He struck me so hard my lip split and bled, simply because I asked where he had been the night before. Early the next morning, I calmly prepared an extravagant Southern breakfast and laid out the silver cutlery. “What a good wife,” he gloated, sitting proudly at the head of the table. But the color drained from his face when the kitchen door opened and someone walked in.
He hit me so hard my lip tore against my teeth. All because I had asked my husband, Caleb Whitmore, where he had been the previous night.
For three seconds, the kitchen was silent except for the rain tapping against the windows and the faint hiss of bacon grease cooling in the cast-iron skillet. Caleb stood above me in his crisp white shirt, his wedding ring gleaming like a warning.
“Don’t question me in my own house,” he said.
My hand lifted slowly to my mouth. Blood stained my fingertips. I stared at it, then looked at him.
