Total pages in book: 196
Estimated words: 180438 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 902(@200wpm)___ 722(@250wpm)___ 601(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 180438 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 902(@200wpm)___ 722(@250wpm)___ 601(@300wpm)
This message wasn’t as bad, but it scared me just the same. ‘Don’t take anything bought with her money. Take only the bare necessities; leave everything else behind. Do not contact Elena Gianni. She will contact you if she so chooses.’
‘Please let me at least explain; let me tell her goodbye.’
‘Only friends say goodbye to friends; enemies don’t have that opportunity. Next time do better. And in case you think I’m bluffing, if you take so much as a paperclip from her home, I will expose you before you turn the key in your car’s ignition. By the way, when you get to the airport, leave the car with the keys under the mat.’
‘I was going to drive to….’
‘No, she bought the car. Have some respect.’
‘I don’t have any money to fly. My accounts have been frozen.’
‘We know, we froze them. Your time is almost up. You’d better leave soon; Mary knows what you did. Run!’
Mary? How does Mary know? Forget taking anything else. If she knew what I had done, that could only mean one thing, she was coming after me. I took one last look around the room and booked it with an overnight bag that I had already packed.
I looked longingly at the luxury car Elena had bought me just two years ago and felt a pang of dismay that the fashion statement would probably have a new owner soon, just as my place as a once best friend would be filled by someone else. Elena has always found it easy to make friends.
I took a step toward the car but caught myself as I looked around, expecting someone to jump out of the hedges. So this is what it’s come to. This is the end of the best friendship I ever had, a friendship I had betrayed.
Yeah, they were right; I had no right to be here. Not after I’d watched her suffer all those years while knowing what was being done to her. Even my tears were an affront; I didn’t deserve to shed those either. That bitch Sydney won, after all. For some reason, that fact hurt me more than my leaving.
It hurts more that I could never break those two apart. Maybe that’s why I’d done it after all because I could never replace Sydney in her heart. Bitch!
Chapter 62
*Janie*
I get to go home today, and my excitement is off the charts. There was a little bit of panic on my end when I thought that I would have to face the public looking the way I do, but at the last minute, I was informed that Ryder’s new coaches were going to meet me here and take me out the back or something like that.
Apparently, they were the ones who’d found me on the bedroom floor that day and called for help, so I guess they’re not so bad after all. Whatever, my only thoughts now are of Ryder and getting back to him. I’ve been riddled with worry and thoughts of getting back to him, wondering what that was going to be like.
Would he be sympathetic? He’s never been before, but maybe he’d remember that I am his wife and act accordingly. I’m sure my public had to have noticed my absence and were keeping an eye on him for me. They would never let him go anywhere near his ex, I’m sure, as some of them have taken it upon themselves in the last couple of years to hound her every step for me, letting me know where, who, and what she was up to at any given moment.
She doesn’t know this, of course, that I have been keeping tabs on her, but I really had no choice. I didn’t trust Rachel entirely, though she was our inside man, and anything she filtered through Mary was suspect as far as I’m concerned. I’d given it a lot of thought while I was laid up in bed and have decided that from now on, things are going to change.
I will no longer be taking Ryder’s subtle abuse, his ignoring me even when we’re in the same room together unless he’s high off his gourd, or the way he blatantly disregards my feelings as if I’m not there.
With my mind firmly made up, I had everything in order. My first order of business was to call up that friend of Mary’s and see about a consultation. I’d signed off on the hospital sharing my medical condition only with him, of course, and there was no reason why I couldn’t have it fixed in a few days or so. Anything longer, and I just couldn’t live with myself. I can’t even look myself in the mirror these days to put on my makeup as the sight is too distressing.
The guys showed up on time, and in my excitement, I rushed forward to greet them, only to be met with the same blank stare they’d always worn. One of them, I think his name was Zak, passed me my phone. I didn’t find it at all strange that he had it as, obviously, they’d collected my things to make the checkout process easier and quicker to boot. The fewer people who see me like this, the better.