Fear drives evil, and Owen was deeply afraid. A man controls someone else because he’s afraid of losing his puppet, or more likely, himself. Just as Owen controlled me, because I let him be what he wanted to be—powerful and in charge. In the bedroom he made sure I knew this, and for those hellish minutes he had full control over my body, my voice, my will.

I loved him every other minute in the day except for those minutes when I hated him, loathed him, wished him dead. And those minutes added up night after night. He had chipped away at my self-worth until nothing remained. He had sabotaged my friendships, turning people against me. I suffered in silence, because Aria at least remained untouched. Owen was my cross to bear, but Aria . . . he wouldn’t be hers.

But things changed. Owen changed. Aria changed. And now I had changed. I touched the sore spot on my neck that had already begun to purple. I hoped my concealer would be sufficient to cover it, since a turtleneck in May would raise red flags. I’d gotten used to hiding my face along with the bruises—mostly easy to cover on my upper arms or ass. But every once in a while it wasn’t so easy to hide, and using the old “I ran into the door” excuse never worked. Friends saw through it. Hell, even strangers knew that line. It had become something of a twisted game keeping the secret from Aria—that her father was a boxer in the bedroom and her mother a weak punching bag.

Last night I made the decision, for real this time. I wanted Owen out of my life and no longer in a position to taint my daughter’s perception of men and marriage and relationships. But if I left him, he’d still have his chokehold, because he controlled the money that controlled me. I could get a crappy job with my limited skills—a career sacrifice that all stay-at-home moms blindly made as we trusted our husbands to stand by us until death do us part. I could barely scrape by, but he’d end up with full custody of Aria, because money bought lawyers who bought custody. Real freedom was what I wanted, and I knew just how to get it.

Despite Owen’s empty threat, the locks hadn’t been changed. In fact, like an idiot he had left the back door cracked open, an invitation for trouble. He was lucky it was only me slipping in through the back and not some vandal. He had no idea how much I did for this family behind the scenes, keeping us safe and fed and out of debt. What gratitude did I get? None. Well, it was time to pay up.