“Then he marked her.” Earl’s voice cracked as he stared into his beer. “A giant Ace of Spades on one breast. His name on the other. Said it would make sure everybody knew who she belonged to.” He gave a bitter laugh. “After that, the only men who looked twice at Daisy were the kind he wanted looking.”
Edgar shifted uneasily. “And now it’s happening again?”
Earl nodded slowly, eyes hollow. “A little redhead joined up a few months ago. Sweet girl. Came with her husband, smiling like they were joining a church picnic.” He swallowed hard. “The Companion started circling her immediately.”
“So he moved on to someone new?”
Earl ignored the question, as though he could no longer separate one horror from another.
“He took everything from us,” he muttered. “First the deed to our house. Then my truck, though somehow I still owed the payments.” His fingers tightened around the bottle. “Savings. Retirement accounts. Every damn thing we built together belongs to him now.”
His laugh this time sounded broken.
“I’ve got nothing left except this beer, and if you want it, you can have that too.”
Edgar watched tears cut through the dirt on the man’s face. Earl looked older than he probably was, worn down by exhaustion, fear, and humiliation.
“But losing the money wasn’t what destroyed me,” Earl whispered. “It was watching her change.”
His eyes drifted somewhere far away.
“At first she cried. Then she stopped fighting him. Then…” His throat tightened painfully. “Then she started wanting it. She laughed with them. Begged for attention. Every time he shared her around, she acted like she never wanted it to end.” Earl rubbed trembling hands over his face. “And the worst part is… I still love her. God help me, I still do.”
Edgar said nothing.
Part of him wanted to reject the story outright, but another part couldn’t stop imagining Justine trapped inside that world—surrounded by manipulation so powerful it rewired people from the inside out.
“No,” Earl said softly, shaking his head. “What finally broke me was when he got tired of her.”
His voice turned cold.
“He handed Daisy over to a bunch of young punks who weren’t even members of the church. Said he needed room for the new girl.” Earl looked physically sick. “My wife would’ve stayed loyal to him forever, but he didn’t want her anymore.”
“What did they do?” Edgar asked quietly.
Earl stared at him with dead eyes.
“They turned her into a business.”
Silence settled heavily between them.
“They charge men for time with her now,” Earl whispered. “The woman I married… the woman I still love…” His voice collapsed completely. “And I can’t save her. I can’t even save myself.”
Outside the bar, thunder rolled in the distance.