Chapter 7 - Say Who Taught You
Sophia repeated her question without raising her voice.
“Say who taught you that beating a wife is normal.”
Marvin stared at her.
His face twisted with anger, shame, and terror.
“You know.”
“I want you to say it.”
The chandelier hummed above them.
Broken dinnerware glinted around his shoulder.
A chair lay on its side near the table, one leg rocking slightly until it finally stopped.
Stillness returned to the room in fragments.
Marvin’s free hand flexed near the spilled food.
Sophia shifted her weight just enough to remind him that movement would not help.
He grimaced.
“You’re hurting me.”
“No. I’m stopping you.”
The difference mattered.
She wanted the recording to show it.
No choking.
No striking back.
No uncontrolled revenge.
A clean defensive hold.
Distance from the shards.
A phone capturing his face.
A second phone capturing his mother’s message.
Marvin’s eyes darted toward the doorway to the kitchen.
“Someone could hear.”
“No one is here.”
“That’s not what I mean.”
Sophia understood.
Someone could hear later.
Someone could see.
The future had entered the room, and Marvin feared it more than the present.
He whispered, “Camryn.”
Sophia held still.
The word had finally arrived.
Not enough.
“Your mother taught you?”
His jaw clenched.
“She said marriage only works if the man leads.”
“Did she say hit me?”
He squeezed his eyes shut.
The phone vibrated again.
Camryn’s portrait.
Sophia did not press answer.
Not yet.
Marvin’s breath shook.
“She said not to let you think you could refuse.”
Sophia’s eyes hardened.
That was not a confession of the exact message, but it was enough to connect the pattern.
Her recording phone remained steady.
Marvin opened his eyes.
“Sophia, please. Don’t send this.”
She looked at him with tears and ice.
“I haven’t sent anything.”
His relief lasted one second.
Then she smiled.
May you like
“Yet.”
Read Chapter 8 👉 Because Marvin finally named Camryn, but Sophia had not yet decided whether the woman on the phone deserved to hear herself exposed.
