“Because she wouldn’t believe me. And it’s none of your business why I haven’t told her.”
That snapped something inside me.
I grabbed her wrists, maybe harder than I meant to. I needed her to hear me. To feel how serious I was.
“It is my business. I’m your husband.”
“Fake husband.” She threw the word like a dagger.
I flinched. It shouldn’t have hurt. But it did. My body felt suddenly cold. My blood drained to my feet. Maybe this started as fake, but nothing about how I felt for her was pretend.
What kind of mother doesn’t believe her daughter?
He wasn’t even her real dad.
The rage surged. Confusion clamped down on me like a vice, my thoughts spiraling as I stared at her—this beautiful, broken woman who kept rewriting everything I thought I knew.
“My stepdad is one of the biggest producers in Hollywood. He has lots of power and made it very clear that if I ever told my mom or anyone, there would be consequences.”
My blood boiled with rage, and I felt my fists clench at my sides.
What a sick bastard
I’ve killed plenty of people in my lifetime, but I never wanted to kill someone as much as I wanted to kill him.
“And my mom is brilliant about turning her cheek and keeping her head in the clouds, so it’s not even worth it.”
She breaks eye contact and starts to walk down the stairs. Brushing past me, I catch a whiff of her perfume. Spice mixed with vanilla. She smelled so good.
“It is worth it,” I say, following behind her. “He can’t get away with something like that. He deserves to be punished.”Here’s a more visceral version of that passage—more raw emotion, more bodily tension, more of what she’s feeling in her bones, all while keeping the meaning intact:
She let out a brittle laugh, the kind that didn’t touch her eyes. “He already has. Why do you think I loved college so much?” Her voice cracked around the edges, even as she tried to sound casual. “I was finally away from him. But when I refused to fuck him, he got jealous—thought I was seeing someone else. So he punished me.”
Her mouth twisted like the words tasted foul coming out.
“He cut me off. Stopped paying for college. Said it was because I crashed the car, but that was bullshit. He knew college made me feel free. So he ripped it away.” Her jaw clenched so hard I thoughther teeth might crack. “He had to take the one thing that brought me joy. Freedom.”
Her voice broke on that word.
Tears pooled in her eyes, but she didn’t let them fall. Her fists were balled at her sides, nails digging into her skin like she needed to feel pain to stay upright. She looked ready to punch a wall—or someone’s throat. The rage rolled off her in waves. But underneath all that fury, there was something even heavier—grief. And shame.
And fuck, she was beautiful in it. Fierce and broken and standing there like a lit fuse.
I used to think her life was charmed—money, beauty, privilege. But if even half of what she just told me was true, then her stepdad wasn’t just a monster. He was a full-blown psychopath.
And she’d been surviving him, silently, for years.
“Is he in love with you?”
She jerked backward like I had just slapped her across the face, and then she looked down at her feet before looking back up at me.
“He’s in love with himself.”
“Is this why you drink so much?”
She turns around swiftly, holding her meter in one hand. “I didn’t tell you all this so you can be my hero and save me, Captain Save-a-hoe.”
“I’m not a captain.”
