“Dude, this is insane,” my brother-in-law, Tyler, laughed. He held his phone up, the camera lens pointed directly at my agony. “Wait till the guys see this.”

My father-in-law, Gerald, leaned against the doorframe, nursing a beer even though it was barely noon. He looked at me with the indifference one might show a roadkill animal. “Should have thought twice before trapping our boy,” he muttered, taking a swig. “She deserved every bit of that.”

The world started spinning. Black spots danced across my vision like angry hornets. I remembered the sensation of Vanessa’s hands on me moments before—the way she had grabbed my neck, her nails digging into my skin, twisting hard until my spine popped. The way she had shoved me, putting her full weight behind the blow, sending my pregnant belly crashing into the sharp granite corner of the kitchen island.