Part 2 — “Mom, Pack What You Need”

I stood there staring at my mother’s bruised face, and for a few seconds, nobody said anything.

My husband, Mark, was still sitting there with his beer in one hand and his phone in the other.

My mother-in-law, Eleanor, looked at me as if I were the one causing a problem.

Then she pointed toward the kitchen.

“Your mother still has work to finish.”

I looked at the stove.

I looked at my mother.

Then I looked at the two little children who were clinging to her.

That was enough.

I turned off the stove.

“Mom, pack what you need.”

Rose’s eyes widened.

“What?”

“We’re leaving.”

Eleanor immediately stood up.

“Excuse me? She isn’t finished.”

I turned toward her.

“She doesn’t work for you.”

Mark finally put his phone down.

“Stop acting crazy. Mom has been helping us, and your mother needs to contribute while she’s staying here.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

My mother had severe rheumatoid arthritis. Some mornings, even buttoning her own shirt was painful.

Yet they had forced her to cook, clean, wash Mark’s clothes, change the sheets, and iron his shirts.

And now he was telling me she needed to contribute?

I picked up Lily and held Noah close to me.

Then I looked directly at Mark.

“You have no idea what she has already contributed.”

He stepped in front of the door.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

“Somewhere safe.”

He laughed.

“You’re seriously going to walk out because my mother told her to cook dinner?”

That sentence made my blood run cold.

He still didn’t understand.

He didn’t care about her bruises.

He didn’t care about her swollen hands.

He didn’t even ask how she got the bruise beneath her eye.

He only cared that dinner wasn’t finished.

I reached for my phone.

Mark watched me suspiciously.

Then I opened the home-control app.

One tap.

The television went black.

Another tap.

The electricity was disabled.

Then I locked the water supply.

Mark’s phone immediately buzzed.

He looked at the screen.

His expression changed.

“My card’s been canceled!”

I stared at him.

“You’re right.”

“What did you do?”

“I gave you back the life you can afford.”

His face turned red.

But I didn’t stay to argue.

Rose grabbed a small suitcase.

I took the twins.

And we walked out.

Mark followed us into the street, shouting my name.

But I kept walking.

Across the quiet suburban road stood the largest mansion in the neighborhood.

Mark had admired that house for years.

He had always joked about what he would do if he ever owned a place like that.

I walked straight toward its enormous iron gate.

Mark stopped.

“What are you doing?”

I pressed my thumb against the scanner.

The gate opened.

Mark stared at me.

His voice suddenly became quiet.

“How do you have access to that house?”

I looked back at him.

“Because I bought it three years ago.”

His face went completely pale.

And that was when he realized the woman he thought he controlled had been keeping a very big secret.

But the biggest secret wasn’t the house.

It was what my mother had hidden from all of us.

Because once we were safely inside, Rose finally looked at me and whispered:

“What they made me do wasn’t the worst part.”

Then she reached inside her cardigan.

And pulled out a tiny memory card.