Chapter 5

My phone buzzed twenty-two minutes after I left the house.

I was sitting in the underground garage of a hotel when Mark sent me a picture.

My wedding ring lay on his keyboard, directly over the draft titled "Even My Daughter Is Afraid of Her Mother."

Under the picture, he had written:

"What is this supposed to mean?"

I didn't answer.

A minute later:

"Julia, where are you?"

Then:

"You took clothes?"

He had opened the closet.

I hadn't taken much. Two changes of clothes. My laptop. Passport. Medication. Personal documents.

But after sixteen years, Mark knew me well enough…