Mason couldn’t sleep. The blood in the bedroom had been cleaned up a long time ago, but he could smell the coppery stench in the air, reminding him of the tragedy that took place a mere few hours ago.

He and Zoe had finally come to the end of the line.

Yanni cried for hours. He couldn't calm her down until past midnight. Then, he passed her to Deborah to take care of her.

The night was dark and quiet when he went into the study. He was smoking on the couch and wisps of light green smoke lingered in the air. It was all around him, giving him a hazy, surreal look.

It seemed, incidentally, that there were a lot of painful memories for Zoe here in the study. He had done some unspeakable, humiliating things to her when he forced himself on her. Then, there was the time when he slapped her because of the vinyl. She grew cold to him after that.

If there was a specific time he would point at and say, “This is where it started going downhill,” it would be that slap.

He tried to salvage th