Chapter 5 - THE FIRST BRUISE
Clara photographed the survey map.
Before she could leave Dominic’s office, the door opened.
He stood in the doorway, watching her.
“What are you doing?”
Clara held up the map.
“You surveyed my family’s property before we met.”
Dominic closed the door.
“It was a preliminary study.”
“You had no permission.”
“My father commissioned it years ago.”
“The date says otherwise.”
Dominic approached slowly.
“Give me your phone.”
“No.”
His expression changed.
The charming man disappeared so completely that Clara wondered whether he had ever existed.
He grabbed her wrist.
She tried to pull away.
His fingers tightened.
“You have no idea what is at stake.”
“You’re hurting me.”
“Then stop resisting.”
Clara slapped him.
The sound shocked them both.
Dominic released her.
For one second, she thought the danger had passed.
Then he shoved her against the bookcase.
Her shoulder struck the wood.
A framed photograph fell and shattered.
Dominic stared at her as if she had forced him to do it.
“Look what you made happen.”
Clara’s wrist turned purple by morning.
Dominic sent flowers to the bedroom.
He cried.
He said the pressure of maintaining the town’s largest employer had changed him.
He promised to begin therapy.
Then he reminded her that she had struck him first.
Clara wanted to believe the incident had been an accident.
She deleted the photograph of the map.
At least, she thought she did.
Her phone had automatically uploaded it to an old cloud account Victoria had created for her years earlier.
Dominic checked Clara’s device and found nothing.
So he became gentle again.
For several weeks, he attended medical appointments and held Clara’s hand while their daughter moved across the ultrasound screen.
Clara almost convinced herself she had misunderstood him.
Then she overheard Dominic talking with Police Chief Randall Pike in the garden.
“She’ll control the trust when the baby is born,” Dominic said.
Pike lowered his voice.
“And if she won’t sign?”
“She will.”
“What about Victoria?”
Dominic laughed.
“She’s a retired attorney with no allies left in this town.”
Clara stepped backward.
A floorboard creaked beneath her.
May you like
Both men turned toward the house.
👉 Clara had heard enough to know Dominic wanted more than land, but escaping would require help from the mother he had taught her not to trust.
