve-count indictment against the Vance family. But inside the county jail, the united front was already crumbling.

It started with Mara.

Unlike her mother, who was an iron-willed narcissist, and her brother, who was a clinical sociopath, Mara was simply selfish and cowardice personified. Facing twenty-five years to life in a state penitentiary without the possibility of parole was a reality her delicate sensibilities could not process.

On Tuesday morning, DA Sarah Chen called me into her office. I was sitting up straight now, color returning to my cheeks, wearing a dark green sweater that showed my growing bump.

“Mara’s public defender called me an hour ago,” Chen said, pouring two cups of chamomile tea and passing one to me. “She wants a deal.”

“What kind of deal?”

“She’s offering full, unreserved testimony against Ethan and Eleanor,” Chen explained. “In exchange, she wants a reduction of charges to secondary accessory and a recommended sentence of five years probation with community service.”

I held the warm tea mug between my hands, thinking back to the sound of Mara moving her lawn chair two feet so her sandals wouldn't touch the mud while I starved.

“Five years probation is too light,” I said calmly. “She sat there and watched. She brought them fresh water pitchers. She knew what they were doing to me and my baby.”

“I agree,” Chen nodded. “I countered with eight years in state prison, with eligibility for parole after four, provided she gives us every detail of their financial planning—specifically, the shell corporations Eleanor set up to steal your inheritance.”

“Did she take it?”

“She snapped at it like a starving dog,” Chen said with a grim satisfaction. “Mara just signed the proffer agreement. And what she gave us during her four-hour deposition yesterday evening turns this case from a domestic violence prosecution into an open-and-shut racketeering ring.”

Chen opened a thick red folder on her desk.

“According to Mara, this wasn't an impulsive act of cruelty,” Chen revealed. “Ethan and Eleanor spent four months researching legal loopholes regarding mental incompetency. Eleanor had found a dirty doctor in the next county who was willing to sign off on a psychiatric hold certificate for you—for fifty thousand dollars.”

My skin turned cold. “They were going to commit me permanently?”

“Worse,” Chen said softly. “The plan was to keep you in that yard until you signed the power-of-attorney documents. Once you signed, they were going to claim you suffered severe postpartum psychosis, place you in a private, unaccredited facility owned by Eleanor’s cousin, and take full legal guardianship of your child and your father’s three-million-dollar estate.”

I took a slow, deep breath, feeling the air fill my lungs completely—clean, deep, and unhindered.

“Where is Eleanor now?” I asked.

“Eleanor found out about Mara’s plea bargain this morning during recreation hour,” Chen smiled thin. “According to the guards, she tried to physically attack her own daughter through the chain-link divider. They had to put Eleanor in administrative segregation for her own safety. The family is eating itself alive, Clara.”

I looked out the window of the district attorney’s office, watching the city below hustle and bustle under the bright, clear autumn sky.

For months, I had been made to feel tiny, crazy, and helpless—trapped inside a grand house on a lonely country road, surrounded by people who viewed me as nothing more than a bank account with a heartbeat.

They had put me in the earth thinking it would bury me.

They hadn't realized I was a seed.

“When does the trial start?” I asked, turning back to Sarah Chen with absolute calm in my heart.

“Selection starts in three weeks,” Chen replied. “Are you ready to take the stand?”