Eric stood at Joseph's side and gave a smug little nod.
I froze there in the doorway, my hands and feet gone ice-cold.
My mind went back eight years, to the day Eric got into the Ivy League.
The two of us had sat in the yard eating dinner, dreaming out loud about his future in New York.
Eric had lifted his little flushed face and raised a cup of water to me.
"Mom, you've worked hard your whole life. Thank you."
Touched that my son had turned out so thoughtful, I drank the liquor he'd bought me.
I was drunk all that night, and when I got up, my voice was gone.
Every doctor in town said a foreign object had damaged my vocal cords.
Back then I only blamed my rotten luck.
It never once crossed my mind that my own child had drugged me.
My son.
For the sake of a respectable future, he poisoned me mute.
Joseph let out a sneer.
"Once we ship her off tomorrow it'll be peaceful again. After Valerie's gone, we'll take Constance to Colorado."
"An accident from the altitude. No one could ever trace it."
"Then Constance's fortune comes to us, father and son, clean and simple. We'd be set for the rest of our lives."
I clapped a hand over my mouth, not daring to make a single sound.
So I wasn't the only sacrifice in this whole lie.
The next day, I meant to tell Constance the truth.
But before I could, she flung my luggage at me.
"Cousin, I bring you home out of kindness, and you steal from me?"
I stood there stunned, and among the scattered things, past a few old clothes,
there was a gold necklace that wasn't mine.
I crouched on the floor, face white, shaking my head and gesturing, trying to explain.
Constance gave a cold laugh.
"Don't play innocent. That necklace was on my vanity yesterday, and today it's in your bag."
"Cousin, you came from the country, but you're not so poor you have to be a thief!"
When I wouldn't admit it, she turned and picked up her phone to call the police.
That was when Joseph came out of the master bedroom, his face full of grief.
"Let it go, honey. We're family. Getting the police involved would be embarrassing."
Eric came down from the second floor too, looking down his nose at me.
"I said we never should have let her move in. Country people always have sticky fingers."
Watching the two of them play off each other, I finally understood.
They had staged this scene first thing in the morning on purpose.
They wanted Constance to loathe me from now on.
So my mouth would be sealed forever.
I lunged and grabbed Constance's arm.
She startled, struggling to shake me off. "What are you doing? Let go!"
My hands moved fast. "They're plotting something! They're going to kill you!"
But she couldn't read it. She just thought I was a lunatic.
When Joseph saw my signing, his face changed.
He stepped forward, pried my hands loose, and shoved me toward the door. "Get out, now. Don't stand here making a scene!"
At some point a wooden stick had appeared in Eric's hand.
He swung it down across my back.
I stumbled, nearly dropping to my knees.
I looked into Constance's eyes, my lips working desperately.
"Hear me out..."
The stick came down again, and the pain blacked out my vision.
Joseph lifted his foot and kicked me in the shin.
My knee buckled and I sprawled on the floor.
Constance made them stop, turning her face away, unable to watch. "Just go. I won't press it over the necklace."
I dragged myself up from the floor and, with shaking hands, fished my phone out of the luggage.
Then I opened the recording, and trembling, pressed play.
