"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…
