Chapter 4 JENNA
That same night…
It's almost dark when it happens. Tension has been in the air all evening, splinters of it working into the seams of every conversation.
I'm rinsing a glass at the sink, half-listening to Jason, who stayed later than usual tonight, and Carter in the adjacent room.
They're arguing about politics, but not really; what they're really doing is trying to one-up each other, as men do, about who knows more about the undercurrents, who's been reading the better sources, who's less naive.
Carter, whose voice never drops below a certain volume even when he tries, has already managed to say let's be realistic twice in the past five minutes.
Jason, whose smile always means he's angry, is goading him on, playing the part of devil's advocate with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer.
Amauri is at the small table with his math books, his elbows on the wood, feet swinging under his chair in time with whatever internal song he's composing.
His tongue pokes out the side of his mouth, his brow furrowed with the grave importance only a fourth grader can bring to three-digit addition.
He is the only one immune to the friction static in the room; he is the only one truly present, drawing pencil lightning bolts on the margins of his homework and humming to himself.
I'm watching the darkness fill the backyard through the window.
There is a chill in the air, a subtle drop in pressure.
I tell myself it's the weather, but there is a part of me that has known for hours that something is coming.
It's the way the wind has gone still, how the birds have vanished from the powerlines.
The glass in my hand is still cool from the drink it held a few minutes ago.
I hold it under the tap, watching the thin stream of water run over my skin, and I wonder how many times I've done this exact thing in my life.
Rinsed a glass. Stood at the sink. Listened to my husband argue with his friend, caretaker, driver, therapist— whatever role the man filling the silence happens to occupy today.
How many times have I tried to perform normal? How often have I told myself that if I just keep moving—keep cleaning, keep smiling, keep managing—I won't hear the voice inside me screaming to get out. To take Amauri and run. To disappear so completely that no one can ever find us again.
My father can't force me to have an abortion anymore. Amauri is here now. He's ten years old. He exists. He breathes. He laughs. I could file for divorce like every other woman in the world. Only… I'm not every other woman, am I?
To the world, I wouldn't be just leaving a husband.
I'd be abandoning a—the word flashes through my mind, sharp and cruel—a broken man.
The shame hits immediately. Hot and choking.
I swallow it down. A man in a wheelchair.
A survivor. A hero. A symbol. The public adores Carter.
They see the tragedy, not the cruelty. The accident that stole his future.
The golden boy brought low. They don't see the way he uses his broken body like a weapon.
They don't see how carefully he wields it.
They certainly don't see the man who sold me to his coach when I was eighteen.
The man who said call me and walked away, leaving me behind to be raped. The man who spat whore at me when I finally broke it off.
If I leave now, my father will take his side.
Not because he loves Carter, but because he loves optics. Because Carter is useful. Because a loyal, paralyzed son-in-law looks better than a divorced daughter with inconvenient truths.
They would frame it as a concern. For Carter. For Amauri. They would talk about stability. About routine. About what's best for the child.
And they would try to take my son.
Not that either of them truly wants him, no, he's leverage, a symbol.
Plain and simple. And because he's easier to control than I am.
I could survive the press turning on me.
I know exactly how it would go. After all, I'm the one who would orchestrate it if the roles were reversed.
The headlines, the whispers, the think pieces.
The righteous outrage. The woman who left the disabled hero. The ungrateful bitch.
I could live with being hated.
But Amauri couldn't.
How does a boy grow up when his classmates' parents whisper? When his mother's name is dragged through the mud, her face paraded across screens and papers? When kids repeat things they don't understand?
I know what a witch hunt looks like. I design them for a living. I'm the PR shield for my father and my husband. I know how stories are shaped. How truths are buried. How narratives are weaponized until there's nothing left but what people want to believe.
So I stay.
I stay in a loveless marriage with a man I despise. I swallow my anger. I manage appearances. I survive on scraps of peace. Because at least this way, I have Amauri. Until I can find a way to protect him, I'm trapped. I've managed so far, and I sure as hell will keep on doing so.
Suddenly, without warning, the power goes out.
It doesn't flicker. It doesn't hesitate.
One second there is light, and the next there is nothing but darkness.
The sudden absence of light is so complete it seems to pull all the air out of the house.
The refrigerator goes quiet. The A/C's hum dies.
The clatter of Carter's voice is cut off mid-argument, and for half a second, nobody makes a sound.
Then the world erupts.
First comes the crash, no, not a crash, an explosion.
The back door is obliterated inward, glass and wood splinters all at once.
The shockwave throws me hard against the counter, the glass in my hand shatters, and water and blood mingle on my palm.
I'm only dimly aware of the pain; the adrenaline is already pounding through my pulse, roaring, telling me to move, run, do something.
But I am rooted by the sight of them: men, half a dozen at least, without masks, but all the more terrifying for it.
No hesitation. No warning. They move as one, rifles up, bodies low and fast and technical, the kind of movement that comes from training, not instinct.
Jason is already moving. I see him in silhouette, throwing himself between Amauri and the chaos with a single, desperate leap.
Amauri is screaming, but the shots drown everything out.
The first round is so loud it feels like it cracks the bones inside my head.
The muzzle flash lights the room in freeze-frame horror: Jason's face twisted, eyes wide, arms outstretched.
He goes down immediately, the force of it knocking him back into the table, his body crumpling like a rag doll.
Amauri falls with him, a tangle of limbs, and for a split second, I think maybe he's shielded, maybe he's okay, please God let him be okay.
The men are on top of them. They swarm like jackals, one grabbing Amauri by the collar—Amauri flailing, he's alive!
Thank God—another man shoots a single round into Jason's head.
They shout commands in a language I don't understand, but the violence is universal.
I try to scream. I try to run. But a hand—a huge, gloved hand—snatches my ponytail from behind and pulls me off my feet.
They scramble for purchase, kicking wildly, but the air is gone, and all I can taste is fear.
Carter is in the living room, his wheelchair wedged behind the couch.
For a moment, I see him try to wheel himself out of the room, his eyes wild, jaw clenched.
He throws something—a remote, a mug, whatever he could reach—at the men.
It bounces harmlessly off one of their backs.
The man turns and, without breaking stride, slams the wheelchair over, sending Carter sprawling.
I hear the dull thud of his body on the floor, the air punched out of his lungs.
I taste copper, and it takes me a second to realize it's my own blood.
I twist, I flail, but the hand in my hair is unbreakable.
Another arm wraps around my waist, pinning my arms, and I'm dragged backward, heels against the marble.
They haul me to the ground, face-first, pressing my cheek into the cold tile.
Tears and blood blur my vision of the kitchen; my eyes land on the math homework scattered like confetti.
Amauri returns to my sight, tiny and shrieking, arms windmilling as he fights the man holding him.
He screams for me, the word Mummy stretching into something raw and animal.
He kicks, he bites, and for a moment I'm filled with pride—my child, my little fighter—but then the man clamps a hand over his mouth, and the pride curdles to terror.
I lose time, maybe minutes, maybe seconds.
I don't know. There is a high buzz in my ears, a static that drowns out everything else.
I'm vaguely aware of Carter being dragged out from under his wheelchair.
I try to turn my head to see Amauri, but a boot presses down on the side of my face, grinding me into the ground.
They are talking to each other, rapid and clipped. One yells into a radio. Another flips Carter over with his boot and pats him down, efficient and dispassionate. They're not here for money. Not here for things. They're here for us. That realization is a hundredfold more terrifying.
Blindly, I reach out, and my hand finds the handle of a cast-iron pan that must have fallen to the floor.
My fingers curl around it, slick with blood, and I swing it upward with everything left in me.
A sense of déjà vu overcomes me—another time, another man—making me sick to my stomach, but there is no time to think about the past. The pan connects with the side of his head, and he lets go.
Instantly, I'm on my feet, rushing forward straight for the intruder holding Amauri.
Taking him off balance, his grip on my son loosens, and Amauri scrambles away, crawling toward me, but a third man catches him by the ankle and yanks him back so hard his sneakers slip right off his feet. He screams again, high and keening.
That's when Carter shouts. "You motherfuckers!" His voice is ragged, furious, and so loud in the silence that even the invaders pause. He's upright again, knuckles bloodless on the arms of his chair; his whole body is trembling. "Let me go! Do you have any idea who I am?"
The man nearest Carter smirks, orders two of the guys to lift Carter up, then punches him—hard—in the gut. Carter doubles over, held up on his useless legs by two men.
A fifth man grabs Amauri, who is still struggling, and throws him over his shoulder like luggage.
I lash out again, this time with my fists, but I'm lifted into the air, a hand covers my mouth and nose until I can't breathe, until my vision goes white at the edges.
I come back to myself in the grip of a man carrying me like a sack of flour.
The world tilts and spins, and from above me, I can hear the whir of a helicopter.
Everything still feels so surreal to me, like I'm dreaming, or maybe caught up in an action movie, like this isn't really happening to me.
To us. But then I hear Amauri scream again, see him being carried into the hovering helicopter.
A helicopter! In the middle of our yard!
I struggle again, remembering bits and pieces of a few self-defense classes I took over the years, twisting hard in the man's grip, I somehow manage to drive my knee into his solar plexus.
His legs buckle, and his grip loosens around me.
Enough for me to twist some more and fall to the ground.
The problem is, I can't seem to stop falling. I keep rolling. The ravine!
The backyard slopes sharply here by the terrace toward the ravine, and I'm tumbling down it.
My body is no longer my own. And then there is pain.
The world flips end over end. More pain.
So much pain. A rock hits me in the hips, and my palm tries to grab on to something, only for it to be a cactus.
My elbow hits a boulder, and for good measure, my knee decides it wants to make its acquaintance, too.
When my body finally comes to a stop, it takes me a moment to gather my wits.
Above, the men scream in what I now realize is Spanish.
I recognize the cadence of the language.
Most of it is drowned out by the sound of the helicopter.
And then I see it. I see it rising into the air, and I scream again.
So loud, I nearly break my vocal cords. Amauri!
They have Amauri. The helicopter lifts, a monstrous insect rising above the trees, its searchlights sweep across the ravine floor where I lie broken.
Shots crack the night. It's only luck that keeps me from being riddled with bullets.
I almost wish one would put me out of my misery.
When I finally open my eyes, the silence is absolute. And my son is gone.