Page 3

The quick pound of my heart matched the dizziness threatening to make me pass out. My fingers scraped against porcelain when Ben wrenched me backward by the hair. I was thrown to the floor, where I curled inward, arms shielding my torso from those pristine Forzieri wingtips.

When the second kick came, I abandoned my ribs and protected my head. Everything slowed. The two-tone leather hovered above me, suspended in its arc like glass about to shatter. In that stretched moment, memories flickered, to my mother humming in our old kitchen, to my father’s eyes crinkling at the corners, to the hidden dishes under the sink and the stained towel.

But one thought crystallized above all others. The brown paper bag tucked beneath my car seat.

Reality snapped back as leather connected with flesh.

Then Ben simply walked away, leaving only silence.

I lay still, lungs burning as I held my breath. The living room clock ticked like a metronome of dread.

One second. Two. Three.

Was Ben finished, or merely retrieving his belt?

“Clean up that goddamn mess.” Ben’s voice echoed from another room.

With trembling arms, I pushed myself up to a sitting position. Sharp pain pulsed along the side of my body, making me bite back the shout trying to force its way out. Nausea swept up my chest, and it felt as if I would vomit.

Using the cabinet door for leverage, I staggered to my feet, using the counter to stop myself from falling over. I tried to take a deep breath, but the action only invited another round of agony that made my knees buckle. Tears brimmed my eyes, but I refused to let them fall. Ben had already taken so much from me. I wasn’t giving him stolen property. As I scraped the food into the sink, my stomach growled, but I was in too much pain to eat.

When the kitchen was spotless, I took my place on the couch, forcing my hands not to shake.

“Do you think I take pleasure in disciplining you?” Ben’s gaze remained steady on the television, watching the international news.

“No, sir.” Fuck yes. It gives you some kind of sick thrill. I stared past the television, past the walls of this house, past the life I’d been condemned to with a warden who possessed a twisted mind.

My body gave a small jerk when Ben patted my leg, but thankfully he hadn’t noticed. “Lesson learned. Let’s enjoy what’s left of our evening.”

The spot where Ben touched burned with the horror of what those hands were capable of. I smiled up at him, gave a single nod, then turned back toward the TV.

Somehow, some way, I would break free. There was another version of me waiting on the other side of this nightmare, and I would find him.

Because one day, Ben’s rage would cross that final line, and then I would be erased.

Chapter Two

Phineas

Late morning sunlight filtered through the windshield, warming my face as I sat in the parking lot behind Main Street. Every muscle ached from last night, a reminder that last night had happened, that it wasn’t just another nightmare.

Mrs. Pegged from HR had taken one look at me this morning and steered me into her office. “Honey, you look like death warmed over,” she’d said, pushing a box of tissues across her desk even though I wasn’t crying. “Take the rest of the day. Mental health is important.”

Mental health. Right. If that were the case, I needed to take the rest of my life off. Funny how people could see bruises but not prison bars.

In the rearview mirror, the bruise bloomed purple-green beneath layers of Maybelline's finest. Tomorrow I’d need to buy a different brand.

Add it to the list of things I’d never thought I’d become an expert in, along with walking silently, cooking perfect portions, and smiling through pain.

Easy to think. Harder to execute when Ben tracked my bank account, my phone, probably my damn heartbeat through that fitness app he’d insisted we both download.

That’s why I had “accidentally” left my phone stuffed inside a drawer in my desk at work. If I hadn’t, Ben would’ve blown it up by now, demanding I head straight home where he could watch me through the many cameras scattered throughout the house.

Scanning the street, I searched for that familiar silver BMW. Ben worked forty minutes away in some glass tower where he terrorized administrative assistants instead of boyfriends, but paranoia had become second nature. Nobody seemed to be watching. Still, habit made me check twice. Three times.

I need to get out.

Not just out of this car but out of everything. Away from Ben, away from that yellow house that had become a prison. Maybe disappear into mountains and let the forest swallow me whole. Dramatic? Sure. But at least trees wouldn't backhand you for leaving towels in the wrong place.