“I can see that I have you all wrong. You claim to be innocent, but I don’t think that you are even close to that. Marshall really did get to you and that’s the reason why you want to hurt him.” I took a bite of the eggs benedict with the hollandaise sauce and it was the best that I had ever had.
“It shouldn’t matter my reasons for doing this. It should only matter that the check clears for your payment. I don’t just want him humiliated. I want to ruin him. You have his head up in the clouds that he doesn’t even recognize his downfall. I’ve been there to circumvent several of his contracts. I just had to hint at his mental instability and I let you do the rest. He’s not acting like himself. He usually knows how to avoid those pitfalls, but he can’t think of anything but you. This is working out better than I could ever imagine.” She was an evil genius. She was the puppet master that knew which strings to pull to make her subjects dance for her amusement.
“I underestimated you. I thought that you were broken, but I see how wrong I was. You were just waiting patiently to strike and you used me to break his will. Like you said, he hasn’t been in his own right mind and doesn’t recognize a hostile takeover when he should see it coming from miles away.” I’d found out that Marshall liked to play fast and loose with business deals.
“What I do is of no concern to you. These next two weeks are very critical. I don’t care what you have to do, but you need to keep his mind occupied. Sleep with him or don’t and that’s entirely up to you. I just don’t want him to see it coming. I’ve already placed all the players on the board. It’s just a matter of sitting back and watching it play out. The only thing that is a bit of a wrinkle is if he is able to stop it before it happens. I’ve said too much and you really don’t need to know any of this. I thought that it was time for you to understand who you are dealing with. Cross me and he won’t be the one that I ruin. You can either take that as a threat or a promise. I really don’t care. If you would excuse me, I have some people that I want to discuss a few things with. Finish up your meal and then leave.” She had only brought me here to rub it in my nose and then to cause a chill to go down my spine with the tone of her voice.
“I don’t even want to think about what you would do to me for failure. Learning about who you are certainly puts a new fire underneath me to get this done as quickly as possible. I need to get you out of my life.” She really was a piece of work. That girl was a master of manipulation. She had me fooled and that was not an easy thing to do. I prided myself on knowing how to read people and she had pulled the wool over my eyes. I was blind. I could certainly see the writing on the wall after she had let me see who she really was.
I’d lost my appetite. It was a good thing that she had refrained from mentioning this until I was almost done. I felt a little sick to my stomach that I had gotten involved with any of this. I was in way too deep and going against her was like throwing chum into the water to attract the sharks.
I got up after drinking the last of my champagne and orange juice. I looked back to see that she was laughing like she didn’t have a care in the world. She was surrounded by a bunch of snobby friends that she would have gladly stabbed in the back. My head was swimming. I took one more glance to understand that I had been used in a campaign to take everything away from Marshall.
I went downstairs, feeling that anger welling up inside me and knowing that there was absolutely nothing that I could do about it. If I told Marshall about any of this, she would come after me. I wasn’t sure what her idea of revenge against me would be. I did know that it would be detrimental to my health. If I were to go through with this, then I would be taking what I felt for him and turning it into something ugly. I really didn’t have anybody to turn to. The only other person that knew about this was Tina.
I got into my car. I found myself spinning my tires and sending up a cloud of black smoke behind me. I needed to find some way to vent and the only thing that came to mind was ripping off Marshall’s clothing and showing him that he wasn’t the only one that could use his considerable charm to get what he wanted.
I knew where he was at all times courtesy of hacking his phone and making it into a GPS. I tapped into that with one eye on the road and one eye on the phone. It was a little dangerous and I’m sure that was how accidents happen all the time. I saw that he was home and he was about to get a rude awakening. When I became like this, I could be a force that nobody could withstand. I had lost count of how many times I would be lying there afterward and the guy would be left speechless with my claw marks all over his body.