Chapter 38
JOSHUA
The sick, acidic rage that I can feel deep down in my stomach won’t leave me. It feels like it’s eating me from the inside out. I have to do something to get it out, but I don’t know what that something is.
The rage churns low in my gut, coiling tighter with every breath I take.
I think getting out of the tiny security office might help and so I close down the CCTV laptop and lock it in the cabinet behind me, the click of the key echoing far louder than it should.
My hands tremble as I lock the office door behind me, not with fear, but with fury.
It is a dangerous sort of fury. The sort that is controlled, tempered, and in the right circumstances, lethal.
I’ve seen a lot in my time here, but this – fuck - this is something else.
Sarah pushed Molly down the stairs. There was no fucking self-defense and no excuse for what she did. She did it deliberately. Methodically. Like she’d planned it. Like she was eliminating a problem. And afterwards, she smiled like she was pleased with herself.
And now she’s walking around the building, walking the same halls she’s walked every day, sipping coffee, breathing our air like she’s done nothing wrong. She’s walking around in my company after hurting the only woman I have ever loved.
No. I can’t let that go. I won’t. Screw the official channels. Even the most picky HR rep can’t say this isn’t a sackable offense or that I didn’t do the right thing by ridding the office of her. She’s a proven threat to the people who work here.
I make my way back to my office, avoiding catching anyone’s eye and trying to ignore the whispers that follow me. I catch snippets anyway, things like he looks mad, and someone is getting fired, shit like that. Well, they are correct on both counts.
I reach my office and sit down and pick up the receiver of my desk phone. I dial the extension number of her work area, and a cheerful voice answers my call.
“Hello Mr Redfern. What can I do for you?”
I take a moment to breathe. The cheerful voice isn’t Sarah, it’s Patty, and it’s not right to take my anger out on her. She isn’t the one who has done anything wrong.
“Can you put me through to Sarah please,” I say.
“Sure,” she says. “But are you sure I can’t help?”
“I’m sure,” I say.
“Ok,” she replies.
She sounds disappointed, but when word reaches her that Sarah has been fired, which knowing this place won’t take long, she’ll be relieved it wasn’t her I wanted to see.
I listen to the beeps as I’m transferred, and then Sarah’s voice comes over the line.
“Hello,” she says. “Wh …”
I cut her off before she can go any further.
“Come to my office,” I say. “Now.”
There’s a pause and then she speaks.
“Is this about …”
I cut her off again. I have given her a simple instruction. Why the hell can’t she just do as I say?
“Now, Sarah,” I say, my voice low and barely controlled.
I hang up before she can answer me with another question.
The anger still burns inside of me, and I need to let some of it out before Sarah gets here.
I want to fire her sure, and I want her to know I’m angry at her, but I don’t want to go so far that she can turn this around on me and get away with what she’s done.
I stand up, and I shove my chair in hard enough that it thuds against the edge of the desk.
I need to move. I need to do something before I go mad.
Maybe I should have gone to the hospital first. I feel like seeing Molly would have calmed me down somewhat because she has that effect on me, reminding me of what is important, but I can’t walk into Molly’s room knowing the woman who tried to kill her is still comfortably employed here.
It’s less than a minute before I hear the clipped sound of Sarah’s heels coming down the hallway towards my office.
She doesn’t even knock on the door. She just swings the door open like she owns the place and waltzes inside.
She obviously has no idea what I’ve learned.
She very much thinks that I still think that she’s the victim here.
She steps further inside of my office, her head held high like she has nothing to be ashamed of. She makes as though to sits down in the chair opposite mine but then she turns slightly to look at me where I stand in the middle of the office and whatever she sees there stops her in her tracks. Good.
Since we last talked, she has pulled her blonde hair up into a top knot, and I can’t help thinking this is another calculated move, showing her injured nose off better and making sure the blood on her blouse isn’t covered by her hair.
She wants people to see her, to ask her what happened so she can try to poison everyone against Molly.
I’m not going to let that happen. Once I’ve dealt with this and been to see Molly, I’m going to hold a meeting and tell everyone what really happened.
For now, though, I just have to get through this part without losing my temper.
“You wanted to see me?” she says. There's a tilt to her head, a calculated innocence in her half smile. “Have you changed your mind about me filling in for Molly?”
I don’t say anything. Not yet. I just stare at her.
She shifts a little, looking slightly uncomfortable under my scrutiny, but still maintaining her smile.
“Mr Redfern? Is everything ok?”
My voice is flat when I speak, and I ignore her question. She’s not here to make small talk with me.
“Sit down,” I command.
She frowns at me and stays on her feet.
“What’s this about?” she says.
“I said sit down,” I reiterate.
She obeys, but slowly, like she’s doing me a favor. Like this is a game and she’s just biding her time until she gets bored of playing with me. Well, if it is a game, she just lost it. She’s not the player she thinks she is. And her poker face is shit.
I close my office door and then I cross the room, step behind my desk. My palms rest on the polished wood surface, and my knuckles are white with the tension.
“You’re done here,” I say.
She blinks, and the shock at my words is evident on her face. I think it’s the first genuine expression I’ve seen on her face in ages, certainly today, and she covers it quickly.
“Excuse me?” she says.
“You’re fired,” I say, simplifying it for her so she can’t pretend to not know what I’m talking about this time.
The words slam into the room like a thunderclap. Sarah stares at me, stunned for a second. Then her mouth curls into a bitter smirk.
“You can’t be serious,” she says.
I don’t respond. I can’t believe she’s still trying to brazen this out.
She laughs, a sharp, disbelieving sound, and she shakes her head.
“I’m the best general secretary you’ve got. Half of the people here couldn’t organize a sock drawer without me. And what? You think you can just throw me out because Molly tripped over her own feet?”
“You’re wrong on two counts there. Frieda is the best general secretary I’ve got by a long shot. And Molly didn’t trip,” I say, my voice like stone. “You pushed her.”
The smirk vanishes.
“I don’t know lies people have been spreading about this, but …”
I am so sick of this bitch lying to my face and I cut her off.
“There is CCTV in the stairwell, and I saw the footage, so you can drop the act now.”
She goes still. Like something behind her eyes just froze up.
I lean forward, my movements slow and deliberate.
“You went into the stairwell with her. You hit yourself. You argued. You shoved her. You watched her fall. And you fucking smiled when she landed.”
She opens her mouth, shuts it, opens it again.
“You don’t understand. She was threatening me. You didn’t hear what she said, what she claimed was going to do to me,” she says.
“And yet earlier, you failed to mention that. In fact, you said she attacked you,” I say.
“I meant she attacked me verbally,” Sarah says.
She is so determined to cling to this fantasy that she will say anything. If it wasn’t this serious, it would almost be funny.
“I’m done listening to you. I don’t care what your latest lie is,” I snap. “The facts are that you assaulted a colleague. You nearly killed someone at work for fucks’ sake.”
She pushes up from the chair, rage rising from her like steam.
“Don’t be so dramatic. I called the hospital. She’s fine, just a sprained ankle, some bruising and a possible concussion.”
I step around the desk, closing the space between us.
“Nice,” I say. “Let everyone think you’re so concerned.”
“This place is better off without her. She was ruining everything,” she spits. “She was messing up left and right and you know it. I covered for her more times than I can count.”
I glare at her.
“Name one thing she messed up.”
I know she has made a few mistakes, but none are particularly serious like Sarah is implying and I’m pretty sure she doesn’t even know about the majority of them.
She’s likely going to go with Molly spilling milk on my father in the board meeting and I’d love to know how she expects me to believe she fixed that.
Sarah scoffs and rolls her eyes.
“What about the Redfart incident? Does that ring a bell?”
My blood goes cold.
“What did you just say?” I demand.
She folds her arms, smirking again now like she thinks she’s on the offensive.
“That ridiculous restaurant booking she made in your name a few months ago, and somehow got Redfern confused with Redfart? You were humiliated in front of a potential client. You must remember that?”
I do remember. I never told anyone except Molly, and I made her swear not to tell a soul, because it’s the sort of name that sticks.
I know she didn’t tell anyone because she was mortified about it.
And now that I think about it, she swore up and down she didn’t do it, that maybe the hostess wrote it down wrong or something.
But now Sarah is bringing it up. Something she was never supposed to know. My eyes narrow as everything slots into place.
“You sabotaged her,” I say, the words barely above a whisper.
“What?”
“She didn’t mess up,” I growl. “You made it look like she did. You wanted her job, and you tried to get her fired.”
Her eyes flash, the mask slipping completely now.
“She didn’t deserve that position. She is weak. Passive. She got the perks, the praise, and for what? So, she could flub her way through spreadsheets and cry in the bathroom when someone criticized her formatting? Please.”
“Get out,” I say.
She laughs.
“Do you really think HR will let you fire me over this? Without proof?”
“Oh, there’s proof,” I say. “Enough to bury you. Maybe not of the sabotaging you did, but of you shoving a colleague down the stairs unprovoked after punching yourself in the face to make it look like she assaulted you first.”
Her jaw tightens.
“You’re making a mistake, Joshua.”
I ignore the fact she uses my first name and that she says it like it’s a dirty word, spitting it out in almost disgusted fashion.
“No,” I say, and I stare her down, and when I speak again my voice is low and cold. “The mistake was letting you stay here this long. You have until the count of three to remove yourself from my sight and leave this building. Or I’m calling the police and having you arrested for attempted murder.”
Her smile dies.
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“Try me. One.”
She hesitates. Her gaze flicks to the door, then back to me. She’s calculating, looking for an angle, a way out.
“Two.”
She stands up slowly like her weight has doubled since she sat down, and she can’t quite control her body. Her face is pale now, sickly looking, but there’s still venom in her eyes.
“You’ll regret this,” she hisses.
“Three.”
I calmly take my cell phone out of my pants pocket and begin to dial nine one one. I have only pressed the nine key when she whirls around and storms out.
I follow her down the main hallway and stand and watch as she reaches her workspace and grabs her jacket and her purse and a few personal effects off her desk.
She ignores the questioning stares of Frieda and Patty and when she’s done, she pushes past me and continues towards the elevator.
I keep following her, watching her every move as she makes her way down the corridor.
Every person who sees her gets out of the way like they know something’s happened. Maybe they do. Word travels fast here.
I get into the elevator with her, watching her quietly fume beside me, and I cross the lobby with her and watch her leave the building. I don’t look away until she’s out of sight. Then I turn back toward my office, my cell phone once more in my hand.
I call the building security and inform them that Sarah Dawson is banned from the premises effective immediately. I tell them that her access credentials need to be revoked, her passwords removed from the systems, and her keys collected. She is not to return under any circumstances.
“Understood,” the officer on the line says. “Do you want us to file a report with the police about anything?”
“Not yet,” I reply. “There’ll be an official police report soon enough.”
I hang up and go back upstairs. I stand in the quiet of my office, staring into space for a moment.
My pulse is still hammering and my throat dry.
I did it. I got her out. I expected to feel better about this than I do, but even though her reign of terror might be over, the damage she caused is still bleeding through the cracks.
God. I should’ve seen it. I should have paid more attention when Molly told me she didn’t do things that it appeared she had to have done.
I should have stopped things long before they went this far.
But I didn’t and I need Molly to know that I see it now, that it’s dealt with, and she will be safe if she wants to come back to work and that I promise to never dismiss anything she tells me ever again.
There’s only one place I need to be now and it’s not in the office, dealing with the gossip of the staff, or talking with the lawyers or HR.
No, right now, I need to be with Molly.
Because everything that happened to her - the bruises on her face, the bandage on her ankle, and the tremor I feel sure would have been in her voice when she woke up in that sterile hospital bed - it’s all because I didn’t protect her in time.
And I don’t care what it takes. I won’t make that mistake again.