Part 1
The bucket hit me before my son reached the bottom stair, and dirty gray water ran from my hair into the collar of my faded uniform. Tabitha laughed as if humiliating an old housekeeper were the funniest thing she had done all week.
“You look completely disgusting,” she said, dropping the empty bucket beside my shoes with a loud clatter. “Someone clearly needs to wash the filth off you right now.”
I slowly wiped my face with the damp sleeve of the uniform I had bought from a secondhand shop in downtown Phoenix. Beneath the soaked fabric, my thumb pressed the tiny play button on the recorder hidden inside my pocket.
“Robin,” I called toward the grand staircase. “Could you come down here, please?”
Tabitha’s cruel smile flickered for a brief second.
Three weeks earlier, my son had announced his engagement to her. Robin was thirty-two, incredibly kind, highly successful, and painfully trusting toward the people he loved. Tabitha had entered his life like polished glass, looking beautiful and expensive, yet sharp enough to cut anyone who touched her carelessly.
