Chapter 1
My mother-in-law had both fists tangled in my hair when she slammed my head against the oak headboard—and my newborn was crying three feet away.
I had given birth to my daughter, Lily, only six days earlier in Dallas, and I was so exhausted I could barely stand without holding onto something.
My mother-in-law, Patricia, had moved into our guest room because she said I “needed a real mother to teach me what to do.”
At first, I was grateful.
Then she started taking Lily out of my arms without asking.
“She needs someone who isn’t nervous all the time,” Patricia would say.
My husband, Ethan, kept defending her.
“She’s only trying to help, Emily.”
That morning, Ethan left for work before sunrise, and Patricia walked into my bedroom while I was feeding Lily.
“Give her to me.”
I shook my head.
“She just fell asleep.”
Patricia reached for her anyway.
When I pulled Lily closer, her face changed.
“You’re becoming possessive.”
“She’s my daughter.”
Patricia gave a cold little laugh.
“Not for long if you keep acting unstable.”
My stomach dropped.
“What does that mean?”
She grabbed Lily’s bassinet and started pulling it toward the door.
I forced myself out of bed, even though pain shot through my body.
“Put it back.”
Patricia turned around.
“You don’t deserve this baby.”
I reached for the bassinet.
That was when she grabbed my hair.
I screamed as she yanked me backward and shoved me toward the bed.
“Stop! Patricia, please!”
She slammed me against the wooden headboard while Lily began screaming.
Once.
Then again.
I covered my head with my arms and begged her to stop.
“You’re going to tell Ethan you fell,” she hissed.
I stared at her through tears.
She leaned closer and whispered, “Because he already thinks something is wrong with you.”
Then I heard the garage door opening downstairs.
Patricia immediately released me, scratched her own arm with her fingernails, and started screaming.
“Emily! Stop! You’re hurting me!”
Ethan came running into the bedroom and froze when he saw me on the floor, his mother crying, and Lily screaming in the bassinet.
“She attacked me!” Patricia sobbed. “Ethan, your wife has lost her mind.”
I opened my mouth, but Ethan slowly raised his phone.
His face had gone completely white.
“Mom,” he whispered, staring at the screen, “the nursery camera has been recording for the last twenty minutes.”
May you like
Patricia stopped crying.
Then Ethan looked at her and said, “Who were you talking to when you said, ‘Once Emily is gone, the baby will belong to us’?”
