Reared in the harsh discipline and judgment of the Tabernacle of the Living Word, young Annabeth Showers endures unspeakable humiliation and physical abuse. She fears her church, her parents, and the vicious God the Tabernacle reveres. She believes marriage to Roger Hogan is her door to freedom. But matrimony to an older man she barely knows is not the escape Annabeth imagined, and she is irrevocably locked into a dark world of fear and dissatisfaction. Her body is under his control, but her mind and spirit rebel. Once she has a brief taste of true joy, she employs every tactic she can muster to leave her crippling existence, even if it means bloodshed. Even if it means death.