Chapter 1 - Eight Minutes
The crack was louder than my scream.
For one impossible second, I stared at my left arm as if it belonged to somebody else. Carter still had my wrist in his hand. His face was flushed from bourbon and fury, but his eyes were horribly clear. That was the part I would remember later. He knew exactly what he had done.
Then he smiled.
“Look what you make me do, Lena.”
I backed away, cradling my arm against my chest. Pain rolled through me in hot white waves. I could taste blood where I had bitten the inside of my cheek. The marble floor of our apartment shone under the chandelier, perfect and expensive and cold. Everything in our home had been chosen by Carter to impress people who never stayed long enough to hear what happened after the doors closed.
“I need a hospital,” I whispered.
“You need to stop embarrassing me.”
He poured another drink.
That was when something inside me changed. Five years of apologies, excuses, careful makeup, long sleeves, fake smiles, and memorized lies suddenly felt heavier than fear. I moved backward toward the hallway.
Carter noticed.
“Where are you going?”
“Bathroom.”
“For what?”
“I’m going to throw up.”
He laughed. “Finally, an honest answer.”
I made it to the bathroom, locked the door, and slid down the wall before my knees gave out. My purse was on the counter because Carter hated clutter and had ordered me to move it there after dinner. With my good hand, I dug through receipts, a lipstick, two diner pens, and a package of tissues until my fingers touched thick black paper.
Vincent Moretti.
Gold letters. One phone number. Four words written on the back in dark ink.
If you ever need help.
I had carried the card for seven months.
The night Vincent gave it to me, he had come into Bell Street Diner after midnight with three men in tailored coats. Everyone in New York knew his face, even if they pretended they did not. Vincent Moretti had never been convicted of the crimes newspapers attached to his name, but fear did not require a jury verdict. Fear traveled faster than facts.
I had spilled coffee near his hand.
I remembered freezing, waiting for anger.
Vincent had simply moved his cuff away from the drops and said, “It’s all right.”
When he left, the card sat beneath the receipt.
I had assumed it was pity.
Now Carter slammed his shoulder into the bathroom door.
“Lena!”
The frame shook.
I dialed.
One ring.
Two.
Three.
“Talk.”
His voice was calm enough to make my throat close.
“I… I don’t know if you remember me.”
Silence.
“I’m the waitress from Bell Street.”
Another crash. Wood splintered near the lock.
Then Vincent said my name.
“Lena.”
I started crying so hard I could not breathe.
“Who is there?” he asked.
“My husband.”
“What did he do?”
I looked at my arm.
“He broke it.”
The silence that followed was not uncertainty. It was rage under control.
“Address.”
I gave it to him.
Carter hit the door again.
“How long?” I whispered.
“Stay alive for eight minutes.”
The bathroom door exploded inward.
Carter stood in the broken frame, black shirt open at the throat, chest heaving. Splinters clung to his hair and shoulders. He looked at the phone in my hand and smiled slowly.
“Who did you call?”
I pressed myself against the marble wall.
“No one.”
He stepped over the ruined wood.
“Wrong answer.”
He grabbed my ankle and dragged me across the tile. I screamed as my broken arm struck the floor. The phone skidded beneath the vanity.
“Please, Carter.”
“Who did you call?”
I heard Vincent’s voice faintly from under the cabinet.
“Lena?”
Carter heard it too.
He crouched, picked up the phone, and stared at the screen.
The color left his face.
For the first time in five years, my husband looked afraid.
Then he recovered and laughed.
“Vincent Moretti?” he said into the phone. “That’s cute.”
No answer.
Carter’s smile tightened.
“You think you can scare me because some diner gangster gave my wife a business card?”
Vincent finally spoke.
“Six minutes.”
Carter’s eyes flicked toward the hallway.
“What?”
“Six minutes until I reach your building.”
Carter disconnected the call.
He stared at me.
“Why does Moretti know your name?”
“I don’t know.”
He slapped me across the face. My head struck the wall, and lights burst behind my eyes.
“Try again.”
“I don’t know!”
His hand rose again, but his phone rang in the bedroom.
Carter froze.
The ringtone was different from the one he used for everyone else. I had heard it only twice before, both times followed by whispered conversations and sudden trips downtown.
He walked out, leaving me on the bathroom floor.
I heard him answer.
“What?”
A muffled voice spoke.
Carter looked back at me through the broken doorway.
“No,” he said. “She doesn’t know anything.”
My blood went cold.
A pause.
“I said she doesn’t know.”
Another pause.
Then Carter whispered, “Moretti is coming.”
The voice on the other end said something that made him go completely still.
Carter ended the call and rushed to the closet. He pulled out a handgun I had never seen before.
“Who was that?” I asked.
He ignored me.
“Carter.”
He checked the magazine.
For years I had believed his violence was about control, alcohol, jealousy, and the ugly private machinery of a cruel man. Watching him load that weapon, I understood something worse.
He had secrets that had nothing to do with our marriage.
A buzzer sounded from the intercom.
Carter stared toward the front door.
The doorman’s frightened voice crackled through the apartment.
“Mr. Voss? There are men downstairs asking for Mrs. Voss.”
Carter raised the gun.
The elevator chimed.
May you like
And somewhere beyond our front door, eight minutes ran out.
The hallway outside had gone unnaturally quiet. I could hear only the rain tapping the windows and Carter's uneven breathing. Somewhere far below, a car horn sounded and then stopped. I remember thinking that ordinary life was still happening outside our apartment while mine split cleanly into before and after. Carter checked the gun again, then looked at me as if I had become evidence against him. For once, I did not lower my eyes. Fear was still there, huge and physical, but beneath it was something new. I had made the call. Someone had answered. Even if the next minute destroyed everything, Carter no longer controlled the entire room. That realization was small, almost ridiculous, and yet it felt like the first free thing I had owned in years.
