Chapter 26
She stood in front of the three paps still camped out in the park across from her building.They had been too shocked by her sudden presence to react. At first, anyway. Within two seconds, they had their cameras clicking and their mics in her face.
“You’re Sarah Clayborn, right?” the only one with real guts asked. “Can you give us a statement about what’s been going on?”
They asked her more specific questions, but Sarah’s mind was already moving forward on full-blast.
“What’s going on? Why, isn’t it obvious?” She lifted a cigarette to her lips and lit it with a bright pink lighter, the black beads of her bracelet clacking in the mic. “The slut’s come out of her closet and is ready to cut loose.”
She blew her smoke into the camera lens before advancing down the sidewalk.
Her wallet was tucked into the deep pocket of her coat.
Her morals and common sense? Left behind in the apartment for the paps to squabble over.
My face and words are going to be on the gossip sites tonight.
Everyone will psychoanalyze me. My doctor is somewhere shaking his head.
Sarah finished her cigarette by the time she reached Moreau Tower a few blocks away.
She didn’t smash it beneath her boot, however.
That would be a waste of a perfectly good sole.
Instead, Sarah would espouse some morality and take her cigarette to the smoking section and deposit the butt there.
One man in a suit on his smoke break glanced up at her with nothing but shock in his dark eyes.
Sarah twiddled her fingers on her way out of the smoking corner. Her next stop? The executive elevator, guarded by one of the dayshift security personnel.
She knew him. He definitely knew her, once he looked past the weird getup.
“Ms. Clayborn?”
“Don’t mind me, Jim. Got something to drop off.” She helped herself into the elevator reserved for the Moreaus, their most important guests… and their #1 personnel, like Sarah.
Nobody in the office had expected her. From the moment Sarah stepped off the elevator, everyone within a hundred feet stopped what they were doing. Especially Alicia Moreau, who had been walking across the room with a stack of folders in her hands.
“Ms.… Clayborn? Is that you?”
Sarah stopped in front of her. “What? Don’t recognize me from my acting debut?”
“I…” Mrs. Moreau put her folders down on the nearest desk and crossed her arms, elbows resting against her protruding stomach. “What are you doing here?”
“Stopped by to let you and Ms. Moreau know that as of today, I’m giving my two weeks’ notice. It’s been a laugh and a half, Alicia, but I’ve got shit to do.”
Was Alicia more shocked by the casual address or the way Sarah was dressed?
Both. Honestly. Look at me! I look like I’m about to stroll into a BDSM dungeon and grope someone.
She wouldn’t know anything about that. She’s the one who gets spanked and feels the wrath of the nipple clamp.
Those had never appealed to Sarah. Or Angel, for that matter.
“I see. I’m sorry to hear that, but I understand.”
“Do you?”
Other executive personnel stopped what they were doing to listen in on the exchange between Mrs. Moreau and her former employee – the employee she had gone to bat for so many times that it was almost embarrassing.
Because what did Sarah love more than anything else?
Pity, of course! She fucking thrived off it, didn’t she?
“If you have grievances, Ms. Clayborn, I’m sure they can be aired out in private. I don’t have any meetings right now if you would like to step into…”
“No need. All you have to know is that my two weeks’ notice starts today. I can help you select a replacement, but beyond that, I’m done here.” She turned. “Give my regards to your wife, the generous benefactor that she is.”
She said that with so much sarcasm dripping from her fangs that Alicia remained frozen where she stood, mouth agape and eyes wide enough to swallow the nearest person.
Sarah stopped off in the bathroom on her way out. She ran into Abby by the sinks.Someone had altered her appearance.
“I see we both changed our hair.” Abby tossed her long, straight hair behind her shoulder.
What the hell? Sarah was so used to seeing the other assistant with her afro that this was…
uncharacteristic. “What a week to decide to relax my hair for the first time in years. Thought I’d do something new, but…
well! Been too busy to properly take care of it because someone else is on leave. ”
Sarah turned on the sink. “Spare me your passive aggression.”
“Oh, I’m not snarking on you. If I were you, I’d definitely lay low for a while.”
“I just gave my two-week notice.”
“Damn. Really? Shit. Now what?” Abby laughed. “This is what happens when a girl changes up her look. Everything goes to hell.”
“Don’t I know it.”
“Hey,” Abby said, before Sarah had the chance to make her grand escape from Moreau Tower. “Go kick some ass for me, would you?”
Sarah – or was that the enigmatic Angel beneath the wig? – spared her a wicked smile. “Way ahead of you. I’ve got shit to do today.”
“Kill the world, girl.”
How prophetic.
Sarah took a cab from the curb to her next destination. This was the first Friday in a long time in which she didn’t have to drop some folders off at a crusty lawyer’s townhouse, yet she found herself in that neighborhood again.
But just because she wasn’t going to the lawyer’s didn’t mean she didn’t have business there. And! It would be the first time she intentionally bumped into Jill Blackbourne.
She opened the door with nothing but disdain on her face.
“What the hell do you want? Dressed like this…”
Sarah pushed her girlfriend’s ex-wife aside and helped herself into the house.
So, this is what Luca’s money can buy? She had insinuated more than once that she helped Jill’s family pay their bills so they could stay in the house her parents bought years ago.
As the area grew trendier and the taxes continued to climb, however, things changed.
Luca didn’t want her son to move out to the Delawarean countryside, where it would be more difficult to see him.
All of the electronics were brand new. Some of the furniture was recent as well.
Either that, or Jill’s mother spent her whole day watching HGTV and doing her own design updates.
Unlikely, if she was born into privilege and refused to come to terms with losing it.
Even my mother willingly walked away from a life of privilege so she could be with my middle-class father.
Not every woman was willing to make that sacrifice, however.
“You need to leave!”
“Is your son here?”
Jill gasped. “Absolutely not! You think I’m hiding him from Luca?”
“No. Just making sure before I rip you a new asshole. Wouldn’t be good for your little boy to hear what I need to say to you.”
Jill remained by the open front door, flabbergasted. What a pathetic person. Before, Sarah had regarded Jill Blackbourne as a woman who tried to make the best of her shitty situation, she kept throwing herself into it like a sacrificial lamb with a scent for slaughter.
Her long black hair had no luster. Her summery maxi-dress was last season.
Her makeup had greasy splotches that were more unfortunate than disgusting.
Her dark eyes were so dim that Sarah wondered if it was from staying in this big townhouse by herself or from those years of self-abuse.
What kind of things did a woman see in rehab, anyway?
“You need to give Luca custody of Victor.”
“How dare you!” Jill took one large step forward, nearly barreling Sarah over where she stood.
“How dare you tell me what to do with my son? Don’t you think I’m looking out for his best interests?
Luca… Luca wants to take him back to Denmark, for fuck’s sake!
And what? What are you going to do?” She scoffed. “Be his new mother?”
The beads rattled around Sarah’s wrist. “As a fellow mother, nobody knows more than I do that I could never replace you. I have no intention of doing that, anyway.”
“You… you don’t have kids. That wasn’t in the report at all.”
“Because he’s dead.”
Jill’s mouth remained open. “I’m… sorry? Is that supposed to make me feel sorry for you? Make me change my mind? Because your kid’s dead, I’ve gotta give up mine?”
“You make it sound like I want anything to do with your son. Like I’ve got some personal stake in that race other than wanting Luca to be happy and do what’s best for her kid.
” Sarah couldn’t hold back the laughter cracking her ribs.
“As if! I’ve already broken up with her.
Pretty soon, I’ll be far away from here.
From her. From you, Jill. But that doesn’t mean I’m not going to tell you to do the right thing for your son. ”
“Get the hell out!” Jill pointed out the doorway. “I’m calling the police if you’re not out of here in two minutes. I swear to God, if Luca put you up to this…”
“I’m the morally bankrupt degenerate, Jill, not your ex-wife.” Sarah showed herself out. “This degenerate has one more stop to make before skipping town.”
“Get out!”
The door slammed shut behind Sarah. Her phone rang in her pocket. Without looking, she knew it was Luca.
She shut off her phone and got back in the cab. With the serenity of a large, destructive storm, she asked the driver to take her up into the hills.
As the car pulled away, she caught a glimpse of Jill in the townhouse window, screaming into her phone. Cops or Luca? Either way, Sarah needed to hurry. She didn’t need either the police or her ex-girlfriend to come after her and stop what she had set out to do.
She was cutting ties with that suffocating job.
She had looked into Jill’s empty eyes and saw the soulless husk of a woman who only knew lashing out and taking everything around her for granted.
Now, Sarah needed to face down the other monster who had turned her into the black angel of unchecked wrath.