At dinner, my husband poured wine on me while my daughter-in-law and granddaughter laughed. I simply dried my face and left the room. Just ten minutes later, the front gate opened, and three men in suits walked into the house.

I should have seen it coming. The signs were all there, subtle as hairline fractures in our wedding china. For forty-three years, I had been married to Frank, a man who moved through our life with the unquestioned authority of a king in his castle. And I, Dorothy, his queen, had long ago learned that my role was to maintain the peace, even if it meant sacrificing pieces of myself.

The evening had started like a thousand others. I’d spent hours preparing his favorite meal—pot roast, slow-braised until it was meltingly tender. I set the dining room table with the china I’d chosen as a young bride, my head full of silly dreams of elegant dinner parties and sparkling conversation. Those dreams had died a slow, quiet death somewhere between Frank’s third beer and his first casual criticism of the gravy.