She had even placed a tracker on my vehicle, logged into the app “Find My Phone” from my phone, and shared my location with her phone a while ago. I had never noticed, because I didn’t use the app. The only reason it was on my phone was because of Zoe. She had been monitoring my messages and calls. Listening to the call between Amélie and me, when Amélie asked who was with me, the night of Zoe’s attack, was how Shaniece learned Chanel was at the cabin.
The police had reviewed Shaniece’s bank accounts, phone records, and even security footage at various locations Chanel and I had been at. She had been at them all.
That hadn’t been hard anyway, because I trusted her implicitly with unfettered access to me. She had hired the girl who took the original photos of Chanel and me at the bar and leaked them online. Shaniece had been the one who vandalized Chanel’s car and apartment. She also had been the same one who followed Muffin to Atlanta and attacked her.
I had always warned my ex-wife about tagging her locations and telling the entire world where she was at, at any given time, or where she was headed. She made Shaniece’s job easy. Apparently, when I made the call to Shaniece to set up the rental car for me, she was already on the road to Cherokee Springs from Atlanta.
But when I shared my location with her, she did a U-turn and headed to Laramie Falls, where she camped out in her vehicle, and waited for the perfect time to strike. What she hadn’t known was that I would turn around on that trip as quickly as I had and return to Laramie Falls from Atlanta.
The police learned that the man she had been intimately involved with was a cybersecurity architect. Trying to impress her, he had shown her how easy it was to hack into camerasystems, using the one at the stadium as an example. Shaniece was not only very intelligent, but she had always been extremely tech savvy, which was one of the reasons I hired her.
She had been able to take what he taught her and hack both the camera systems at the stadium and Chanel’s apartment and have them record on a loop. The problem with Shaniece was that she also liked to keep a record of things. She loved basking in praise about how smart she was, which led her to keeping notes about all the incidents, including the people she had hired for tiny things like following us to take pictures at the hotel, the bar, and Chanel’s parents’ house.
I was glad that the nightmare was behind us, and we could move forward with sharing our lives. As the days passed, the police shared more details on the news. People were quick to change the tune they had been singing. Someone leaked other details from the notes that Shaniece had been keeping. Those were related to the times that Zoe had cheated on me, who she cheated with, and the disrespect she had shown me through the years.
The police used those details to paint the picture of a disturbed individual who had been plotting to be with me for a long time. I knew better though. Yes, those things were true, but they were painting that picture to cover their asses and make sure that her family didn’t try to sue them or bring charges against their officers for killing her.
Either way, I couldn’t care any longer. The public had lots of opinions on Zoe, and she even lost her contract for the showBalla Wives.I didn’t feel any type of way about it, because I had given her everything and protected her as much as I could. When she stepped out from underneath the shelter of my protection, there wasn’t anything I could do about it. I refused to keep playing her fool. My attention swiveled to protecting Chanel.
Unfortunately, people had found my cabin, and the media made it their business to camp out there. Amélie had arranged to have our things shipped back to the city, and she sold off anything that didn’t have sentimental value to me. The cabin was put up for sale, and I was looking online with a realtor for a new place.
Chanel, Titan, and I had hidden out at my home and spent a relatively quiet Christmas there. We had only been able to accomplish that by unplugging from social media and our phones in general.
Chanel’s PA, Evie, had been generous enough to lend her services until we could find someone else to perform that role for me. I wasn’t excited about looking for another PA, but Evie promised that she and Chanel could find someone that would be perfect for me.
In the interim, we holed up in my house for Christmas, and both our families came to spend Christmas Day with us. My family loved her immediately, especially Corinna, and her father proclaimed that in him, I had a life-long fan, as long as I didn’t hurt her. She had given me signed Grant Porter and Vince Jeffries basketball jerseys, two hall-of-famers that she knew I wanted, and I had purchased her a new car.
This evening was our first time venturing out again after the shooting. We were at the Jamil “Shooter” Perry and Jason Jones boxing match.
“You good?” I asked as I pressed a kiss to her head.
I figured it was safe to do so since the Jumbotron was now focused on another celebrity couple. She turned her face up to me and brushed her lips against mine. “Mm-hmm. I was starting to get cabin fever being tucked away for so long.”
I chuckled. “Well, you’ll be back at work by next week.”
“It’s not going to be the same,” she replied softly.
“Why’s that?”
“You won’t be there.”
“Well, it’s the same as when I retire. I won’t be there then either.”
“I know, but I wanted to enjoy these final games before you sat down, old man.”
I leaned closer and hid my lips behind her ear so that no one could lip read. “I’ve got your old man, baby. Wait until tonight.”
She bit her bottom lip and smiled. “Why wait? We’ve got a chauffeur.”
“You’ve been reading my mind, li’l mama?”
“No. I just know your nasty ass don’t like waiting for any amount of time. But it’s okay. I’ll still take it easy on you.”
“You don’t think I can hold up?”
“That leg and chest says differently.”
“Whatever.”
