Chapter 4
I called the bank before the nurse finished my discharge paperwork.
The fraud department froze the application in under seven minutes.
Daniel called eleven times while I was on hold.
I answered the twelfth.
"What?"
His voice came fast.
"Emily, please listen before you do anything permanent."
"Too late."
Silence.
"You froze it."
"So you did know."
"I knew Mom was trying to restructure some debt. I didn't know she submitted the final paperwork."
"My signature is on the application."
"I thought you signed the authorization packet last month."
I almost laughed.
"The packet you told me was for health insurance?"
He stopped talking.
There it was.
Not innocence.
Cowardice dressed up as confusion.
"Come home," he said finally. "We'll fix this together."
"I am not coming home tonight."
"It's our house."
I looked at Robert.
He heard it through the speaker.
"Actually," I said, "apparently it's mine."
Daniel's breathing changed.
"Don't do this."
"You let your mother hit me."
"I didn't know she was going to—"
"You watched her afterward."
He had no answer.
I ended the call.
Robert drove me to a hotel because I refused to stay anywhere Daniel could walk in without warning.
At midnight, someone knocked on my door.
I checked the peephole.
Lisa stood outside, still wearing the green dress from dinner.
I almost ignored her.
Then she held her phone up to the peephole.
On the screen was a video of Margaret raising her hand.
Lisa whispered through the door.
"Emily, I recorded the whole thing."
I opened it two inches with the chain still on.
"Why?"
Her face was pale.
May you like
"Because the slap wasn't the first thing I recorded tonight."
Then she showed me what had happened in the kitchen before dinner.
