Chapter 4: The Microphone

The Stockwell Foundation luncheon had two hundred women and one microphone.

I sat at Kenneth's table in a cream dress, with Lillian on my left and my hand in my husband's.

I had a folder in my bag and a photograph of a signature on my phone, and I had slept for one hour.

Preston took the stage to announce the year's gifts.

He smirked through the first speech.

Then he looked straight at me.

"And of course our chairman's wife, the foundation's favorite charity case."

Laughter rippled across the room.

I felt Kenneth's thumb stroke my knuckles.

He did not say a word.

"Some of us were engaged to her once," Preston went on, enjoying himself. "Before she was damaged. I'm glad my uncle had a use for her."

Two hundred women laughed.

Lillian reached over and patted my wrist.

"Don't mind him, Suzie," she whispered. "He's joking."

I had spent five years believing that if I smiled hard enough, it would stop.

It had never stopped.

I stood up.

The chair scraped, and the room went quiet in a wave.

"Preston," I said. "Give me the microphone."

"Sit down, Suzette."

"Give it to her," a voice said from the third table.

It was an older man in a gray suit, one of the donors.

Preston hesitated, then held it out with a sneer.

I took it.

My hand did not shake, and I noticed that.

"Five years ago," I said, "three men took me out of my engagement party and raped me for three days."

Every sound in the room died.

A fork dropped on a plate and rang.

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