Chapter 1 - The Taste of Untouched Champagne
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I did not scream when my husband tied my wrists to the rusted iron wine rack beneath our sprawling Newport mansion. I didn’t flinch when he raised the leather riding crop for the thirtieth time.
The basement smelled like damp earth, old oak barrels, and the metallic tang of the blood running down my bare back.
Directly above us, the crystal chandeliers of our ballroom were glowing. Our wealthy guests were likely still whispering over untouched champagne flutes and a three-tier unicorn birthday cake. Just one hour earlier, my daughter, Maisie, had been twirling in a cloud of white tulle. She had been giggling, her eyes bright with the innocent joy of turning five, waiting for the father-daughter dance Grant had promised her.
Now, she was crouched in the dark corner of the cellar. A burly private security guard had his massive hand clamped over her small shoulder. She was sobbing so hard her little chest heaved, struggling for air.
"Daddy, stop! Please stop!" Maisie begged, her voice hoarse.
Grant Hawthorne did not stop.
He stood before me, immaculate in the perfectly tailored black suit I had steamed for him that very morning because he claimed the house staff was incompetent. His piercing blue eyes—the same eyes that once made me ignore every dire warning from my protective family—now looked colder than the steel hook digging into my wrists.
"Admit what you did, Evelyn," he demanded, his voice dangerously low.
The leather snapped through the damp air again.
Liquid fire ripped across my shoulder blades. My knees finally buckled, but the coarse ropes kept me suspended. A sound clawed its way up my throat—a low, broken whimper—but I swallowed it down with the taste of copper. I would absolutely not give Brooke Ellison the satisfaction of hearing me cry.
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Brooke stood near the heavy cellar door, draped in a luxurious cream cashmere coat. She was dabbing her perfectly mascaraed eyes with a silk handkerchief, looking every bit the tragic heroine in a perfume commercial.
"She's just jealous, Grant," Brooke sniffled. "She always has been."
