I have to kill her. It’s the only way to return what is rightfully mine.
I hold my breath, ready to sneak out of the opposite closet door and leave them and their toxic tendencies behind me. But just as I back away from the crack in the door, it’s as if Dean feels my presence, and his eyes scan the room over Jesika’s bare shoulder. I swear we lock eyes, but I don’t know if he knows it because it’s so dark in the closet—in their room, period—that I bet his eyes aren’t focused enough to see me. I hope anyway. It takes that moment for me to realize the risk I’ve found myself in. If Dean catches me, he will call the police, or he’ll kill me. There are no other options.
My muscles are frozen in place as Dean dots kisses along Jesika’s neck and then begins to thrust with renewed speed. I nearly laugh, wondering if he took his little blue pill tonight or if struggling to perform is the usual for them. Soft groans bounce off the walls of the room, and I know then that Dean is finished. I cringe inwardly, wishing I’d never been here to witness this. I thought seeing them in love would help me move on, but instead, it’s made everything worse. So much worse. I can taste the rising bile in my throat, and I have to think of anything but Jesika and Dean making love to prevent myself from getting sick. As satisfying as it would be to vomit in one of Jesika’s designer heels, I can’t risk leaving any more DNA around this apartment. I never expected Bishop to send Dean to the hospital, never anticipated a police investigation or the risk of getting arrested. What would this crime even be?Is it trespassing? Jesika gave me the key code to her apartment. Even invited me in for a sleepover. If I get caught and am arrested for this, it would be her word against mine, and with no evidence of a break-in, how can the police prove otherwise?
Dean hovers over Jesika’s body and drops his head between her breasts, placing kisses down to the center of her stomach. He’s murmuring something soft and sweet now that I can’t hear, and my sense of jealousy is back because he was never that tender with me.
I wonder what I did wrong or what I could have done better to keep him.
Just as I’m about to say fuck it all and sneak back out of the closet unnoticed, Dean rises up from the bed and starts coming toward me. I freeze like a deer caught in headlights, my brain crying for me to run, but my muscles refuse to move.
This is it. I’m caught.
My petty little plot for revenge is over, and soon, I’ll be rotting away in a jail cell with street thugs and common criminals.
Dean passes the doorway, and I hold my breath, sure that with only a few inches of space separating us, he could hear me breathe if he listened hard enough. He continues to saunter down the hallway, and I hear him turn into the bathroom. He must’ve left the door cracked because I can hear everything—he hums while he urinates, one trait I used to find adorable but now think is childish and annoying. When he finishes, I hear the sink faucet turn on as he washes his hands. He’s still humming when the faucet is turned off, and then he stops as I imagine he’s drying his hands with a towel.
“Honey?” Dean calls into the air, and the hairs on the back of my neck rise.
“Yeah?” Jesika replies.
“Weird question, but—is this gum?” I nearly choke on my tongue with Dean’s words.
“What?” Jesika calls.
“I-I think it’s Juicy Fruit.”
If there were a window in this enormous walk-in closet, I would be throwing myself out of it right now.
“We really need to get a housekeeper in here,” Dean mumbles as he passes my little cracked closet door. Once he reaches the bed, he crawls over Jesika and then arranges her around his broad body so she fits perfectly against him.
I wait a long time. Twenty minutes. Maybe forty. I wait until Dean is snoring and Jesika has finally put her phone down and fallen asleep. I watch his round belly move up and down, and I have the errant thought that he reminds me of a snoring pig. I wait until it’s safe, and then I back out of the closet, searching for the other door in the darkness as bitterness flavors my taste buds.
I hope Dean feels tortured by the ghost of me in his life because I plan on spending the rest of mine haunting him.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“So how is Chicago treating you, Shae?”
I bristle at my therapist’s use of my old name. “Fine. Not as good as I’d hoped, I guess. I came for some business meetings, but things aren’t really going according to plan. Chicago just doesn’t fit my brand. It’s not a good look for me.”
“Oh?” Kelly Fraser, LLP raises one eyebrow. “You know what they say about plans.”
I hate when she says clichéd things like this. It makes me feel like I’m wasting my money when I could just be finding the same overused inspiration on a self-help Pinterest board. I’m perched in the chair nearest the window overlooking Jesika and Dean’s apartment for today’s therapy session. I made sure to carefully turn away on the off chance that one of them starts to look too hard at their neighbors in the building across the street. Now that I know they have such a very clear view—as clear as mine, I guess—I’m trying to take extra precautions.
“I’ve worked so hard on this brand, and it’s really starting to pay off,” I finally answer her. “I thought a new citywould inject some creative inspiration into my feed, but my followers seem to be paying less attention instead of more.”
“What doyouwant to do—regardless of your followers?” my therapist asks. I see her scratching down notes on a notebook in her lap that is out of sight of the video call.
“I don’t know. I’ve lived and breathed this business the last year. I can’t really think about anything else.”
“Of course you can. Do you remember a time when your social following wasn’t a part of your business and was just fun? Maybe you could go back to that and unplug from the business side of things.”
“No. No, I don’t really think I’m ready to…” I frown, trying to measure my reactions, always aware that the camera is on. “I don’t think I’m ready to let go.”
“Well, you don’t have to let go. What about holding space for yourself as the CEO of this business? Even CEOs need a break now and again.”
“CEOs need self-care too, huh?” A wry grin curves my lips.
