Prologue – Seven Years Ago
"Mom, there's someone at the door," Katie yelled. She stood slack-jawed in her pajamas, hands on her hips and her fair hair up in a bun, in front of the door, the perfect picture of the sort of sass that settles into your bones when you turn twelve.
"Who is it?" her mother called back. Her voice was muffled by two walls and the sound of a shower on full blast, but it still got back to her daughter without much of a problem. Katie rolled her eyes and shot a glance at the door. Solid wood, no peephole and the "stylish" glass window a few inches out of her reach even if she was on her tiptoes.
Katie pressed her back against the door. "Dunno," she announced. She chewed on her lip as she waited for her mother to reply.
"You can get it!" her mother yelled at the same time that her father came running down the stairs yelling his own answer – "Katie, no!"
But it was too late. It happened in one swift movement. The door was opened and the police were in. Her back was against the wall, small hands digging into the floral wallpaper of the duplex. She saw a mix of colours – blue, mostly, and the starched white of her father's shirt. There was a chorus of voices. "Sir, you're under arrest," and then something that she had only heard in movies (that she would later learn were called 'Miranda Rights').
It was too fast and it blurred. There was a scream and she found herself on the floor, curled into a ball with her hands over her head. They were on her father – her daddy, the man that would never hurt a fly, who took her horse-back riding for her seventh birthday and always let her put the money in the meter, who tucked her in and protected her – like rabid dogs on a piece of meat. And her dad fought back, until he was out the door and her mother, dripping wet and clutching a towel, with tears streaming down her face screamed and cursed after him.
On the day that changed her life forever, Katie Hale held her little brother's hand on her front porch while she watched her father get arrested for a crime that he did commit.
oops i oc'd. well most of this is planned out and i've got a lot written and i'm having a brilliant time.