Chapter 1 - GET OFF THAT FLOOR
Ethan Mercer was already on the tile when Nurse Carla Jennings reached the doorway.
Three days after emergency surgery for a ruptured appendix, nineteen-year-old Ethan had one hand pressed over the dressing beneath his hospital gown and the other braced uselessly against the floor.
His lip was split.
His stepfather stood over him.
“Get off that floor and stop acting weak—you’re working Monday!”
Franklin Mercer jabbed a finger inches from Ethan’s face.
Dana stood beside the bed with both hands over her mouth.
She had watched her husband slap her son.
And she had done nothing.
Ethan tried to pull himself backward against the bed frame.
“I can’t.”
Franklin bent down.
“You can.”
He seized the front of Ethan’s hoodie and gown and started hauling him upward.
Pain ripped across Ethan’s abdomen.
He gasped and folded around himself.
“You live under my roof,” Franklin snarled, “so you start earning your keep now.”
Carla crossed the room fast.
“Let go of him.”
Franklin ignored her.
Carla wedged herself between them and pried his hand loose.
Behind her, two Indianapolis Metropolitan Police officers entered through the open doorway.
Franklin finally stepped back.
His expression changed immediately.
“Officer, this is a family issue.”
Carla crouched beside Ethan.
“Can you hear me?”
Ethan nodded.
His vision blurred at the edges.
Franklin reached around her.
“Come on. Quit performing.”
Ethan slapped his hand away with what little strength he had.
“He slapped me,” Ethan said, his voice shaking. “Don’t let him touch me again.”
One officer moved Franklin toward the foot of the bed.
The second, Officer Elena Ruiz, crouched beside Ethan.
“Has he done this before?”
Ethan looked toward his mother.
Dana’s face had collapsed.
“Mom?”
Franklin twisted toward her.
“Dana.”
She stared at her son on the floor.
Then she nodded.
Once.
Yes.
Franklin went pale.
“That’s not what she means.”
Ruiz stood.
“What does she mean?”
Dana began crying harder.
Franklin tried to move toward her.
The other officer caught his arm.
“Stay where you are.”
For the first time in three years, Dana did not obey her husband’s stare.
She whispered, “He’s hit Ethan before.”
Ethan stopped breathing for a second.
He knew Franklin had shoved him.
Pinned him against a garage wall.
Thrown a toolbox past his head.
But Dana had always called those incidents arguments.
Now she had used the word hit.
Franklin looked at her as though she had committed the betrayal.
Not him.
Carla helped Ethan back onto the bed while Ruiz began separating everyone for statements.
As Franklin was led into the hallway, he turned once.
“This kid has cost me everything.”
Ethan looked at his mother.
Dana dropped her eyes.
Something about the sentence frightened Ethan more than the slap.
May you like
Because Franklin wasn’t talking like a man angry about hospital bills.
He sounded like a man who had been keeping score.
