Because they land exactly where the worst part of me already lives.
I don’t answer.
She takes my silence as permission. “He likes strays,” she says lightly. “Broken girls. Girls who look at him like he hung the moon because they’ve never been in rooms with men like him before. It flatters him.”
My nails bite into my palms.
“And for a moment,” she continues, lips curving, “you probably let yourself believe it meant something.”
I want to slap her. I want to scream.
What I do instead is stand there and let the shame burn through every cell in my body while she watches to see if I’ll break.
She leans in slightly, voice softer now, somehow meaner for it. “You were a distraction. A warm body with a nice voice and no sense of scale. Don’t confuse that with being chosen.”
Something in me goes still.
Because maybe she’s lying. Maybe she wants to wound me because she knows exactly where to aim. Maybe this is all just another game in the elegant war she and Aleksei seem to have been fighting for years.
But standing here in the aftermath of the office, with my worst secret crawling through fluorescent hallways behind me, I don’t actually have enough self-respect left to sort poison from truth.
And that is the part I can’t forgive.
I hear my own voice in my head, flat and clear.
Leave.That’s it. Just leave.
No speeches. No tears. No dramatic confrontation in the office. No waiting for him to show up and explain why my life is currently on fire. No more being the girl who stays while richer, harder, more dangerous people decide what she is worth.
I look at Alena one last time.
And because I need one thing today to belong to me, I straighten.
Maybe it’s pride. Maybe it’s the last scrap of it.
“You know what,” I say quietly, “you can have him.”
Her smile flickers.
I turn and walk away before my legs can reconsider. Fast at first, then faster. Half a block later I duck into a café entrance just long enough to pull out my phone with clumsy fingers and open my mail.
Subject line: Resignation
My vision blurs for one second, then clears.
I type:
Dear Mr. Vasiliev,
Effective immediately, I resign from my position. Thank you for the opportunity.
Zatanna DeLaurentis
It looks pathetic. I’m pathetic right now.
I send it anyway.
Then I shut the phone off before I can see anything come back.
