Chapter 8

The Turning Point

Getting back to work felt like breathing again.

After everything I’d been through, I needed something that was mine — something steady, something that didn’t depend on anyone else’s moods or mistakes. Cleaning rooms at a hotel wasn’t glamorous, but it gave me purpose. It gave my days a rhythm again. My kids went to daycare, I paid my own bills, and for the first time in years, I felt like I was standing on my own two feet.

Then, as luck would have it, I landed an office job for one of my family’s oldest friends. Life has a funny way of circling back — familiar faces showing up when you least expect them.

It felt like coming home.

When I was younger, I’d spend the night at their house on weekends just so I could ride the broodmares in their pasture. The horses were owned by another family friend who used to laugh and tell me, “If you can catch them, you can ride them.” So I did.I made a rope bridle with a snaffle bit I’d found, and one by one, I caught and rode those horses like I’d been born in the saddle. Their son, a couple years younger than me, used to tag along until I found a snake — then he’d disappear faster than I could blink.

Years later, there we were again — older, steadier, and somehow right back where we’d left off.

We started spending time together again — dinners, movies, long evenings under the stars after working all day for his parents. It wasn’t a whirlwind; it was something gentler, deeper. A quiet comfort that felt like safety.

And almost before I knew it, we were dating.

A younger man, sure — but one who had the kind of maturity most men twice his age never reach. He finished high school and started his own business, while I poured myself into something new too.

I completed my detention officer and security specialist program, then went to test for the sheriff’s department. I passed.

I won’t lie — it felt good.Standing there in that uniform, badge gleaming under the lights, I felt like I’d finally taken back control of my life.

For about a year, I was happy in that job. I wouldn’t say I loved it, but I was proud of the work I did and the person I was becoming. Then one morning, everything changed.

A new sheriff had been hired.

The first day I met him was the last day I worked. I turned in my resignation before the sun went down and never looked back.

All that hard work, all that training — but I knew myself well enough by then to know what I would and wouldn’t tolerate. And I would not work for a man like him.

So, I left the badge behind and went to work right alongside the love of my life.

He was incredible with my kids.

Soft-spoken, patient, steady. He never raised his voice unless it was to call them in from outside. He’d sit with them for hours, teaching them how to write their names, reading books, listening to their endless stories. When they begged him to play, he never said no — even when it meant crawling around on his hands and knees, pretending to be their horse in the middle of the living room.

Those were the golden years — simple, quiet, and full of laughter.

Our life was good.

Until it wasn’t.