Chapter 22
TICKET
Bea
This wasn’t the plan. This wasn’t the way things were supposed to go. Bea clenched her hand into a fist to stop the trembling and then raised it to the chipped paint of the door before her, knocking twice.
What was she going to do?
Where was she supposed to go?
She’d pleaded and reasoned and bargained and begged, but Milo hadn’t budged an inch. He’d had a court order for her to vacate. Evidently, that was in the prenup as well.
When Bea first proposed the idea of a prenup back when they were engaged, so many years ago—it hadn’t had much to do with Milo at all.
On the contrary, Bea had been noticed by a scout at the mall when she was eighteen.
She’d scored a modeling gig from it, but when she’d received her first paycheck, a whopping five thousand dollars, paranoia began to set its claws.
The similarities between her situation and her parents’ were alarming.
Bea’s mother was a small-town beauty queen who’d made a small fortune modeling through big box department stores.
Barely a year into her success, however, Bea’s father had wooed her mother with sweet talk and overpriced gifts.
He’d gotten her pregnant, blown through her money, and then moved on to the next woman that caught his eye faster than the time it took for Beatrice to take her first breath.
So Bea had asked for the prenup, wanting to protect herself from her mother’s pain. To stop Milo from stepping out. From taking her hard-earned money. Milo came from his own wealth, yes, but that wasn’t something Bea was considering in the face of her own inevitable success.
Following that initial gig, however, Bea struggled to find work in the modeling industry.
Her next audition failed, but only because her stylist had fucked up her haircut.
Then her attempt at a commercial was a bust because her alarm clock never went off, so she showed up late and didn’t have time to study the lines.
For her last audition, she actually received a callback, but the talentless floozy who got the job was clearly sleeping with the casting director, so she’d never truly stood a chance.
None of it had ever been her fault; it was simply a long streak of bad luck.
It was all incredibly disheartening. Very taxing on the mind.
But when she stopped trying, Milo’s attitude changed.
He stayed on her constantly about not giving up on her dreams. He put limits on his credit cards and made her listen to multiple patronizing lectures about how her spending was out of control.
It was all very dramatic considering that he, himself, was a child of nepotism.
She’d said that to him.
And he’d walked away.
Then he’d returned, and she’d been forced to listen to yet another lecture.
He droned on and on—about how painful it had been to lose his parents so young.
How his precious grandmother had helped fill those gaps.
How he’d started as a clerk in his father’s company and worked his way up.
And how much he struggled with leaving the company and his father’s legacy when he wanted to start his consulting business.
How instrumental his grandmother had been in helping him feel confident in his decision to step away and forge his own career. All things Bea had known already.
“I’ve never relied on nepotism,” Milo had said, anger in his eyes. “My father would’ve never stood for such a thing.”
Bea wanted to say that his father wouldn’t be standing for anything any time soon, but she bit her tongue, gritting her teeth.
She hated it when he patronized her. When he turned into consultant Milo and started advising her on how to turn her career around.
She already resented the fact that she was spending his money when she shopped.
She didn’t need him constantly throwing the matter in her face as well.
In all her life, she’d only ever had one person who’d listened to her concerns and sympathized, regardless of what was said. A constant, unwavering friend who never judged. One person she could turn to no matter what.
The door swung open beneath her fist, and there she was—Eliana.
Bea knew, objectively, that she should feel guilty as she looked up at her friend—but she didn’t.
All she felt in that moment was anger. Anger that Eliana had always been allowed to play the perfect little housewife, without question.
The quiet girl-next-door who always won out in the end. The underdog that everybody rooted for.
Nobody ever rooted for Bea. Not truly. She was an idol to some, a project to Milo, and a cautionary tale to others, just like her mother.
She’d clawed herself out of the pit her parents had dug with her bare hands.
She’d booked that gig. She’d won Milo’s heart.
She’d come up with the idea of the Busy Bea store.
She’d built her own image from the ground up. But it was never enough.
Eliana, on the other hand, wasn’t prettier than Bea.
She wasn’t smarter. She certainly wasn’t more hardworking.
Eliana just sat at her house doing fuck-all during the day.
She was handed everything on a silver platter because she’d popped out a couple of kids, and she took it all for granted, while Bea had to start a whole company just to get a little spending money in her pocket.
Bea had often wondered—did Eliana not realize how fragile it was?
How quickly it could all disappear? Eliana’s life was ideal.
A dream. But it wasn’t real. It was dangerous.
It was naive. But for years, Bea had watched how Eliana and Jesse interacted, searching for the crack.
It was clear how Jesse hung onto her every word, and in time, to her horror, Bea realized that Eliana was secure.
That this man truly wanted to be her provider.
He wasn’t the most romantic guy, but there was no doubt in anybody’s mind that Eliana was the sun around which Jesse orbited.
And Bea wanted it more than anything else she’d ever wanted before.
At first, she’d just been curious—testing the waters to see how far Jesse would let her take the flirting, the jokes, and then the kisses.
Each response she earned served to soothe her chafed pride.
But it wasn’t until he’d shown up in Elliston that Bea knew she had him.
She began making plans while he lay by her side, snoring mindlessly. Jesse may not be as wealthy as Milo, but it wasn’t like Milo was overly generous in the first place, and judging by the jewelry and the bouquets and the trips, Jesse was doing fine on his own.
It had all been going perfectly to plan, until Eliana took the damn job working with Milo, completely out of the blue, and turned Jesse into a boar. Their meetings were no longer about Jesse’s thrill of being with Bea, but rather his fury over his wife moving out from beneath his thumb.
Perfect Eliana.
Bea loved her.
Bea hated her.
And even though it boiled her alive to stand before her friend and ask for help, Bea had nowhere else to go.
“He’s leaving me,” she whimpered, running a knuckle beneath her eye, wiping away an imaginary tear. She stepped forward to walk into the house, as she’d done hundreds of times before, but Eliana sidestepped, blocking her path.
“I’m sorry.” Eliana stated, though her voice held a note of steel Bea had never heard before.
Her gaze darted up in surprise, and she was horrified to find the same steel reflected in Eliana’s eyes.
“Milo told me what happened and what he was planning—given that you and I were friends.” Bea ignored the spear of pain that stabbed her at Eliana’s casual use of past tense.
“But I can’t support you on this, knowing how you chose to hurt him.
You know how I feel about cheating. Milo may be my boss, but he’s my friend too. ”
“I was your friend first,” Bea snapped, her temper roaring to a peak in the blink of an eye. Milo got to keep everything. He couldn’t have her friend, too. Bea already had to share Eliana’s attention with the red-headed bitch. Maybe Eliana just didn’t know how ruthless Milo was . . .
“I don’t have anywhere to go,” she pleaded. “He’s taking everything from me. I’m going to be homeless, Elly.”
“You know that’s not true.” Eliana rolled her eyes, shocking Bea to the core.
“We’ve been to the bank together dozens of times.
You know that I know that you've got more than enough to live very comfortably for at least a year or two. And he said you’re keeping the store.
And besides, you made this choice. You know what they say about lying with dogs. ”
That uncharacteristic line landed like a slap, and for a long moment, Bea simply stared. Processing.
How dare she? Who was she to judge? The words were right there on Bea’s tongue.
To tell Eliana exactly who the dog was. She wanted to spill, just to knock that smug look off her face.
Eliana thought she was so high and mighty with Jesse hanging on her every word—Bea wondered how she would feel knowing everything he was getting up to behind her back.
But then a familiar face appeared above Eliana’s shoulder, eyes going wide as Jesse saw who stood on their doorstep. There was panic in his expression. Clear, unadulterated panic.
“What’s—” He cleared his throat. “What’s going on? Elly?”
“I was asking Bea to leave, considering what she’s done to Milo. I am sorry that it has to end like this, but cheating is a hard line for me. I can’t move past this,” Eliana answered, her tone final.
For a moment, time stood still in the wake of her words. The conviction in her voice lingered in the air, the horror in Jesse’s expression frozen in place, and the cogs clanking to life in Bea’s mind. This could be her ticket out—if she played her cards right.
So Bea did what she always did. She gritted her teeth, held her tongue, and gave the performance that was expected of her.
“I understand,” she sniffled. Then she cast one last lingering glance at Jesse before turning and walking in the direction of the bus station, beneath the brilliant colors of the setting autumn sun.
They may have gotten the best of her that day, but she’d win out in the end.
No matter what it took.