‘Once the baby's grown, I might think about forgiving you.’

Cold sweat crawled down my spine in an instant.

Even with the icy wind pouring desperately into the room, I still felt like I was suffocating.

I forced down the nausea churning in my stomach and turned to look at Jackson.

‘I don't need your forgiveness. Let's just end it here.’

‘Jackson, let's get a divorce.’

The moment the words left my mouth, out of the corner of my eye I caught a flicker of glee in Naomi's.

Her bright eyes fixed on Jackson, brimming with hope.

‘In your dreams!!’

Naomi's expression darkened in an instant.

The hand Jackson pressed against my collarbone snapped me back.

‘Camila, I'm not divorcing you.’

‘I already told you. I'm going to torment you for the rest of your life!’

‘A lifetime means a lifetime. One day short doesn't count!’

As he spoke,

Jackson yanked Naomi into his arms and kissed her, deep and smothering.

The sound of their sweet, sticky kissing swirled around my ears.

Clutching my clenched stomach, I bolted straight for the bathroom.

But the second I turned, Jackson seized my wrist.

He pointed at the kitchen, his voice cold.

‘Go cook.’

Looking at the madman's glint in Jackson's eyes, and the kiss marks he'd just left on Naomi's neck,

a helpless despair rose up inside me.

If I refused, who knew what sickening thing might happen.

I slowly pushed Jackson's hand off my wrist and went to the kitchen alone.

The crackle of the stove couldn't drown out the sweet sounds coming from the living room.

Jackson held Naomi in his arms,

shelling sunflower seeds for her one by one,

slipping a straw into her can of soda with practiced ease.

These were all things he'd once done for me.

I knew he was doing it on purpose. Doing it to sicken me.

Over and over I tried to look away, but I couldn't stop myself.

By the time the meal was done, it felt as if my soul had been drained out of me.

Naomi, though, was thrilled.

Looking at the table full of steaming dishes, she pointed at the TV.

‘Jackson, I want to watch something.’

‘Sure. You're the sweetest. Whatever you want.’

Jackson gave Naomi's nose a doting little tap and switched on the TV.

Naomi tapped away at something on her phone.

The next second, a piercing scream ripped out of the television.

My head jerked up toward the screen in front of me.

It was playing the video from three years ago, the one of me being assaulted by that old vagrant……

My body started shaking uncontrollably.

I shot up from my chair and lunged to grab Naomi's phone.

But before my hand could even touch it,

Jackson caught my wrist.

He picked up a piece of fish, set it in Naomi's bowl, and didn't even look up.

‘Don't move. Watch.’

From the speakers Jackson had picked out himself came the sound of my clothes being torn, and my desperate screams.

In that instant, everything I'd lived through three years ago replayed in my mind like a film, over and over,

and I broke down completely,

using every ounce of strength to wrench the phone out of Jackson's hand.

‘Jackson, have you lost your mind?!’

‘Give me the phone! Let go!!’

‘I won't!!’

Jackson's voice suddenly rose.

He grabbed the phone and slammed it hard against the floor with a ‘crack’.

The phone shattered, but the video kept playing on the TV.

‘Camila, I told you. I'm going to grind you into the dirt!’

‘What? Not feeling so good?’

Jackson shot to his feet and seized me by the collar.

‘Camila, say you love me.’

"Say it once, and I'll turn off the video."

A vast bitterness welled up in my chest.

Love?

After everything, how could I ever say I loved you?

"Oh, come on now…"

Naomi rose and hooked her arm through Jackson's, her soft, boneless hand stroking his back again and again.

"What's there to be angry about? Tonight I'll make it up to you properly."

"Didn't you say your marriage bed was custom-made overseas? Tonight I'll try it out with you…"

The fury in Jackson's eyes was swallowed at once by desire.

He yanked Naomi into his lap and sat back down.

"Fine. Whatever you want, you little minx."

He picked up his chopsticks, lifted a rib, and set it in Naomi's bowl.

"Eat up. You'll need your strength to take care of me tonight."

With that, his chopsticks reached again for the dishes on the table.

On the screen, the video kept playing.

Humiliation, shame, resentment, all of it surged up at once.

Something in me broke completely.

I grabbed a corner of the tablecloth and wrenched it upward with all my strength.

Crash!

One deafening smash,

and the whole table of pots and dishes slammed to the floor.

Naomi never saw it coming. A full clay pot of scalding soup poured straight over her swollen belly.

"Ahh…!"

Naomi let out a shriek,

jabbing a finger at me, spitting through her teeth,

"Camila, you're trying to kill my baby…!"

I was about to speak

when Jackson lunged forward, swung his arm up, and slapped me across the face.

"Bitch!"

Jackson glared at me, eyes bloodshot and fixed on mine,

his voice cold as if steeped in poison.

"Camila, if anything happens to the baby in Naomi's belly, I'll make you suffer a thousand times over!"

With that, Jackson scooped Naomi up and left,

and this time he slammed the door hard behind him.

Watching Jackson's back as he walked away without hesitation,

Thaddeus's words from three years ago rose in my mind,

"You are not to tell anyone about this. Unless you die, I will make the truth known."

I looked at the shattered porcelain scattered across the floor, and I smiled.

I picked out the sharpest shard on the ground, brought it slowly to my wrist, and dragged it down hard.

Then I took a photo and sent it to Thaddeus.

"Thaddeus, please. Tell Jackson the truth."

The bright red blood ran down my wrist like a little stream,

and in the last moment before consciousness slipped away,

my phone rang wildly with a call from Jackson…