Chapter 3

Danae Hodges POV:

My cheek throbbed, a searing fire that spread through my jaw, up to my temple, and behind my eye. The physical pain was sharp, immediate, but it was nothing compared to the cold, crushing weight in my chest. Clay had slapped me. Clay. The man who had been my anchor, my savior, had just struck me down. In front of our families.

I stared at him, my mouth open, but no words came out. His face was a mask of horror, his hand still suspended in the air, trembling slightly. The hypocrisy of it all was almost comical. He was the one who had gaslighted me, cheated on me, humiliated me, and now he looked like I was the one who had committed an unforgivable sin.

"Clay," I finally managed, my voice a broken whisper, raw and thick with disbelief. "Why?"

He stammered, his eyes darting frantically. "Danae, I-I didn't mean to. I just-you were screaming at Charity, and she was... I just reacted." His words were a frantic scramble for an excuse, a pathetic attempt to justify the unforgivable.

I tore my gaze from him, turning to the silent, petrified faces of our families. Bertha, Clay's mother, looked scandalized, but not for me. For the scene I was creating. My mother, Dianne, had tears in her eyes, but they were tears of fear, not empathy. Fear for her own precarious social standing, not for her daughter' s shattered dignity. My father remained stony-faced, already calculating the damage to his reputation.

"Are you all blind?" I demanded, my voice rising, trembling with a fragile rage. "Can't you see what he is? What he's done? He doesn't love me! He loves her! He always has!"

The words ripped through me, tearing apart the last vestiges of my composure. Tears, hot and furious, streamed down my bruised cheek. My knees buckled. I closed my eyes, a silent scream tearing through my soul, but no sound escaped my lips. Just the silent, agonizing torrent of tears.

Clay rushed forward, his face contorted in remorse. "Danae, please. Don't say that. I love you! I swear I do. Punish me, Danae. Do anything you want. Just don't say you don't believe me." He fell to his knees in front of me, grabbing my hand, his grip tight, desperate. "I don't want a divorce. Please, baby, please." He buried his face in my skirt, his shoulders shaking with sobs.

My mother, Dianne, recoiled. My father cleared his throat, embarrassed by the display. But Bertha, Clay' s mother, saw her chance. She strode forward, her eyes blazing.

"Get up, Clay! Stop this display!" She then turned to me, her hand raising not to comfort, but to strike. Before I could even register the movement, her open palm connected with my other cheek, a sharp, stinging slap that echoed Clay's.

"You ungrateful little hussy!" she spat, her voice venomous. "You see what you're doing to my son? You're driving him to tears! You're making a scene! You always were too sensitive, too fragile for our family. You were lucky he even looked at you!"

The room was a blur of shouting and movement. My father grabbed my arm, his fingers digging into my flesh. "Dianne, control your daughter! Get her out of here!"

My mother, instead of defending me, whined, "Danae, please, stop. You're making things worse. You need to calm down. Think about what your father said. Where will you go? What will people say?"

"People will say you're a divorced woman!" my father roared, shoving me towards the door. "And don't you dare come crying to us! You want to throw away a good man like Clay? Fine! But don't expect a penny from us. You'll be on your own, just like you always wanted to be, you selfish child!"

Clay, still on his knees, lifted his head, his face streaked with tears. "Danae, they don't mean it. Please, don't listen to them. I'll change. I'll do anything. I'll cut off Charity, I swear. Just give me another chance. Please, baby, please." His voice cracked, filled with a raw despair.

But Charity's voice, her taunts, her casual cruelty, replayed in my mind. The morning Clay had left for a "business trip," Charity had "accidentally" left her scarf on our bed. A crimson silk scarf, smelling faintly of a perfume I didn't recognize, but which Clay had once complimented on me. He said it suited my skin. I had found it that morning, neatly folded on my pillow, a subtle, mocking message.

Then, a few weeks later, a new photo had appeared on Clay's nightstand, a framed picture of him and Charity from high school. He' d said it was an old photo, a reminder of his past, nothing more. But the frame was new. The glass was clean. It was a recent addition, a fresh stake in the ground, marking her territory.

I remember Charity' s casual visit to our home once, when Clay was supposedly "at work." She had looked around, her eyes lingering on the new painting I had just finished for the living room. "Oh, how... cozy," she'd said, a faint sneer in her voice. "Clay always said he preferred minimalist. But I suppose you have to work with what you're given, don't you?" It wasn't just a critique of my artistic choices. It was a dismissal of my entire presence. A declaration that I was merely tolerated, a temporary fixture in her space. The space she believed was hers.

The red scarf. The new old photo. Her condescending smile. It was all a pattern, a slow, deliberate erosion of my sanity, orchestrated by her, enabled by him. They had been playing with me, tormenting me, for longer than I knew. My head was throbbing, my cheek stinging. But the pain inside was colder, sharper. It was the pain of absolute clarity. This wasn't a mistake. This was a deliberate, calculated cruelty.