Chapter 2 - The Hickory Cane
Helen sat perched on the high leather barstool like an ancient, gilded vulture.
She was wearing a cream cashmere cardigan that I had bought her for her birthday.
Her manicured fingers tapped impatiently on the white quartz island.
Richard sat two stools down, engrossed in his tablet, completely ignoring my entrance.
“Well, look who finally decided to join civilized society,” Helen scoffed, looking at her gold watch.
“It’s twenty past five, Clara.”
“When I was pregnant with Trent, I woke up at four every morning to churn butter and milk cows on my father's farm.”
“Modern girls think carrying a child is an excuse to become an absolute parasite.”
“Helen, please,” I gasped, leaning heavily against the stainless-steel double refrigerator.
“I have been bleeding lightly since yesterday evening.”
“I need to sit down.”
Trent slammed a cast-iron skillet onto the six-burner gas range.
The metallic clang rang out through the kitchen like a gunshot.
“You will sit when you finish your responsibilities,” Trent snapped.
“Three eggs over-easy for my father.”
“A spinach omelet with no oil for my mother.”
“Pancakes and bacon for Nicole and me.”
“Burn a single strip of bacon, and you’ll eat it off these freezing tiles.”
I reached for the carton of eggs in the door of the refrigerator.
The moment my fingers touched the cardboard, the entire room tilted forty-five degrees.
The bright pendant lights above the island blurred into long streaks of white fire.
A sickening wave of nausea crashed through my chest.
My knees gave out beneath me without warning.
I collapsed sideways, my hip slamming hard onto the unforgiving Italian tiles.
The egg carton flew from my limp grip, shattering several eggs across the polished floor.
Yolk and broken shells splattered across my bare ankles.
I lay there gasping, curling my body into an arch to keep my stomach from hitting the floor.
Richard didn't even lower his tablet.
He simply reached over, slid his coffee cup away from the edge of the counter, and sighed.
“Completely pathetic,” Richard muttered without looking up.
“She doesn't have an ounce of grit.”
“Trent, you married a defective woman.”
“I told you two years ago she had soft breeding.”
Nicole pointed her phone closer, zooming in on the egg yolks coating my skin.
“This is pure content,” Nicole giggled, tapping her screen rapidly.
“Look at her rolling around in the mess she made.”
“Should I caption it ‘When the trophy wife forgets how to stand’?”
Helen let out a sharp, dismissive cackle.
“Don't flatter her by calling her a trophy, darling.”
“She was an investment that hasn't paid a single dividend.”
From the mudroom by the back entrance, I heard the heavy, rhythmic thud of Trent’s work boots.
He wasn't walking like a man coming to help his fallen wife.
He was walking with the deliberate cadence of an executioner.
When he re-entered the kitchen, my blood instantly ran ice cold.
In his right hand, he held his grandfather's antique walking stick.
It was carved from solid, heavy hickory, with a heavy brass eagle’s head mounted on the top.
It was a weapon that could shatter bone with a single swing.
“Trent, no!” I screamed, terror finally puncturing my exhaustion.
“Trent, think about the baby!”
“She is your daughter!”
“She is twenty-four weeks old!”
I wrapped both of my trembling arms around my belly, pulling my knees up as high as they would go.
Trent stopped two feet away from where I lay in the mess.
His face was completely distorted by an ugly, uncontrolled rage.
“You think that kid makes you untouchable?” Trent roared, raising the cane.
“You think getting knocked up gives you the right to embarrass me in front of my parents?”
The hickory stick cut through the air with a sickening whistle.
The first blow struck the outer side of my left thigh with tremendous force.
A blinding white light exploded behind my eyes.
A scream tore from my throat, raw and animalistic.
The impact rattled all the way up into my pelvic bone.
“AGAIN!” Helen shouted from her stool, leaning forward with predatory excitement.
“Teach the little bitch some respect, Trent!”
“If you don't break her now, she will rule this house with her whining forever!”
Nicole zoomed in closer, her fingers flying over her keypad.
“The family group chat is going insane!” Nicole laughed hysterically.
“Uncle Marcus just replied with a laughing emoji!”
“He said call it the Lazy Wife Correction!”
Trent raised the cane again, his knuckles turning white around the brass eagle.
He swung it down across my shoulders.
The pain was so intense that my breath vanished instantly from my lungs.
I felt something warm and wet trickling down the inside of my right leg.
It wasn't water.
It was thick, dark, and hot.
Blood.
Inside my belly, the violent kicking suddenly stopped.
A terrifying, unnatural stillness settled over my daughter.
“No, no, no,” I sobbed into the floorboards, tasting dust and raw egg.
“Please, baby, kick for Mommy.”
“Just kick once.”
I looked up through the veil of my own hair and saw my iPhone lying beside the trash can.
It had slipped out of my robe pocket when I fell.
It was barely three feet away from my right hand.
Three feet between my unborn child and absolute death.
Richard took a sip of his coffee.
“Trent, finish it outside,” Richard said coldly.
“She is getting blood on the grout, and that stone is porous.”
I bit my tongue until the metallic taste of blood filled my mouth, using the pain to anchor my consciousness.
I began to drag myself across the floor, scraping my elbows against the tiles.
“Trent, look!” Nicole shrieked, pointing her phone down.
“She’s crawling toward her phone!”
“Stop her!” Richard barked, finally putting his coffee down.
“Don't let her call the neighborhood association!”
With the last reserve of strength in my soul, my fingers reached out.
My fingertips brushed the smooth glass of the phone.
I dragged it into my palm.
I didn't try to unlock the screen.
I didn't try to dial nine-one-one, because Trent would snatch it before dispatch could answer.
Instead, my thumb slammed rapidly five times against the power button on the right side.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five.
The emergency SOS sequence engaged silently.
A direct satellite distress signal, paired with live GPS coordinates and an open microphone feed, shot straight to my emergency contact.
To Alex.
My older brother.
Former Staff Sergeant, First Reconnaissance Battalion, United States Marine Corps.
A man who had survived three deployments in Sangin and Ramadi.
A man who lived precisely seven minutes down the road in his renovated farmhouse.
“Alex,” I whimpered into the tiny microphone at the bottom of the device.
“Please... Trent has a cane.”
“They are killing the baby.”
A heavy boot came crashing down onto my wrist.
The delicate bones of my wrist clicked sickeningly under Trent’s weight.
I shrieked, my fingers losing grip on the phone.
Trent kicked the device across the room, where it slid under the kitchen island.
He bent down, grabbed my hair again, and pulled my face up toward his.
He raised the heavy hickory stick directly above the center of my swollen abdomen.
“Nobody is coming to rescue you, Clara,” Trent snarled, his breath hot against my tears.
“You belong to this family.”
“And you will learn your place today, even if we have to start over with a new baby.”
He braced his feet on the tiles.
May you like
He pulled the stick back to drive the brass eagle straight into my child.
Then, without a sound of warning, every single light in the three-story house died.
