Chapter 35
‘My good opinion once lost, is lost forever.’
Rocky was at the door whining before I’d even turned the key. I didn’t hesitate. I scooped up the handful of belongings I had in the staff flat, stuffed them into a suitcase, and within ten minutes I was in my own car, heading north up the freeway with Rocky in the passenger seat.
Destination: Rhiannon’s flat on Russian Hill.
The closest non-Fuller friend I had. We worked together at Rivertide and had bonded over shared eye rolls at malfunctioning software and too-strong office coffee.
I’d been to a couple of her parties. She knew me as Florence-who-did-IT, who wore jeans and plaid and was married to some guy in sales who travelled a lot.
She didn’t know that by night I’d been playing hostess in Fullerland, married to a man with a coke habit and a family trust more controlling than a small dictatorship.
I pressed the buzzer. ‘Rhiannon, it’s Florence. I’m sorry to disturb you, but I’ve got nowhere else to go.’
There was a pause, then: ‘Florence?’
The door buzzed open. I took the stairs two at a time. The moment I saw her, I broke. Hot tears burst forth, humiliating and unstoppable.
‘Dear God!’ she said, hauling me into the flat. ‘What the hell’s happened?’
‘Chase,’ I sniffled. ‘My bastard husband.’ I gave her the abridged version of the crumbling marriage, staff flat, Candice’s smug revelation, and the fact that I was now a free agent with nowhere to sleep.
Rhiannon listened patiently, handed me a gin, and told me I could stay as long as I needed. ‘You and Rocky can have the sofa,’ she said. ‘Conor won’t care.’
I hugged her.
‘I’ll be gone in a week,’ I promised.
I went completely radio silent with the Fullers. Unshackled from the cycle of their society lives, I could exhale. Living with Rhiannon and her roommate Conor felt like slipping back into my old skin. We had gin, tea, sarcasm, and the BBC World Service on in the background. I felt… human again.
On the Monday, Rhiannon and I commuted into work together. I dumped my bags next to my desk and took Rocky on a walk over to the other side of the building to where Rivertide’s phalanx of lawyers resided.
Kurt was buried in a contract when I knocked and leaned in. ‘Florence!’ he grinned, spotting Rocky. ‘To what do I owe the pleasure?’
‘Got a minute?’
‘Sure,’ he pushed back from his desk, raising his hands to cup the back of his head. He was the nicest lawyer on staff. We both took our dogs to work so had bonded early on in my career there on lunchtime walks around the property.
‘I need a divorce lawyer.’
He sucked in air between his teeth, steepled his fingers to rest his grey, bearded chin. ‘Want to tell me a bit about what’s going on first? It’s off the Rivertide record, just between you and me.’
‘It’s a long story.’
He shrugged. ‘We’re in the business of long stories. Shoot.’
I did. I told him everything, start to finish. The parties, drugs, silences, Milan, Candice. I gave him the edited highlights of a life that had looked golden from the outside but which felt like quicksand from within.
When I finished, he leaned back, exhaled. ‘Damn. You really did marry one fucked-up scion.’
He promised to put me in touch with someone sharp. Top-tier. Someone who wouldn’t blink at the Fuller name, and who’d make sure Chase paid for the privilege.
It was the first time in months I felt like something was actually moving forward, deliberately, in my own direction.
Three weeks later, I was officially a client of Layla Schweizer.
She wore sapphire power suits like armour and spoke in sharp, surgical bursts.
Thanks to Kurt, I got a fast-tracked consultation and a discounted retainer.
Even so, handing over a two-thousand dollar cheque felt like parting with a vital organ.
At the same time, I signed a lease on a studio apartment in North Beach.
It had bars on the windows, a bathroom barely wide enough to turn around in, and a galley kitchen so narrow you could touch both walls at once.
But it was mine. Rocky and I moved in with a mattress, battered sofa, and television gifted by Rhiannon’s friend, who was fleeing to Boston in pursuit of some man she described as ‘a gentle soul with a full head of hair.’
Bunny still believed I was staying with a friend.
She called me at work, under the guise of concern, though half her sentences were laced with something closer to PR management.
‘I must say,’ she drawled, ‘I was shocked at you stealing the Rolls… but also a little impressed. Gutsy flair. You remind me of myself, you know. Mark my words, Chase will come crawling back with diamonds.’
I told her nothing. The longer she thought I was licking my wounds in someone’s guest room, the more time I had to get everything in place.
Chase finally called that Friday.
I knew instantly he was high. His voice was soft in that too-careful way, like everything he said had been practised in a mirror. ‘Honey,’ he said. ‘Let’s go down to Monterey for the weekend. Just us. Get back to who we were.’
‘No, Chase. I need time.’
The pause that followed was too short to be real.
‘You’re such a bitch,’ he snapped, then slammed the phone down.
And as the habit of enduring finally snapped, the silence that followed sounded like peace.
Evenings became a sacred ritual. Chinese takeout, Rocky curled at my feet, cheap wine, something mindless on TV. Space, and above all, freedom.
Then came the knock.
Loud. Sharp. Not Rhiannon. Not Conor.
Rocky went berserk.
I crept to the door, peered through the grimy glass. A huge figure loomed outside, bending down.
‘Flo, are you in there?’
‘Dom!’
I flung the door open and he swept me into a bear hug, suitcase in hand.
‘I’ve been sent to check on you en route to Hong Kong. Project managing a new restaurant there for some Dubai group.’
He took in the flat with a grin. ‘Four walls, a roof, and no sign of the tosser. Brilliant.’
That did it. I burst into tears. ‘Sorry,’ I choked. ‘I’m fine. I just…’
He hugged me again. ‘You’re an Elliot. We don’t do things halfway. You married a wanker, and now you’re divorcing him. Let’s go celebrate.’
We did. Giuseppe’s for dinner, the Redwood Room for drinks. Dom told me about the accountant at the family business who’d embezzled ￡1 million. Dad was closing up shop. The construction company our grandfather built was done.
‘No point coming home,’ Dom said. ‘It’s all over. You’ve got better chances here. I’m filling the coffers with a few contract project management gigs. Also just invested in a couple of pubs.’
‘Better chance here you think?’ I said, mid-hiccup. ‘I live in a box, and I’m about to divorce a sociopath.’
‘You’ve got a job, and you’ve got mates. That’s two out of three. The love life. My advice? Give it a rest for a while.’
He grinned and called for another round.