“Vanessa?”
Maya flinched at the name.
My heart began pounding.
“Sweetheart, did that lady hurt you?”
Tears filled her eyes.
“I don’t know. Sometimes I wake up there, and my arms hurt. She tells me to close my eyes again.”
I wanted to scream.
Instead, I wrapped my arms around my daughter and held her gently.
“Listen to me, Maya. You haven’t done anything wrong. Nothing that happened is your fault.”
Her lower lip trembled.
“Will Daddy be mad?”
I closed my eyes.
That was the moment I understood how deeply Adrian had frightened our child.
My daughter was suffering, and she was more afraid of upsetting her father than of the pain itself.
“No,” I whispered. “Nobody gets to punish you for telling the truth.”
I kissed her forehead, picked up my phone, and called emergency services.
For weeks, Adrian had convinced me that taking Maya to a doctor would be an overreaction.
