Lila’s knees were bruised. Her palms burned. She had been cleaning since dawn — washing dishes, folding laundry, mopping floors. Every time she slowed down, Diana’s sharp voice cut through her like a knife. The little girl’s body was fragile, but what hurt more was the loneliness — the fear that her father, Sergeant Nathan Morgan, stationed overseas, would never know what his daughter endured.

That afternoon, as sunlight streamed through the dusty blinds, Lila’s vision blurred. Her breathing grew shallow. She tried to whisper for help, but her voice was gone. She collapsed on the cold floor, the mop falling beside her. A thin line of blood ran down her leg where she had scraped herself earlier.

Fate intervened at that very moment. Nathan had returned home unexpectedly after months of deployment. He walked through the front door, expecting to see his little girl run to him like she always did. Instead, what he saw froze him to the core — Lila, motionless on the floor, pale, and bleeding.