“I think my money is mine.”
I had barely finished saying it when his hand closed around my throat.
For one stunned second, everything inside me seemed to stop except the awareness that I could not breathe normally.
This was my father.
The man who had been yelling about money a moment earlier was suddenly using his hands to force me out of the house because I had refused to surrender it.
Then he grabbed my hair.
He pulled me toward the front hall.
I struggled to keep my balance as he dragged me to the door.
When he threw me outside, my shoulder struck the porch railing.
Pain shot through it.
I turned toward the doorway instinctively.
Mom was there.
Emily was behind her.
Neither one came toward me.
That detail stayed with me almost as sharply as what Dad had done.
They had watched the argument become physical.
