"No, old man," Cynthia spat, her eyes gleaming with psychotic resolve. "He will hear the truth from me."
Before Reginald could grasp what she was doing, Cynthia’s hands shot down to the side seam of her burgundy designer gown. With vicious, premeditated force, her manicured fingers hooked into the tailored fabric at her left hip and yanked violently upward.
Rrrrriiiip.
The heavy silk and illusion netting tore apart with a sickening, razor-sharp sound, exposing her bare thigh all the way to the upper hip. She immediately raked her sharp fingernails down her own exposed skin, producing three bright, stinging red welts that welled with tiny beads of blood.
Reginald froze, his eyes widening in pure, unadulterated horror. "What in God's name are you doing?!"
Cynthia didn't answer him. Her face contorted instantly into an Oscar-worthy mask of shattered, weeping hysteria. She threw her head back, opened her mouth wide until the veins on her neck bulged, and let out an ear-piercing, blood-curdling scream that vibrated off the chandelier crystals.
"HE ATTACKED ME!" she shrieked, her voice breaking into agonizing, broken sobs. "HE ATTACKED ME! SOMEBODY HELP ME!"
She stumbled backward toward the sofa, deliberately tangling her stilettos, clutching her torn skirt with both hands as if desperately trying to shield her modesty from a brutal predator. Tears streamed through her mascara with theatrical perfection.
Reginald took two staggered steps back, his hands raised in utter bewilderment. His jaw hung open, his breath hitching in his chest. "Are you mad?! Cynthia, stop this!"
"HELP! MARCUS, HE'S CRAZY! HE TRIED TO ASSAULT ME!" Cynthia wailed, her shrieks growing louder, echoing into the cavernous hallway like a siren of manufactured tragedy.
The double mahogany doors swung inward with violent force.
Marcus burst into the room. He was dressed in a dark navy button-up shirt and tailored trousers, his powerful athletic frame coiled with instant panic. His eyes darted across the grand parlor, locking immediately onto his wife crouching against the ornate furniture, weeping hysterically, her gown torn open to the hip, her thigh streaked with red welts.
And standing just three paces away, facing her with an outstretched hand, was his father.
CHAPTER III: THE BLIND BEAST
The visual information hit Marcus's brain with the force of an electric shock. He didn't process context. He didn't look for weapons, nor did he ask what had preceded the scream. In that split second of primal chivalry, every instinct he possessed was hijacked by the sight of his weeping wife clinging to her ruined garments.
"Cynthia!" Marcus roared, his voice trembling with disbelief and fury.
"Marcus! He grabbed me! He tore my dress!" Cynthia cried, burying her face into her hands, her shoulders shaking violently. "He said... he said he would teach me a lesson for speaking back to him!"
Reginald turned toward his son, his weathered face pale, his eyes wide with desperate urgency. "Marcus, wait! Don't listen to her! She did that to herself—"
He never finished the sentence.
Marcus crossed the marble floor in three thunderous strides. His jaw was clenched so hard the muscles jumped against his temples, his eyes bloodshot with white-hot rage. Before the sixty-eight-year-old patriarch could raise a defensive arm, Marcus threw his full weight forward.
With both muscular hands driving squarely into Reginald's chest, Marcus shoved his elderly father with brutal, unchecked violence.
"How could you do this to my wife?!" Marcus bellowed.
The sheer momentum sent Reginald flying backward. His dress shoes slipped against the polished floor, his hips colliding heavily with the gilded mahogany frame of the parlor sofa. The patriarch fell hard into the tufted upholstery, his gray hair disheveled, the breath violently driven from his lungs in a ragged gasp.
A sharp, crushing pressure exploded behind Reginald's sternum. His vision blurred at the edges, a cold sweat breaking across his forehead. He clutched his left hand over his heart, his fingers digging desperately into the fine wool of his charcoal jacket.
"Marcus..." Reginald wheezed, his voice strained and hoarse as his lungs fought for air. "Son... she's lying... she's lying to you..."
"Shut up!" Marcus snarled, towering over his fallen father like an executioner, his chest heaving, his fists clenched into white-knuckled stones. "Don't you dare speak! How dare you lay your hands on her?! In our own home?!"
Behind Marcus, hidden beneath her trembling fingers, Cynthia let a sliver of a triumphant smirk cross her lips. The hook had been set deep. The old man was incapacitated, discredited, and despised by his own flesh and blood.
CHAPTER IV: THE CRACK IN THE GLASS
"Marcus, please! Don't let him near me!" Cynthia whimpered, playing her part to the hilt as she cowered into the opposite armchair, pulling the torn fabric together with trembling hands. "Call the police! He’s dangerous!"