Chapter 11 — There Is No After #2
I packed my things slowly. Put the laptop in my bag. Grabbed my coat.
I looked at the door one last time. Light still glowed beneath it.
He knew I was still here. He had access to the cameras, the time logs, everything. He knew I was sitting a hundred feet away, waiting.
And he chose silence.
The message was clear. There is no after. What happened was an anomaly, a pressure buildup that needed release. Now that the pressure was gone, so was the usefulness of the release valve.
Humiliation burned my face, hotter than Richard's slap could have been.
I stood up and walked to the elevator.
I pressed the button. The doors opened immediately, as if they'd been waiting to expel me.
I stepped into the metal box. It was the same elevator. The same confined space where, days ago, he'd pinned me against the wall and almost kissed me. Where the tension had begun.
Now, the space felt empty. Cold.
I rode down to the garage.
My car wasn't there—I'd come with Gabriel. I'd have to get a taxi or an Uber. The mundane logistics of rejection.
I walked through the dimly lit garage, the lonely echo of my heels on the concrete.
That's when I saw it.
A black car, nondescript, engine running, parked near the pedestrian exit. It wasn't Gabriel's car. It was a standard executive sedan.
The rear window rolled down as I approached.
I stopped, every instinct screaming. Was it Richard? Had he stayed to get revenge?
But it wasn't Richard.
It was a man I'd never seen. Young, cheap suit, nervous eyes. He held out a manila envelope through the window.
“Ms. Walsh?” he asked.
“Who are you?”
“Courier.” He shook the envelope. “Instructions for your ride.”
“My ride?”
“Home. It's been paid for in advance.”
I hesitated. I looked at the envelope. There was no return address, but I recognized the handwriting on the outside. Angular, aggressive, precise.
Gabriel.
He didn't come. He didn't call me. He sent a car and an envelope.
I took the package with trembling hands. The car unlocked its doors.
“Where to?” I asked the driver.
“Your apartment. The address is in the system.”
I got into the back seat. The car smelled of synthetic lemon, nothing like the leather and sandalwood of Gabriel's SUV. It was functional transport. Logistics. Asset management.
I opened the envelope as the car climbed the ramp to the wet street.
Inside was a single object and a note.
The object was a new phone. Latest generation. Black, matte, no markings.
The note, written on Moretti & Hale letterhead, contained only two lines:
The old one was compromised. Use this. Emergencies only.
And below, scrawled with a force that almost tore the paper:
Don't leave home until I say so.
I crumpled the note in my hand.
He was sending me home. He was locking me up again. He was giving me a secure phone so I could keep being useful when the next crisis erupted.
Not a word about what we did. Not a “sorry.” Not a “thank you.”
Just orders.
I looked at the phone in my hand. It was a digital collar. Another one.
But then I felt the weight of the other object in my pocket. The listening device. The small black button that still held Richard Hale's voice confessing his crimes.
Gabriel hadn't asked for it back.
Maybe he'd forgotten in the chaos. Maybe he thought I was too loyal to use it.
Or maybe… maybe it was a test.
I leaned my head against the cold window glass, watching Ashford's lights blur past.
My body ached. My soul felt empty. But curiously, I didn't feel like crying.
The tears had stayed behind in that file room, along with my innocence.
Gabriel Moretti thought he could turn me on and off like a switch. He thought he could fuck me on his desk, then send me home with a new phone and expect me to sit around waiting for his next order.
He was wrong.
The “after” didn't exist for him, because he lived in the perpetual present of control.
But for me… for me, the “after” was just beginning.
I squeezed the listening device in my hand until the plastic bit into my skin.
I had Richard's confession. I had the proof from Turkey. And I knew how Gabriel Moretti's body trembled when he lost control.
He told me I didn't owe him trust.
Well, he was about to discover that distrust is a two-way street.
The car stopped in front of my decrepit building.
I got out, slamming the door. The rain had started again, cold and relentless.
I climbed up to my empty apartment, which now seemed too small, too quiet.
I went inside and locked the door. Turned the key twice. Slid the chain.
I looked at the lock.
Gabriel had said: “The door you don't lock is the door chaos enters through.”
I'd locked the door.
But it was too late. The chaos was already in here, sitting on my couch, with his taste in my mouth and his mark on my neck.
I stepped into the shower, determined to scrub every inch of skin until he disappeared.
But as the hot water beat down on my back, I knew the truth.
I wasn't trying to wash him off me.
I was trying to prepare myself for the next time.
Because there would be a next time. I would make sure of it. Even if I had to burn down Moretti & Hale to make him come out of that glass tower and look at me again.