Chapter 1
The buzzing woke Victoria before the pain did.
At first, it sounded like a trapped insect near her ear.
Low.
Mechanical.
Wrong.
She opened her eyes to warm lamplight, white sheets, and the sharp smell of heated metal.
Then she felt the cold air on the side of her scalp.
Hair slid down her cheek.
A thick dark lock landed on the pillow beside her mouth.
Victoria froze.
Linda stood beside the bed in a red satin robe, smiling down at her with electric clippers in one hand.
The blade was still running.
A strip of Victoria’s dark hair had been shaved from one side of her head.
Loose hair covered the sheets like something stolen from her body.
Linda’s voice was calm.
Smug.
“Tomorrow you’ll quit that job.”
For one second, Victoria could not move.
She grabbed the shaved side of her head.
Her fingers met bare scalp.
Then hair.
Then the uneven edge where Linda had cut into her while she slept.
Her breath caught.
“What have you done?”
The bedroom door flew open.
Ryan rushed in wearing a dark T-shirt and plaid pajama pants, eyes wide and confused.
“What’s going on?”
He looked from his wife to his mother.
To the clippers.
To the hair on the bed.
Linda lifted her chin as if she had done something wise.
“She needed help making a decision.”
Victoria moved before either of them expected it.
She came off the bed with real, furious momentum and slapped Linda across the face.
The sound snapped through the luxury bedroom.
Linda stumbled backward, dropped the clippers, and fell beside the bed, one hand flying to her cheek.
Ryan lunged toward Victoria.
“Victoria! What the hell are you doing?!”
Victoria stood beside the bed, breathing hard, one side of her hair visibly shaved, navy silk pajamas wrinkled, eyes bright with shock turning into something colder.
Linda stared up from the floor.
Ryan stepped closer, furious.
But Victoria did not back away.
She picked up her phone from the nightstand.
Her voice dropped low.
Dead calm.
“You should have let me sleep.”
Ryan’s anger cracked.
Only a little.
Enough.
Victoria unlocked the phone and tapped once.
At the same moment, Ryan’s phone vibrated.
Linda’s phone vibrated too.
Their faces changed as they looked down.
Victoria stood over them with hair scattered across the bed behind her and the clippers silent on the floor.
“Every card is dead, every payment is gone, and by sunrise both of you will be begging me to turn your lives back on.”
Ryan stared at his screen.
Linda stopped holding her cheek.
May you like
For the first time since Victoria had married into their family, neither of them spoke.
Because the woman they had tried to humiliate had just reminded them whose money kept the lights on.
