“And you are a cockroach,” Russell snapped back. “No matter how many times I try to quash you, you come right back again. Why don’t you scurry away now, little cockroach? Shit.” He turned away. “I’ve seen those eyes before.”
“I bet you have.” Alicia was enjoying this too much. “I look like Clarissa, right?”
That black and white folder in the dossier had haunted Alicia for more than a few days. Everyone had forgotten to mention that Clarissa Livingston was a blonde with high cheekbones. No wonder Russell had pissed himself when he realized Alicia was becoming a problem. Now that she had effectively taken his role in the company? It was his parents’ death all over again. How dare that old bitch take what was his, right? Didn’t Clarissa know that it was Russell’s birthright to lead a large company even though he was only sixteen? Shit, this man’s megalomania was so out of control that he probably had something to do with his parents’ death!
Alicia did not doubt he had something to do with Clarissa’s death.
“Yes, and she was a lot easier to get rid of than you, Ms. Colbert.”
“So you admit it. You admit you killed your own grandmother!”
“If bykilledyou mean I conveniently left a bag of my delicious snack that she was allergic to by her bedside for her to wake up to, then I suppose you have a generous definition of that word. I’m not surprised. You don’t seem like the brightest bulb in this room.”
“Oh, that’s where you’re wrong, sir. I am quite bright. Ask my wife. You know, that woman you allowed to actually be born because she was a happenstance of good genetics? This woman right here?” Alicia gestured to Danica, who kept a respectful distance from this verbal altercation but also kept a watchful eye on it. “You keep blaming me for all of this, but isn’t she the one you trained for this role? You knew this day would come. The young always overcome the old in the end!”
“May your foul offspring do the same to you!”
“Father,” Danica rumbled. “It’s time to step down. You’ve been at this for a very long time. Don’t you have some private island you can fuck off to for the next twenty years?”
“You would depose me?”
“You would depose all of us, if you could.”
“That’s right,” Alicia continued. “Except he wouldn’t do it himself. Because he’s a coward who won’t bother getting blood on his hands. He’s ruined many lives without touching a single one of them himself. He doesn’t deserve to retire to some comfortable island where he can make everyone there miserable, too. He deserves to rot in prison for the rest of his life.”
“Good luck making that happen.” That was the Moreau smirk hurled at Alicia. Funny. She could hurl it right back at Russell. “You’ll never be able to pin anything on me. What? Do you think I’m stupid? You two can do your cute little takeover behind the scenes all you want. In the end, I am this family.”
“Wrong, Grandpa.” Alicia pointed to the screen showing her portfolio. “Iam this family now! I am the next phase of a mighty legacy that will put everything you and your ancestors did to shame! I was chosen to lead this family and its company to greater glory! You think I won’t do it? You think I can’t handle it? I have overcome every obstacle you have hurled at me this year. I have done the damn impossible! Let me tell you, I must be carrying some stellar fucking genes if I can still be pregnant after all this mess! You think this baby is going to be weak? Do you think it will disappoint us? Do you think it won’t deserve the name Moreau when it one day picks up where my wife and I leave off? The most fucked up thing is that you won’t even get to know or appreciate everything we’ll do. You’ve made your decision to play no part in it.”
Sweat trickled down Russell’s forehead. His cheeks flushed. The corner of his mouth? Twitched in anger. So much anger thathe would burst on Alicia at any moment. Good. She was ready. Alicia was ready to put this dog down and become the new leader of the pack.
One day, not so long ago, Danica Moreau thought she had spotted a submissive woman willing to fulfill her familial fantasies. She had no idea she had really found her perfect business equal and the partner who would help her take down the corruption in her own family.
“Look at you,” Alicia spat. “You’re pathetic.”
Russell’s left arm trembled against the table. His lips attempted to speak, but all that came out was a low, disturbing groan that even made Alicia take a step back.
“He’s having a stroke,” Nigel announced from the back of the room.
So he was. The big and mighty Russell Moreau, patriarch of what he thought washisdynasty, was nothing more than a shaking tree about to take its last fall in a cut forest.
“Someone please call an ambulance,” Alicia said with a sigh. “Don’t be in a rush, though, if you have other things to do first.”
Danica was the only one who went to her father. Alicia did not hold it against her wife. It’s her father. I’d be more worried if she didn’t care. Didn’t mean Alicia was rushing, too.
Neither was Sarah Clayborn. The two women exchanged tired looks. Could this hurry up, already?
Chapter 25
At least this time, Alicia was not in the hospital because of her own problems. Was a nice change of pace after spending two, no,threeseparate occasions in this smelly abode, each one the result of Russell Moreau’s narcissistic bullshit.
Danica leaped up from her seat when the doctor came out with a grim face. Was it too much to ask for the devil to be dead? Alicia would never say it out loud. She wanted to be better than that, especially around her rattled wife.
Russell wasn’t dead. The doctor pronounced the eldest Moreau alive and stable. There was, of course, some dire news.
Naturally, the definition of dire was up to interpretation. Alicia felt no pity when she was told her father-in-law had suffered major paralysis of his face and body. His mental faculties were not as bad as they could have “feared,” but right now, the doctor’s prognosis was that Russell Moreau had a “long, staggering road to recovery ahead of him.” Given his age, it would be even more unlikely to ever hear that man’s voice again.Watch out for all these tears I’m crying.
Danica wanted to be alone while she processed everything that happened that day. Alicia gladly vacated the ICU and went to the maternity ward. There she used the power of her name and status to track down a doctor who would be willing to do a quick pregnancy test. While she waited for the results, Dee arrived with a few police officers to take Alicia’s statement regarding the events of that morning.
