Chapter 20 - Letters from PrisonA year into her sentence at a maximum-security federal facility upstate, a thick envelope arrived at Arthur’s coastal Maine mailbox. It bore no return address, but the handwriting on the front was unmistakable: rigid, sharp, and unmistakably Victoria's.
Arthur sat at the kitchen table while Maya and Leo were at school. He stared at the envelope for a long moment before sliding a letter opener under the flap.
Inside was a single sheet of prison-issue paper:
"Arthur,
I suppose you are living comfortably by the ocean now, playing the hero father you always pretended to be. I am writing this not to ask for forgiveness—I know there is nothing left to salvage between us. But sitting in this concrete box twenty-four hours a day, watching the world move on without me, I finally understand what my father taught me. He taught me to treat everyone as a pawn. And in the end, I became a pawn myself.
I hope you are happy. I hope the children never remember my face. Because every single day, the ghost of what I threw away is the only thing that haunts me.
May you like
Victoria."
Arthur read the letter once, calmly folded it back up, and dropped it straight into the wood-burning stove beside him. He watched the flames consume the paper until it turned to ash, sealing the final chapter of a broken past forever.
