Chapter 12: Letters from the Coast**
Prison life stripped away the power, the silk suits, and the feared reputation, but it could not touch Damon’s inner peace. In the high-security facility, he worked in the library, teaching fellow inmates how to read and helping younger men draft petitions for educational programs. He asked for no special treatment and engaged in no prison politics.
Every month, without fail, a thick vanilla envelope arrived from an undisclosed address in Maine. Clara had taken Lily to a quiet coastal town under the federal protection agreement, living in a charming cottage overlooking the Atlantic Ocean.
Inside each envelope was a handwritten letter and a drawing.
*Dear Uncle Damon,* Lily wrote in neat, developing cursive when she was eight years old. *I planted a rose garden in front of the porch today. Clara helped me with the thorns. I got an A in mathematics because you told me numbers never lie. I miss you every day, but I keep your picture on my desk.*
May you like
Damon would trace the crayon lines with his calloused, ink-stained fingers, remembering the night a single sketch saved his life. He kept every single drawing in a wooden box beneath his cot, treasuring them more than all the gold and shipping empires he had ever commanded. Lily was growing up safe, untouched by the underworld that had swallowed her parents, flourishing in the warm sunlight of ordinary, beautiful childhood.
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