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“I know success demands sacrifice. You don’t get to the top tier by being nice, Vanessa. You get there by being ruthless. That’s how everyone else operates, so I have to do the same—if I want to make it.”
“You’ve already made it.” Vanessa smooches her little dog’s cheek again.
“Not as big as I want. I want Fit For Life to be bigger. I already have plans to triple sales next year. It’ll be doable once Brock folds. We got away with pegging Gwen, and your meeting up with her today is only going to give her a chance to ask you questions. I’m sure she’s going to want to ask you about what’s going on. If you ask me, that’s probably why she’s coming out here to meet with you, anyway. Brock probably accused her of leaking the launch info, and she’s got some suspicions it was you all along. She’s smarter than she looks, I bet.”
I have no idea what they’re talking about.
They pegged me… for what? She spoke so fast, I’ve barely processed the details.
Brock didn’t accuse me of anything. He fired me out of the blue… but that was more about what was happening between us personally than anything else. Wasn’t it?
I’ve thought about it a lot over the past few days.
I figured spending the night at my house was just too much for him. When I saw him and Vanessa so close in his office doorway, it struck a nerve. I watched her kiss his cheek…
“Will you give it a rest?” Vanessa says. “Not everyone has ulterior motives, you know.”
Clarice paces to the creek’s shore. I can barely hear her now over the sound of the rushing water. I miss a few words but then catch on when she turns slightly. “…and I bet she’s onto us. She probably knows you got onto Brock’s laptop when you were at his house. I bet she’s going to try to get you to admit it.”
“Stop being so paranoid. That lazy detective didn’t suspect anything. He gobbled up those stories you had your staff feed him, and it looks like Brock bought it all, too. That poor Gwen Temple is probably just freaking out because she doesn’t have an income anymore. And we did that. It’s our fault. We threw her under the bus.”
“What, now you’re getting soft? You were all about doing this with me when we discussed the pay.”
“I just feel bad for her.” Vanessa crouches to set her dog down.
The little white dog lifts his nose into the air. He swivels his groomed head left, then right.
Then, he points his tiny black nose up the hill… toward me.
His bark is so sharp it hurts my ears. “Yip! Yip-yip-yip!”
Chapter 23
Brock
The trail system in this park is confusing.
I grabbed a map, but it’s not very helpful. The orange and red lines squiggle across the sea of pale green, but there are no landmarks displayed.
I can hear rushing water up ahead and some little dog barking, but that hardly helps my situation. What would help is if there was some indication of a waterway on this map. Then, I might be able to figure out where I am.
I asked a middle-aged woman, back in the parking lot, if she’d seen Gwen while out walking her dog. ‘She has auburn hair, usually she’s wearing a sweater…”
“Pretty girl? About thirty?”
I nodded. “That’s her.”
“She’s on the Ancient Oak trail,’ the woman said.
And now, I’m on the Ancient Oak trail. These trees lining the dirt path must be hundreds of years old. The woods on either side of me are incredibly dense. Barely any sunlight reaches the leaves and dark green moss that covers the ground. Sunlight does make it to the cleared path, though. It looks like pale yellow paint on the dirt. I feel like a character in The Wizard of Oz, following a yellow brick road.
The path curves. The sound of water flowing over rocks is louder now. The air’s cooler, too, in that way that happens near water.
That dog won’t stop barking.
The bark is sharp and rapid. I know dogs better now—not that I’m an expert or anything—and this sounds urgent.
The dog is beside himself, like he’s spotted an intruder.
