I closed my eyes for a moment to get hold of myself. I wiped the tears from my face. “Just don’t hurt her, Ricky. She’s innocent. She never did anything to you. I’m the one you hate.”

“I don’t hate you. You’re my wife.”

I’m not, I wanted to scream, but I held my tongue.

“Besides, I would never hurt my daughter,” he went on casually. He caressed your face with false compassion, his fat fingers on your neck, making me twitch with fear. “I mean, she is mine, isn’t she? My baby. My little girl. She couldn’t be anyone else’s. Right, Bec?” Suddenly, he bellowed at me. “Right?”

I refused to answer him. Even if I knew for sure who your father was, I would never, ever say the words: She’s yours. No. Because you were not his. You would never be his. I would never allow it.

“What do you want?” I asked him, laboring to be calm. “Tell me what you want.”

“You already know what I want. I want my wife back. I want my life back.”

I shook my head in despair. “Why? Why do you want what we had? We were both miserable and unhappy.”

“That was because you didn’t know your place,” he said. His voice rumbled out of his throat like the growl of a mean dog. “Do you know your place now, Bec? Have you finally figured it out? Do you understand why you’ve always been mine?”

“Ricky, please. Just let me have my baby.”

His eyes hardened into ice. “Beg.”

“What?”

“Beg me.”

“Ricky, for God’s sake.”

“Did you not hear what I said? Do you still not get it? I’m in charge. From now on, you do whatever I tell you to do. And what I want you to do is beg.”

I swallowed down my hatred. I felt the horrible years of my marriage rising up in my memory like bile in my throat. All the degradation. Every humiliation I’d endured to keep the peace. I couldn’t go back to that. I wouldn’t. And yet my life was no longer my own. It belonged to you, Shelby. Not him—you.

“Let me have her back,” I whispered. Then I choked out the next words. “I’m begging you.”

“Louder.”

“I’m begging you.”

“Get on your knees.” He added with a snicker, “You were always best on your knees.”

“Ricky, please—”

“On your knees. If I say something, you do it! Do you understand me?”

I was crying, furious, desperate, helpless. Rage welled up inside me like an animal consuming my soul, but I did what he wanted. I had no choice. Slowly, I slid to my knees. I put my hands together, as if I were praying. “Give me my little girl. I’ll do whatever you say. Just give her back to me.”