In the end, it was an ambulance that took me to the hospital. The person who called it was Sandra.
Once we arrived, they put us in the same room.
I needed to remove my pants so the nurses could bandage the wounds across my legs. Tristram and Rodney both stepped out.
"I'm the one who called that ambulance for you. Aren't you going to thank your big sister?" Sandra's voice dripped with mockery.
The doctor was still wrapping my injuries, gentle with every motion, pausing to ask if it hurt.
I shook my head. The pain in my chest was a hundred times worse than anything on my skin.
When I didn't speak, Sandra smiled. "Oh, little sister. Don't blame me and Tristram too much. After all, he went through quite the effort to keep you tied to him. He even staged that whole kidnapping, start to finish."
I froze. My head snapped toward her. "What did you just say?"
"I understand you, really. Any woman who found out her husband was cheating would want to leave. But if you're not exactly pure yourself, what right do you have to demand purity from him?"
"That little accident five years ago took your big sister quite a lot of work to arrange."
She leaned on the word accident like she was savoring it.
"That was you...?"
My mind went black. Every thread of reason snapped at once.
I shot up from the hospital bed, grabbed the vase on the nightstand, and swung it at her.
"Help! Somebody help me!"
She screamed. Before the vase could connect, Tristram burst through the door and drove his fist straight into my lower abdomen.
My body slammed backward into the wall. The freshly wrapped bandages tore open on impact. Blood soaked through the hospital gown and pooled on the floor beneath me.
A wave of blinding pain swallowed me whole. Everything went dark at the edges.
"She knows everything now..." Sandra's voice crumbled into a pitiful whimper. "It's my fault. I couldn't keep my mouth shut. She asked, and I just... I went soft. She's still my sister, after all. I couldn't bear to hide it from her forever..."
Rodney sat on the edge of her bed and pulled her into his arms. He shot a venomous glare at Tristram. "Handle your own mess. If that bitch lays a finger on Sandy again, you and I are done."
Before the words had even settled, Tristram was already standing over me. "Angelica. I really underestimated you. You've been going after Sandra this whole time because you resent me for never touching you. Is that it?"
"Fine. I'll give you exactly what you've been asking for."
He seized my arm with one hand. He didn't bother closing the door. He didn't care how many people were watching from the hallway. He ripped the clothes off my body in two savage pulls.
The vase slipped from my fingers and shattered across the floor. Glass shards scattered everywhere.
"Don't touch me... Don't touch me!" I stumbled backward, step by step, and every movement drove shards of glass deeper into my skin.
I collapsed on the ground in a broken heap. Tristram towered over me, glaring down with a look of cold fury, as if I were the one who had wronged him.
Sandra and Rodney stood off to the side, watching like it was a show.
This scene was identical to five years ago, in that warehouse, when those men violated me.
Last time, it was because of them. This time, it still was.
I snatched a shard of glass off the floor and pressed it against my own throat. "Come one step closer and I'll end it!"
Only then did Tristram stop. He shut the door.
"Tristram. We're done." I ground the words through clenched teeth, the glass still biting into the skin of my neck.
He let out a cold laugh. "Angelica. You really think holding a piece of glass to your throat gives you leverage over me?"
He crossed the room in two strides, walked to Sandra's bed, and picked up her phone.
Sandra had been recording.
The footage played back on the screen. Me, naked, thrashing, screaming, utterly destroyed. Tristram turned the phone toward me and smiled. "A breakup isn't happening. If we split, what excuse do I have to stay by Sandra's side?"
"If we break up and people find out about me and Sandra, do you have any idea what that would do to her reputation? You hate her that much? Is that what this is?"
Another bucket of filth I couldn't dodge, dumped squarely on my head.
