Total pages in book: 118
Estimated words: 110492 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 552(@200wpm)___ 442(@250wpm)___ 368(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 110492 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 552(@200wpm)___ 442(@250wpm)___ 368(@300wpm)
“What is going on here?” she muttered to herself. Going to the walk-in closet, she opened the door and found that her clothes were all gone. Someone else’s clothes were hanging there instead—someone considerably thinner than Torri was who favored short skirts and expensive handbags.
Hanging from the hook where her own serviceable, no-nonsense black purse used to rest, she saw a Louis Vuitton, a Valentino, a Prada, and lastly, a Saint Laurent that couldn’t have cost less than two thousand dollars.
Torri felt sick. There was no explaining this away. Not only was Chuck cheating on her, he had moved his mistress right into their house—into their bedroom!
“Torri? Are you all right?” It was Vic, right behind her. He sounded worried.
“These aren’t my clothes, okay?” she waved at the silky blouses, short skirts, and expensive handbags she never would have bought. “They belong to some other woman. Chuck moved some other woman into my place!”
At that moment, she heard the distinct sound of a key in the front lock and then the door downstairs swinging open.
Twenty-Five
“Quickly, turn off the lights and hide!” Vic hissed at her. “I’ll camouflage us if I have to, but it’s better to be out of sight.”
Torri turned off the closet light and they crouched in the semi-darkness, both trying to control their breathing. The closet door was the kind with a Louvered wood design, so she could look through the wooden slats and see what was going on in the bedroom.
After a minute, she heard the sound of footsteps on the stairs and Chuck’s voice saying,
“I know I left it in here somewhere…” He appeared in the bedroom and began looking under the pillows and through the bed clothes.
“I can’t believe we had to come all the way back home just because you forgot your stupid phone!” a familiar voice answered.
Stalking into the bedroom behind her husband was Amanda, his secretary.
Torri bit her lip to keep from shouting at the two of them as they searched the bedroom for Chuck’s phone. Was this who he had been cheating on her with? This little blonde bimbo who couldn’t even get his paperwork and filing right and spent all day working on her manicure? At least that was what he had always complained to Torri. And here he had been seeing her behind Torri’s back! But for how long?
“Look, Manda baby, just let me find it and we’ll go,” Chuck said. He was a big man with a bit of a beer gut and thinning brown hair on top. He was wearing a gray suit and Torri thought he looked like he had put on a few pounds since the last time she had seen him—which was months ago.
“We’d better not miss our reservations at Equinox, Chuckie!” Amanda said sulkily. “I’ve been wanting to go there for months and now that your crazy wife is put away, we finally don’t have to sneak around to go places!”
“Now, babe—in the last three years, have I ever messed up date night?” Chuck grabbed her around her skinny waist and laid a smacking kiss on her bright pink lips.
“Not so far you haven’t, but there’s always the first time.” She fluttered her eye lashes at him, letting him know she was kidding.
Three years? Torri felt even sicker. All this time she’d been certain her husband was bowling—she’d even gotten him a new bowling ball for his birthday last year and he’d acted like he loved it! And what about that stupid trophy? And the weekend trip to new Mexico?
“Speaking of your crazy wife, I saw the divorce paperwork downstairs,” Amanda said, frowning as she watched Chuck resume his search for his cell phone. “When are you going to get her to sign so you can file it? Don’t forget, you promised we’d be married by the end of the year.”
“Take it easy, babe—Dr. Burrows has to get her to sign the first set of papers to start with—then we can move ahead with the divorce, once the money’s in my name.”
Money? What money? And what other paperwork? Torri wondered. Then she remembered that Dr. Burrows had said something about paperwork that Chuck wanted her to sign. At the time she’d thought it had to do with insurance forms but maybe not…
“Just think of it…five million dollars—and all for us!” Amanda giggled and fell back on the lacy lavender bedspread, kicking her feet in the air. “I can’t wait to get that Hermes bag I’ve had my eye on forever!”
“Well, technically four point five, after Dr. Burrows gets his cut,” Chuck corrected her. He laughed. “You know, I always thought Torri’s grandpa was crazy, playing the market like he did. But the old coot really made some good investments before he died. Thank you, Grandpa Pete!” he yelled and Torri realized that he was drunk—or very close to it.