Chapter 2 - THE MARRIAGE EVERYONE ENVIED
My husband, Trent Holloway, knew exactly how to make people trust him.
That was one of the reasons I married him.
He remembered names.
Opened doors.
Helped elderly neighbors carry groceries.
Coached youth baseball on Saturdays and donated enough money to the volunteer fire department that his construction company’s name appeared on every fundraiser banner in town.
People called him dependable.
I called him my husband for eleven years.
For the first six, I would have used the same word.
We had Lydia after years of trying.
Trent cried when she was born.
Real tears.
He held her against his chest and promised her she would never need anything.
Somewhere along the way, that promise changed.
First came the questions.
Where had I been?
Why had groceries cost that much?
Who had texted me?
Why did I need a separate savings account?
Then came the rules disguised as practicality.
Trent handled the bills because he was “better with numbers.”
Trent kept both vehicle titles because his office had a safe.
Trent wanted location sharing because married people should have nothing to hide.
Whenever I resisted, he laughed.
“You watch too many crime shows, Cass.”
The first time he frightened me, he never touched me.
He punched the pantry door beside my head.
Then spent two hours repairing it.
By morning, there was no evidence.
That became his specialty.
Damage.
Repair.
Denial.
Harry noticed before I admitted anything.
My brother and I had always been close. After our parents died, he became the person I called for everything from broken water heaters to bad days.
Trent hated that.
“He needs his own life.”
“He has one.”
“Then why is he always in ours?”
Eventually I stopped calling Harry when Trent was home.
It was easier.
That was how isolation happened.
Not with one locked door.
With a hundred small choices made to prevent the next argument.
Then Brock Timmons started coming around.
He and Trent had played football together in high school.
Now Brock wore a sheriff’s uniform.
To everyone else, that meant safety.
May you like
To Trent, it meant insurance.
I just didn’t understand how much until the night I ended up on that stretcher.
