Chapter 13 - A New Horizon
Three weeks later, the moving trucks rolled away from the San Diego house—the house where the terror had begun, and where we had finally slain the dragons that haunted our lives. We didn't look back as we drove north, trading the glaring southern sun for the misty, quiet pines of the Pacific Northwest.
We settled into a small, unassuming timber home nestled near the rugged coastline of Oregon, far away from the slick corporate boardrooms, the corrupt legal syndicates, and the ghosts of Coronado. There were no security alarms humming in the walls, no hidden cameras, and no bitter reminders of a past built on lies.
Nora enrolled in a local elementary school. For the first week, she walked hand-in-hand with me every morning, her laughter ringing out across the damp moss and ferns. She didn't look over her shoulder anymore. She didn't flinch when someone offered her a drink.
Caleb kept in touch through encrypted satellite channels. The federal investigation into the wider syndicate was expanding, sweeping up high-profile judges and offshore bankers in Geneva and the Caymans. The network that had tried to steal my daughter’s sanity was collapsing like a house of cards.
One evening, as the sun dipped below the horizon, painting the Pacific sky in shades of deep violet and amber, Nora and I sat on the wooden back porch roasting marshmallows over an open fire pit.
"Daddy?" Nora asked softly, poking a golden-brown marshmallow off her stick.
"Yeah, sweetheart?"
"Are we ever going back down south?"
May you like
I smiled, pulling her closer into the warmth of my jacket, breathing in the scent of cedar and woodsmoke.
"No, sweetie," I said, looking out past the treeline toward the endless ocean. "We're exactly where we're supposed to be."
