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"ALLISON!" Martha Morrison's voice tore across the patio like a blade. I looked up just as she came storming toward me, heels stabbing against the stone, pearls gleaming against her stiff neck, rage burning so hot in her face it almost made her look ugly. Almost. I had learned one thing very quickly in this house. When Martha Morrison was angry, it was better to let her explode in public than save it for private. Public anger came with witnesses. Private anger came with creativity. So I straightened from the table I had been setting for her guests and forced my face blank. "Martha, is something—" SMACK. My head snapped sideways. The world blinked. For one disorienting second, all I could hear was the ringing in my ears. My body stumbled, hip knocking into the edge of the patio table hard enough to rattle the glasses. Pain bloomed across my cheek, hot and sharp, and I lifted my hand to it in shock. Martha stood over me, chest rising, her nostrils flaring. "I told you to have everything ready before my guests arrived," she hissed. "Yet here you are, dragging your feet like the useless little stray you are." My fingers curled against my burning skin. "Martha, I have been—" SMACK. The second slap sent me reeling harder than the first. I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from gasping. Copper flooded my tongue. "Did I tell you to speak?" she said, voice low and vicious. "Or have you forgotten your place?" Her gaze swept over me with open disgust, lingering on my plain dress, my tied-back curls, my worn flats. "I still don't know what my son ever saw in a low-life girl like you." Then she smiled. That smile. Cold. Detached. Effortless. The kind she wore when she had already decided the truth didn't matter. "Make sure this mess is finished before they arrive," she said lightly, as if she hadn't just struck me twice. "And fix your face. You look pathetic." Then she turned and walked away, elegant and unhurried, like cruelty was just another item o
