“Have you ever used any of my toys?” she asks me slyly, and I feel warm blood rushing to my face. “I see you did, good,” she continues, my embarrassment the only answer she needs. “Maybe you don’t know it, but my vibrator bullets do more than just vibrate.”
“What do they do?”
“Well, they do something that might help you out. You see, Penny, sometimes the truth is like a rotten tooth… It just lies there, uselessly, and you have to pull it out and bring it into the light, even if sometimes you have to use unsavory methods.” Then, grinning wickedly at me, she pauses for a few seconds for dramatic effect. “My bullet can help with that.”
I look at her and her eyes sparkle.
“It can record conversations,” Natalie says with a smile.
I lean forward in my chair, suddenly feeling as if I’m conspiring with a woman I’ve known forever.
“Tell me what to do.”
29
The New York Daily Journal
Reap What You Sow
Gossip Central on Page Eight. From the Desk of Vicky Durner - All the gossip you never even knew you needed to know!
Good morning Gotham.
One week.
That's what my spies are telling me is the length of time that the city's #1 Douchebag Magnus Davion has until his Board of Directors holds a session to evaluate whether he's fit to lead his company.
I know it sounds like a big step and our hearts may go out to Magnus, but it's important to realize that we should only feel compassion for someone who deserves it.
We really should not feel any sort of empathy for Mr. Davion—a serial breaker of hearts who has left a trail of women broken and battered in his wake. While there are no claims that he has ever raised a hand against them, I'm sure the emotional turmoil that he has caused women is plenty. We all know that the pen name Vicky Durner is used for the gossip columnist for Page Eight of the New York Daily Journal, but there are other reporters who write these articles. But one thing is for certain. Every single person involved with Gossip Central on Page Eight is unified in their complete and utter disdain for Magnus Davion.
In fact, the whole scandal involving his stepdaughter, once the initial loathing wears off, isn't surprising.
Leave it to Magnus Davion to only look at women as sex objects. Nothing more.
Rather than cherish and celebrate his stepdaughter, what does he do instead?
He treats her like he's treated every single woman in his life.
A vehicle for satisfying his sexual desires.
There's a lot to be said for the woman, Penny Wright, herself in these matters. I mean, we at the Gossip Desk understand that she used to work for us and that she's the daughter of the Editor-In-Chief, but who really sleeps with their stepfather? Who even tries to tempt someone into doing that?
Was there two-directional flirting? Because if so, her feet deserve to be held closely to the fire as well.
There's a word for people like her. Before it was not accepted to use it to describe women, we would use the following words.
Slut.
Harlot.
Trollop.
Tramp.
Those are all adequate descriptions for a woman with the character and temperament to not only receive and welcome advances from her stepfather, but to actively seduce him as well.
It is our sincere hope that the Equinox Tower project be pulled from Davion Development, and that Magnus Davion be exiled from the company he founded. Such a large and powerful company does not belong in the hands of that man.
And who exactly is that man?
An uncouth and barbaric man-child on his best of days.
And a dangerous and scheming sexual predator who has the forked tongue to seduce an entire city on his worst of days.
New York City is much better off without Magnus Davion.
It's time the rest of us woke up to that reality. This man is nothing but the Devil himself.
30
Penny
I never thought I'd be here. Standing outside the Editor-In-Chief's office. After I'd been let go so unceremoniously.
But there's no other option. There's no other choice in the matter.
Magnus doesn't know that I'm here. I haven't told him. It's what I need to do. For Magnus.
For our baby.
The door opens and an Assistant Editor that I don't recognize walks out. Mom's been replacing a lot of the people in the top spots lately. But now it makes sense.
What she's doing is pure and simple character assassination. And a lot of old hands at the Daily Journal wouldn't have stood for it. They'd have either refused to do what she was asking and been fired, or resigned.
They certainly wouldn't be crawling back here for a desperate attempt at mercy.
At least that's what it seems like to me—a desperate attempt—as I walk into Mom's office.
No, she wasn't expecting me, okay. That's why she looks surprised. I didn't call ahead or do anything.