The Serpent I Carried Chapter 1

For eighteen years, my adopted son hated me.

He was convinced I was the one who killed his birth mother.

So, he found a homeless man, riddled with sores from a life on the streets, to destroy me.

The day my husband drove me to the lake house to "end things," our son stood on the shore, watching me walk into the freezing water. His words were colder than the ice.

"You know," he called out, his voice clear and sharp, "every time I had to call you 'Mom,' it made me want to vomit. Consider this a final moment of pleasure. My way of repaying you for eighteen years of pretending."

Then, I blinked.

And I was reborn as his short-lived, sainted mother.

Looking down at my swollen belly, I turned and walked straight into the city's free clinic.

"Hi," I said to the woman at the desk. "I need to schedule an abortion."

This child must not be born.

* * *

The water seeped into my mouth and nose, gritty and freezing. My hands were bound behind my back with zip ties, the plastic cutting into my wrists with every struggle.

Primal survival instinct made me arch my back, fighting to keep my head above the surface. My vision blurred, but the two figures on the shore remained horrifyingly clear. My husband and my son.

They stood side-by-side, their gazes as distant and detached as if they were watching a stray piece of driftwood float by.

"Why..." I managed to gasp.

The foul lake water rushed in, silencing the weak cry in my throat.

Why? I taught you to read, to be a good man. I poured my life into you, and in return, you hire a vagrant to defile me and destroy my name?

Why? I loved and respected you, managed your home and your political campaigns, and in return, you watch me die for a crime I didn't commit?

Eighteen years of a mother's devotion.

Twenty years as a loving wife.

It was all a sick, elaborate joke.

One hated me to the bone, the other saw me as disposable trash. The despair was sharper than the winter water stabbing at my skin.

If there is a God, if I get another chance... I will burn their world to the ground.

...

I opened my eyes.

Someone was on top of me, a warm hand sliding across my skin. To be subjected to this humiliation even in death?

The rage that had been simmering in my soul erupted.

I shoved the man off me with all my strength and, in the same motion, swung my hand across his face.

CRACK!

A sharp, stinging pain shot through my palm. I froze.

This wasn't a dream?

In the dim glow of a bedside lamp, I saw the man's face. It wasn't the homeless man with his vacant eyes and open sores.

It was my husband, Julian Ashworth.

A bright red handprint was already blooming on his left cheek. He stared at me, his expression one of pure shock. "Catherine? What's wrong? Is it the baby kicking again?"

The baby?

I followed his gaze down. And saw a distinctly pregnant belly.

When I didn't speak, Julian’s concern deepened. "What is it? Catherine, talk to me!"

His handsome face was a mask of worry. A complete one-eighty from the cold indifference he'd shown me on the lakeshore.

Almost without thinking, I raised my hand again. And slapped his other cheek even harder.