Touch Me Not (Book 1 of Sanctuary & Sin)

I never forgot the sound of breaking glass. It wasn’t the crash that haunted me—it was the silence before. That breathless moment when everything held still, waiting for the impact. Like the house itself knew what was coming. I was folding laundry when Evan threw the tumbler. It missed my face by inches, shattered against the wall, and rained down in glittering shards. Whiskey soaked into the carpet. Lemon polish clung to the air. My ankle stung where a shard had kissed skin, but I didn’t flinch. I never flinched. “You think anyone else would want you?” he said, voice low and deliberate. “You’re nothing without me.” I didn’t answer. Upstairs, I heard the creak of a bed—Emi shifting. Tomo’s door clicked shut. Souta was too young to understand, but even babies know when to hold their breath. I stood there, bleeding, silent. Because fear was a currency, and I couldn’t afford to spend it. That night, I lay in bed beside a man who snored like he hadn’t shattered a glass against my body. I stared at the ceiling and mapped my escape: the gas station that stayed open late, the shoebox in the closet with our birth certificates, the second debit card tucked inside my old knitting book. If I stayed, my children would grow up believing love sounded like breaking glass. So I chose. I left.