Page 171 of Brighter Together

Someone might be inside.

I draw breath.

Lee clamps his hand across my mouth.

“No. None of that.”

Alcohol rolls off him.

That’s not the smell of one drink.

My panic sharpens.

Lee angry is dangerous.

Lee drunk and angry is worse.

I know that from experience.

For one horrible second I am twenty-six again, lying in a hospital bed with a fractured cheekbone while Mum sits beside me explaining to the doctor that a stranger attacked me outside a pub.

She waited until we got home before laying into me.

Lee wouldn’t have hit me that hard without a reason.

I must have said something.

I must have pushed him.

I should have known when to stop.

Even then, somehow, it was my fault.

“We’re ruined because of you,” Lee hisses.

His fingers dig into my cheeks.

“Dad’s fucking furious. We needed one thing from you. One.”

I shake my head against his hand.

“You were already spreading your legs for Atkinson. How difficult would it have been to make him sign a fucking contract?”

Something inside me changes.

Fear is still there.

My heart is hammering so hard I can hear it.

But underneath it, anger pushes through.

All those years.

All those projects.

All those times I stayed quiet because saying no made everything worse.

All the things they took from me and then told me I owed them more.