Everything had changed.

My daughter, Sophie, stood at the edge of the crowd twisting the bottom of her T-shirt between both hands. She wasn’t watching Travis. She was watching me, searching my face for proof that I could keep her safe.

“Sophie,” I said, never taking my eyes off my brother-in-law, “go stand beside Mr. Palmer.”

Her sneakers scraped across the pavement behind me.

Travis laughed and bounced on the balls of his feet. “That’s right,” he said. “Move the kid so she doesn’t have to watch her mom beg.”

I bent down and picked up the gloves. I did not put them on. I held them loosely at my side and looked at the man who had just threatened to cripple me in front of my child.

“Take one more step toward my daughter, Travis.”

His grin widened. Mine did not.

To most of the neighborhood, I was Claire. The quiet single mother who worked in records management for a federal agency and drove an SUV old enough to still have a cassette deck.