Chapter 52

• POV: Richard
• The second Bella stomped up those damn stairs, I felt a mix of things I couldn’t even put a name to. I was standing there, still trying to process the impact of the vase she’d just thrown at me. A vase. And not just any vase—Mother’s vase, the one she’d scolded us for even looking at when we were kids. Bella had just cracked that thing over my head like it was some casual Sunday morning activity. And I’d stood there, stunned, half expecting to bleed out in some kind of tragic, dark comedy.
• Raymond’s laugh rang out from across the kitchen. “Damn, that was something,” he said, sounding way too pleased with himself as he bit into an apple.