Page 16 of His Wicked Revenge

She sighs. “Treatments at a salon. Had to get rid of the curls somehow. Oh!” Veronica leans forward, widening her eyes. “They are green now. Aren’t they pretty?”

“No,” I answer again, but this time, the chills are replaced with a flush of heat as I watch the expression on her face.

She shows no shame, no remorse for what she did to me. She is just sitting there, flaunting her new blonde hair and new green fucking eyes as if I could give a damn about any of this.

My eyes begin to twitch as I sit here and look at this woman. She might as well have driven that knife into my heart because that’s what it feels like she did anyway.

“Shame. I wanted them to match yours.” She falls back into her seat and drops her voice to a whisper, “These changes had to be made. I couldn’t very well roam around looking like I used to.”

“Nice to hear you’ve been pampering yourself this whole time,” I say with disdain.

She visits me in hopes of what, taunting me? Showing off her new look? Seeing how I am doing?

Does she not remember that she is the reason I am locked away in this cement building, stuck eating shitty food every day, sleeping on what is no better than solid ground?

That I’m counting down the days until I get to see my family again, all while she is out there, enjoying the sun and a life of freedom—freedom that we were supposed to have together?

The fact that she dares to show her face here ignites a flame inside me that I didn’t know I had. There had been one burning due to my ongoing rage for her, but this flame? It’s new, and I don’t think it will leave me anytime soon.

I mean, who does she think she is?

Her skin looks tan, meaning she has been in the sun. She’s been living her life and having fun while I’ve been stuck in here.

“Is it pampering if it was something that needed to be done? I don’t think so. Pampering is when you want something. It’s not like I wanted to lose my curls, but I had to do what had to be done.”

“What are you doing here, Veronica?” Although the question comes out with a hint of disgust, her eyes shine at the sound of her name.

“That’s not my name anymore. It’s Camille, now.” Interesting. “I missed you.”

I laugh bitterly. “You missed me? You could have had me, Veronica. This whole time, you could have been with me.”

“Yes, and I had time to think about it,” she says. “You would have slowed me down; that was the truth. I couldn’t be worried about either of us being caught. I had to think about myself.”

“The truth?” I scoff and lean back in my chair. “How about you give me another truth? Did you ever love me?”

“Leo… you don’t want me to answer that.”

I shake my head. “I don’t, but I need to know.” I lean forward in the metal chair. Squinting my eyes, I glare at her, and with a serious tone I’ve never shown her before, I say, “I need to know if all the time we spent together was a lie. Or if it was all honest, and you stabbed me because you were frightened of getting caught. If you betrayed me because you weren’t thinking straight.”

Part of me doesn’t want to know what her answer will be. I don’t think my already broken heart can handle it. If she admits that she regrets what she did or even sincerely apologizes for that matter, would it make this hurt any less? Or would it make it hurt more?

“I was thinking straight. I wanted to love you, Leo. I did. It just wasn’t in me at the time…”

“Stop talking,” I order.

I changed my mind. I don’t want to hear what she has to say.

“But I wasn’t lying when I told you I felt something for you because I did. I wanted it to be love so bad because I wanted to be capable of giving you that. But it wasn’t. It was attraction and lust.”

“Stop. Talking.” I drop my eyes, squeezing them shut tight.

She continues to speak, but I can’t hear her over the buzzing in my ears. My skin is growing hot, slowly starting to feel uncomfortable.

“I am sorry, Leo. For manipulating you from the start.”

My eyes fly open, and I look into her fake green eyes. “From the start?”

“Time’s almost up,” Officer Colt says from over by the door.