Bound (The St. Jean Legacy #4)

Beginning

NIA

One Year Later

I stood in the kitchen stirring heavy whipping cream into the pot of cheese grits, moving the spoon slow and steady, like if I rushed it the whole thing might scorch.

The pot clicked faintly against the burner.

The smell of butter and salt filled the house the same way it always did.

Mornings had a way of pretending nothing was wrong if you let them.

Sunlight poured in through the window over the sink, bright enough to make the dust float, as if it had somewhere important to be.

I could tell the temperature had dropped overnight by the way the leaves clung to the yard just long enough to let go all at once. The tree out back looked thinner than it had yesterday. Everything did.

Juelz and Jezel sat at the counter, swinging their legs, arguing softly about something that had happened at school the day before.

A teacher. A girl who'd said something slick.

Whose turn it had been to line up first. Their voices blended together into a low hum I didn't need to follow.

I listened just enough to know they were fine.

That was the rule now. Check for fine. Keep moving.

It had been a little over a year since we buried Juliana. A year since Jules had been locked up. A year since the house had learned how to breathe without them in it, even though it still felt wrong every time it did.

Grief didn't come crashing in like people said it would.

It settled. It slid into the cracks of my routine and made itself useful.

I woke up. I cooked. I signed papers. I combed my hair.

I showed up where I was supposed to be and stayed quiet when it mattered.

Some days passed so smoothly I almost forgot why my chest felt heavy.

Other days, I felt it before my feet even touched the floor.

I'd learned how to coast. That was the only word for it. Not living. Not healing. Just moving forward because the world didn't stop when my daughter died.

I couldn't afford to fall apart even if I wanted to. I still had three other children who had lost her, too. Lost their sister. And lost their father in a different way. I wasn't the only one grieving in this house. I was just the one expected to carry it without spilling.

The spoon scraped the bottom of the pot. I turned the burner down and reached for the salt, measuring by memory. Too much and they'd complain. Too little and they'd drown it in butter to make a point. Every small thing felt like it mattered more now.

Jules and I hadn't spoken in months. Not really, we hadn't talked in a way that meant anything. We hadn't said two full sentences to each other outside of logistics, phone calls with the kids, schedules, and things that could be handled without emotion attached.

I tried to go see him once. I still remember how the visiting room smelled, clean, like it had been scrubbed too many times without enough care. The way he came out and didn't even sit. How he looked at me like I was something he'd already decided to let go of.

"Get the fuck on," he'd said, voice flat. Like he was ordering food he didn't want anymore. "Take me back to my cell."

That was it. I didn't cry in the car. Nor did I scream or even ask why. I drove home the same way I drove everywhere now. eyes forward, hands steady, heart tucked somewhere it couldn't interrupt.

Part of me felt like I deserved it.

I knew what happened to Juliana was on me.

Nobody had to say it. The silence around it said enough.

The guilt sat quietly but permanently, like a bruise you stopped looking for.

I replayed that day more times than I could count, always starting a little earlier, always ending a little sooner, like if I adjusted the memory enough it might change the outcome.

I would have traded places with my baby without hesitation. I still would. That thought lived in me like a reflex.

I knew Jules would never forgive me. Not fully. Maybe not at all. He didn't even look at me the same way in my mind anymore. In memory, his eyes always slid past me like I wasn't something worth stopping for.

"Ma, the grits done."

Julise's voice cut through the kitchen and pulled me back. I blinked and turned toward her. She leaned against the counter, arms crossed, already watching me like she was waiting to see what version of me she'd get today.

She was almost fourteen now. Old enough to understand more than I wanted her to.

Old enough to ask questions, I didn't always have answers for.

The older she got, the more she looked like her daddy.

She had the same eyes, same mouth when she was annoyed, same way of standing, like the world was already against her.

She held me accountable in ways my other kids didn't. We butted heads constantly, not because she was bad, but because she was watching and measuring. It felt like she was deciding who I was now.

I looked her over and felt my mouth tighten.

She had on a cropped sweatshirt that showed her stomach when she moved, tight leggings that looked two sizes too small, and lip gloss shining like she was going somewhere she didn't need to be. Her braids were pulled half up, half down, neat but intentional. She knew what she was doing.

"Jul, go and change now," I said, keeping my voice even. I raised an eyebrow, waiting.

She stared back at me, unmoved. Like my words had floated right past her.

"Julise," I said again, firmer.

She didn't budge.

"Julise, go change your damn clothes now."

My voice came out sharper than I meant it to. The kitchen went quiet for half a second. She rolled her eyes, huffed under her breath, and stomped off down the hallway.

That was how we talked now. Tension first. Understanding later, if at all.

She blamed me. I knew it even if she never said it.

A part of me let her. I didn't correct her when she slammed doors.

Nor did I argue when she muttered under her breath.

I absorbed it the same way I absorbed everything else.

She didn't just look at me. She watched me.

Like she was still deciding what kind of mother I was gonna be now.

"It's her attitude I don't like," Juelz said from the table.

I carried their plates over that held grits, eggs, and bacon, laid out just the way they liked it.

Juelz turned seven last month and had inherited Evie's mouth without asking permission.

He said what he thought without thinking and didn't care about the consequences.

"Hush, Juelz," Jezel said quickly, waving him off.

"Mama, don't forget to sign our planners this morning," she added, smiling up at me.

Jezel was my backbone. Nine years old and already holding things together in ways she shouldn't have had to. She didn't look at me with questions in her eyes. She didn't choose to measure my grief against her own. She loved me plain and simple. To her, I was still just Mama.

I nodded and went back to the counter, signing both planners without reading what was written inside. I'd learned to trust that if something was important, they'd tell me. I slid the planners back into their backpacks and hung them on the backs of the chairs.

Julise came back into the kitchen dressed down in a t-shirt and jeans with her jacket zipped all the way up. The dramatics were intentional. I let my eyes roll once and said nothing. "You didn't fix me breakfast?" she asked, hand on her hip.

I didn't turn around right away. I rinsed the spoon.

Wiped the counter. Finished what I was doing before answering.

"You know my rule already," I said finally.

"I fix plates for whoever's at the table when foods served.

If you want something to eat, fix it." She opened her mouth like she wanted to argue, then closed it again.

"Meet me at the car in fifteen minutes," I added, already walking off.

I left her standing there because if I stayed, I might've said something I couldn't take back.

And I'd learned that silence was safer than honesty most days.

In the hallway, the house felt too quiet for that early in the morning.

I paused outside Juliana's room without meaning to.

The door stayed closed the same way I left it.

Not locked. Just untouched. Like opening it would restart something I barely survived the first time.

I stood there long enough to feel the weight press down behind my ribs.

I turned away before my hand could lift on its own and walked into my bedroom.

The mirror above the dresser caught me mid-step, and I stopped again. Different pause. Same heaviness.

I stared at myself like I was trying to recognize someone I used to know.

Straight up and down. No softness left anywhere that didn't serve a purpose.

My body didn't look like it had carried four children.

It didn't look like it had ever held a baby against it long enough to memorize the weight.

I damn sure didn't look like anything had changed me.

Sometimes that felt like a compliment. Other times it felt like proof.

I pulled a knit hat down over my short cut, fingers brushing hair that had grown out just enough to look unfinished.

I had an appointment scheduled later. It was nothing fancy, just a clean-up.

Another maintenance task and thing on the list that kept me moving forward without asking why.

I didn't linger in the mirror. Didn't check my face too closely.

There were lines there now that hadn't been before; they had shown up when I wasn't paying attention.

I learned early not to stare too long at things that might ask something of me.

I grabbed my keys and purse and headed back toward the kitchen, already bracing myself for another day of holding everything together without being asked how heavy it felt. It didn't matter, though. That had been my life.