Chapter 4
Jackson gave a bitter laugh. “So that’s how it is? She plays victim, and everyone suddenly turns on me?”
“No one turned anything,” Marcus said. “We watched you throw a plate.”
Jackson’s jaw worked.
Aunt Sylvia, Genesis’s sister, placed both hands on the table. Her rings flashed under the chandelier. “I think everyone needs to calm down.”
“That’s what you said when he grabbed her arm last Thanksgiving,” Marcus said.
The room went still again.
I felt my breath catch.
Jackson turned slowly toward him. “What did you just say?”
Marcus’s voice was quiet, but it did not waver. “I said that’s what she said last Thanksgiving. And at Dad’s birthday. And at the charity dinner when Elaine disappeared into the bathroom for twenty minutes and came out with red eyes.”
A strange sound filled the room. It took me a moment to realize it came from me.
Not quite a sob. Not quite relief.
Someone had seen.
All this time, someone had seen.
Genesis rose from her chair. “Enough.”
But the word no longer had the same power.
Sirens sounded faintly in the distance.
Jackson heard them too. His face changed again, this time with real fear. Not panic exactly, but calculation. He began looking around the room as if searching for the fastest way to rebuild the old order before strangers arrived and asked questions no one could control.
Then his eyes dropped once more to the recorder.
“What is that, Elaine?”
I did not answer.
He took a step toward the table.
Marcus blocked him again. “Don’t.”
Jackson’s voice dropped. “I’m asking my wife a question.”
“She doesn’t owe you an answer right now,” Marcus said.
May you like
Genesis’s breathing had become shallow. She gripped the back of her chair with both hands.
Arthur looked at her then, really looked at her, and something in his face folded inward. It was not shock. It was recognition mixed with dread.
