Then she shoved me.
It was not an accidental brush. It was two hands, both hard, both deliberate, straight into my shoulders.
My lower back slammed into the edge of the granite island. White pain exploded through my body. For a second everything went bright and soundless. Then I slid sideways, hit the floor on one knee, and felt warmth running down my legs.
I looked down.
Blood was spreading across the white tile.
I put one shaking hand over my belly.
‘My baby,’ I whispered.
Michael came in at the sound of a dish breaking. He took in the scene in one glance: me on the floor, the blood, Janet standing above me, the open doorway to the dining room where several of his guests were now half-risen from their seats.
He frowned.
Not in fear. Not in horror.
In irritation.
‘God, Elena,’ he said. ‘Why do you always make a mess?’
I stared at him, stunned beyond anger.
‘Call 911,’ I said. ‘Please. I’m bleeding.’
Janet stepped backward, suddenly pale now that other people could see consequences forming.
Michael looked toward the dining room and lowered his voice.
‘No ambulance.’
I thought I had misheard him.
‘What?’
‘No ambulance,’ he repeated. ‘The neighbors will talk. I just made partner. I am not having police and medics outside this house on Christmas.’
I reached into my apron pocket for my phone.
He saw it instantly.
He crossed the space between us, snatched it from my hand, and smashed it against the wall so hard the screen burst into glittering black shards.
One of the women in the dining room gasped.
Michael crouched beside me and grabbed a fistful of my hair near the base of my neck, not enough to leave obvious marks immediately, but enough to force my head back.
‘Listen to me very carefully,’ he said, almost gently. ‘I’m a lawyer. I know the sheriff. I know half the judges in this county. If you say one word that makes me look bad, I can have you painted as unstable before the paperwork dries. You are hormonal, you are bleeding, and right now you are not credible. Do you understand me?’
For one second, pure fear hit me.
Then something colder rose underneath it.
He thought the law was a costume. He thought volume was power. He thought isolation was permanent.
I looked straight into his face and said, ‘Then call my father.’
He barked out a laugh.
‘Your father?’
‘Yes.’
Janet folded her arms as if humoring a child’s tantrum.
Michael stood, took his own phone from his pocket, and said loudly enough for the room to hear, ‘Fine. Let’s call your father. Maybe he can explain why his daughter is ruining Christmas.’
I recited the number from memory.
He put the call on speaker.
It rang once.
A deep voice answered immediately.
‘Chief Justice Adrian Mercer speaking. Who is this?’
Every sound in that house stopped.
Michael’s face did not change at first because his brain had not yet caught up with his ears.
Then his color drained so fast it was almost visible.
The managing partner from his firm, Paul Harmon, stood up in the doorway and said, very quietly, ‘Oh my God.’
Michael tried to recover. ‘Sir, this is Michael Whitford. Your daughter
