Chapter 2
Victoria lunged for the monitor.
Marcus pulled it back just in time.
Two crew members stepped between them.
“Give me that footage,” she snapped.
Marcus didn’t move.
“No.”
Her eyes flashed.
“Do you know who signs your checks?”
“My company does,” Marcus said. “And my company doesn’t cover up children being hurt.”
The words landed like a slap.
Children being hurt.
For years, I had tried to explain Victoria without saying that sentence.
She was strict.
She was angry.
She was different when Dad wasn’t home.
But children being hurt was the truth.
Dad stared at the monitor.
On the frozen screen, Victoria’s hand was tangled in Lily’s hair.
Lily’s face was twisted with pain.
The vase was caught mid-flight near my head.
Dad looked sick.
“Victoria,” he whispered.
She changed instantly.
Her shoulders dropped.
Her eyes filled.
Her voice softened.
“Richard, please. I lost control. It was one second.”
“One second?” I said.
She turned on me.
“You be quiet.”
Lily flinched.
Dad saw it.
His face changed.
Not fully.
Not enough yet.
But something cracked.
“Lily,” he said softly. “Come here.”
Lily didn’t move.
She held onto my shirt with both hands.
Dad’s eyes filled.
“Baby?”
“She hits when you leave,” Lily whispered.
The room went completely silent.
Victoria’s face hardened.
“That is a lie.”
Lily shook her head, crying.
“She pulls my hair when I cry. She locks Emma in the laundry room when Emma tells her to stop.”
Dad looked at me.
I could see it.
The memories rearranging in his head.
The nights I said I tripped.
The times Lily was too quiet at dinner.
The missing bedroom door lock he believed had “jammed.”
“Emma,” he said.
I swallowed.
“She told me if I told you, you’d send me away.”
Victoria laughed.
“She is sixteen. She knows how to manipulate you.”
Marcus lifted the monitor again.
“She also knows how to tell the truth. The camera caught the hallway before the take.”
Victoria snapped toward him.
“What hallway?”
Marcus tapped the screen.
The footage changed.
There I was, standing near the dressing room.
Victoria had my arm in her grip.
Lily stood behind me, wiping tears.
“If either of you embarrass me,” Victoria said on the recording, “I’ll make sure your father knows you’re too unstable to stay in this house.”
Dad sat down on the edge of the fake sofa.
His face was gray.
The video continued.
Victoria crouched in front of Lily.
“And if you cry during my commercial,” she said, “I will throw that ugly stuffed rabbit away and tell your father you lost it.”
Lily started sobbing against me.
Dad stood.
“Turn it off.”
“No,” I said.
Everyone looked at me.
My voice shook, but I kept going.
“You don’t get to look away now.”
Dad froze.
Then slowly, painfully, he nodded.
Marcus let the footage play.
Victoria slapped me in the hallway.
Quick.
Practiced.
Then she smiled and said, “Tell him. See what happens.”
When the video ended, nobody spoke.
Victoria’s tears were gone.
She knew she couldn’t perform anymore.
Dad looked at her.
“How long?”
She lifted her chin.
“Long enough to know they’ll never accept me.”
“They are my daughters.”
“They are Claire’s daughters,” she snapped.
My mother’s name struck the room like thunder.
Dad went still.
Victoria realized too late what she had said.
Dad’s voice dropped.
“You told me you wanted to love them like your own.”
Victoria looked at Lily.
Then at me.
“I tried.”
“No,” I said. “You wanted us to act like we loved you.”
Marcus pulled out his phone.
“I’m calling police.”
Victoria pointed at him.
“You release that footage, I will destroy you.”
Marcus looked at Dad.
Dad’s hands were shaking.
For one horrible second, I thought he would choose reputation.
Again.
May you like
Then he turned to Marcus.
“Call them.”
