Page 3 of He Had It Coming

Her condemnation drilled into me with marked precision. “Maeve, what?”

“What part of the Anonymous post is inaccurate?” She shrugged. “I’ve seen one but I’m told there have been more.”

This was sabotage. Pure and simple. “I’m not doing this dance with you. We have an entire communications department tasked with handling invasive crap like this.”

Maeve stared for a few fraught seconds before talking again. “Did you intend to kill her?”

The words jolted through me. The years of passive-aggressive comments at the dinner table, looks of disgust by Dad’s friends. It all came rushing back.

“I’m asking for a reason.” Maeve leaned forward with her elbows balanced on her oversized desk. “Think this through. Because of who you are and our family’s reputation, the accusations will take hold online. Mainstream media will come calling with a fresh take and new questions. How you answer them matters.”

She pretended to care, to want me to be ready. I saw through her. She secretly hoped I’d fail and get destroyed in spectacular fashion.

I would not let any of that happen. “This will go away if we ignore it.”

She sat back in her chair. “History suggests otherwise.”

The tightness around her mouth. The hint of disdain that she’d inherited from our father. So familiar and unwarranted. Unfortunately, I needed her on my side. Dad listened to her . . . when he could. When he was lucid enough to understand.

I had to go through her to get to my goal. That meant not burning the bridge to the ground before I had a chance to hop across it. Time for a different approach. Softer. Calmer. I fought for both. Might as well put all of that forced time with the behavioral therapist to good use. Fourteen months of father-required counseling.

You’re lucky you’re not in prison. I could almost feel his spit hit my cheek as he yelled in my face back then.

I took the deepest inhale possible. “I know you believe you have to be like this but—”

“You’re very close to being sent back to Dad’s basement.”

Fury slapped sudden and hard. “Fuck you.”

A smug look of satisfaction settled on her face. “Berating me isn’t the best way to beat those misogyny accusations.”

“What do you want from me? I laid low. I took it. I lost everything.” I refused to spell out every humiliating detail. “I know you don’t want to hear it, but I’m a victim here.”

“An interesting theory.”

Let it go. Don’t react. “Dad was clear. I come here. I work. I prove myself.”

She didn’t get to object to my getting a second chance and it was killing her. She seethed behind that haughty persona. Flushed cheeks. A death grip on her expensive pen. Hints about the barely restrained anger festering inside her, leaking out without her noticing.

“We’ll see tomorrow,” she said.

I’d been dismissed. Dad did the same sort of thing. A practiced scorn disguised as a need to get to more important things. Agenda items more interesting than me.

I made it to the door before I launched one last thought. “Anonymous is Sabrina Forde. Her goal is to destroy me.”

“That’s a guess. You don’t actually know who set up the site.”

Typical Maeve. She always had to score the last word. Fight when she should back down. “Fine, Ms. Company President. Who else could it be?”

Maeve hummed again. “That depends. How many other women have you killed?”

Chapter Four

The Truth About Jerek Hayes

Her name was Ruby Forde.

She had the misfortune of meeting Jerek Hayes through friends. They all attended the same college. Ruby, a young woman from a small town near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, transplanted in New York City. Big dreams but not ready. Excited. Sheltered. From an insular background. Beautiful and smart but too naive to survive Jerek’s rich boy, I get whatever I want onslaught.