CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 5
Ethan opened the door with shaking hands.
Two police officers stepped inside.
Margaret immediately became a different woman.
Her shoulders softened. Her voice trembled. Her eyes filled with performance tears.
“Thank God you’re here,” she said. “My future daughter-in-law is having some kind of breakdown.”
I stood near the wall, both hands on my stomach.
One officer looked at me first.
“Ma’am, are you hurt?”
“My back hurts,” I said. “She shoved me, and they locked me inside when I refused to give them my ATM card.”
Ethan exploded. “That’s insane.”
The officer turned to him. “Sir, lower your voice.”
Margaret lifted her chin. “This is a family misunderstanding.”
“No,” I said. “It’s not.”
I played the recording.
Margaret’s own voice filled the living room.
“Give me your ATM card. And your PIN.”
Then Ethan’s voice.
“We’re family now. Your money is our money.”
Then Margaret again.
“Without my son, you’re just a pregnant woman with nowhere to go.”
No one spoke when it ended.
Even the chandelier seemed too bright.
The second officer looked at the security camera in the corner. “Is that recording too?”
“Yes,” I said. “The system belongs to me. I paid for it.”
Margaret’s mouth opened.
Nothing came out.
Ethan looked at me like I had betrayed him.
That almost made me laugh.
He had locked me inside his mother’s house, demanded my money, stood there while she put hands on me, and somehow he still believed he was the injured party.
The officer stepped between us.
“Sir, move away from her.”
Ethan did.
May you like
Slowly.
For the first time since I met him, he obeyed someone who was not his mother.
