system. “You're jealous of her, aren't you, El? That's what this is all about, isn't it? Just plain jealousy. You're jealous of your own daughter.”
“You're drunk.” She dismissed him with a wave of the cigarette, unwilling to listen to what he was saying.
“I'm right, and you know it. You're sick. I'm just sorry for her that we ever had her. She doesn't deserve a life like the one we give her… you give her…” He took no responsibility for his wife's cruelty and took great pride in the fact that he had never laid a hand on Gabriella. But he had never done anything to protect her either.
“If you're trying to make me feel guilty about her, don't bother. I don't. I know what I'm doing.”
“Do you? You beat her senseless practically every day. Is that what you had intended for her?” He looked horrified as he drained his glass, and felt the effect of his fourth martini. Sometimes it took more than that to drown the things that he remembered her doing.
“She's not an easy child, John. She needs to be taught a lesson.”
“Well, you've done that, El. I'm sure she'll always remember the lessons we taught her.” His eyes began to glaze as he said it.
“I hope so. Children don't need a lot of fussing over. It's not good for them. She knows I'm right too. She never argues with me when I punish her. She knows she deserves it.”
“She's too afraid to argue with you, and you know it. She's probably afraid you'll kill her if she says anything, or tries to resist you.”
“You make me sound like an ax-murderer, for God's sake.” She crossed one shapely leg over the other, but for several years now he was no longer moved by her. Seeing what she was doing to their child had made him begin to hate her, but not enough to try and stop her, nor leave her. He didn't have the guts to do that, and was slowly beginning to hate himself for it.
“We should send her to school somewhere in a few years, just to get her out of here, away from both of us. She deserves that.”
“She deserves a proper education from us before that.”
“Is that what you call this? ‘Education’? Did you see the bruise on her cheek when she went to her room tonight?”
“It will be gone by morning,” Eloise said calmly.
He knew it was probably true, but hated to admit it. Eloise always seemed to know just how much force to use so that the bruises never showed on the exposed areas of Gabriella's body. The marks on her upper arms and legs were usually a different story. She was an expert at it.
“You're one sick bitch,” was all he said to his wife as he left the room and walked unsteadily to their bedroom. She was, but there seemed to be nothing he could do about it. He stopped in the open doorway of his daughter's room on the way, and stared into the darkness. There was no sign of life there, no sound, and the bed appeared to be empty, but when he walked softly into the room and looked more closely, he saw a small lump at the bottom of the bed and knew it was Gabriella. She always slept that way, hidden way down in the bed, so that her mother wouldn't think she was there if she came to find her. Tears filled his eyes as he looked at the small, barely visible lump of battered terror that was his daughter. He didn't even dare pull her back up to the empty pillow. It would only expose her to Eloise's anger again, if she came in to see her. He left her there, lonely and alone and seemingly forgotten, and turned and walked on to his own room, wondering at the injustices of life, the inhumanity that had befallen his child, and yet he knew as he walked away from her, he knew that there was nothing he could do to save her. In his own way, he was as powerless against his wife as Gabriella. And he hated himself for it.
Chapter 2
THE GUESTS BEGAN arriving shortly after eight o'clock at the town house on East Sixty-ninth Street. A handful of well-known socialites were there, a Russian prince with an English girl, and all of the women Eloise normally played bridge with. The head of the bank where John Harrison worked had come with his