Chapter 6: The Eviction Notice
Chapter 6: The Eviction Notice
True to their word, the retaliation from my parents was swift and brutal.
Three days after the bail hearing, while Sophie was resting at home on the couch watching cartoons, there was a loud knock on my door. When I opened it, a process server handed me a stack of legal papers.
An eviction notice.
The two-bedroom apartment I lived in was owned by a holding company controlled by my father. I paid rent every month, but because it was a family arrangement, we had a month-to-month lease. The notice gave me exactly seventy-two hours to vacate the premises due to "unauthorized structural alterations"—a completely fabricated lie.
Ten minutes later, my phone pinged. It was an email from the human resources department at the architectural firm where I worked as a senior designer.
Dear Evelyn, due to restructuring and recent public controversies surrounding your personal life, the firm has decided to terminate your employment effective immediately. Your final severance check will be mailed to you.
My father had called the managing partners of my firm. He had used his legal influence to get me fired. They were systematically cutting off my shelter and my income, trying to starve me into submission before Preston's trial.
I sat on the kitchen floor, the eviction notice in one hand and my termination email on my phone screen. For a moment, the old fear crept back in. The fear of being the helpless daughter who had to beg for scraps from her parents' table.
Sophie walked into the kitchen, her head still bandaged, holding her favorite stuffed bear. She sat down next to me and wrapped her small arms around my neck.
"Mommy, are we going to be okay?" she whispered.
I looked at her, at the stitches hidden beneath her hair, and the fear vanished, replaced by an icy, unyielding resolve.
"We are going to be more than okay, Sophie," I said, kissing her forehead. "They think they can starve us out. But they forgot that I’m the one who knows how to survive."
I pulled out my laptop. If my father wanted to play dirty in the dark, I was going to bring everything into the blinding light. I recorded a video sitting right there on the kitchen floor, holding up the eviction notice and the termination email.
May you like
"My father, Richard Bennett, just evicted his injured granddaughter and got me fired from my job for refusing to drop the charges against my brother," I said directly into the camera. "They want to ruin me. But I will not back down."
The video went viral within thirty minutes. But this time, it caught the attention of someone my father could never control.
