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Frustration bubbles up inside me as I log off my laptop for the evening. It’s a snap decision. I can make a quick pitstop at my old apartment and check it out myself. Clues might have been left behind pointing to his identity. Maybe even a message intended for me.
If I wait on Salvatore, he won’t let me go. He’ll insist on sending his men. My security detail will make the same claim. The head of my security today, Fabio, will tell me ‘Psycho’ wouldn’t want me going by my old apartment.
The choice is no one else’s but mine to make. I have the firearm I’ve been carrying since I started training with Salvatore. I’m capable of doing this without a chaperone.
As the building empties and everyone log offs for the evening, discussing their plans for Halloween night, I grab the gym bag I keep in my office. I change into a hoodie, leggings, and sneakers.
There’s a back exit in the city hall building that officials and other employees sometimes use in order to escape the media when they’re camped outside. I’m using it to sneak off undetected from the security Salvatore has assigned me. They’ll never know; city hall and the local police department are two buildings they can’t follow me inside of. They’re forced to sit outside throughout my workday.
Salvatore is going to be pissed. He’ll be livid I’ve snuck off on my own. We’ll certainly fight about it.
But it’s the only way I can see the wreckage that’s my apartment for myself. Salvatore is busy and won’t be home for at least another hour or two.
“Working out tonight?” Brenda asks as we make it to the elevator together.
I humor her with a smile. “Just getting ahead of the curve. The holiday season is coming. I always get greedy on Thanksgiving.”
“Me too! Except I hate working out, so I’ll just become one with the extra pounds.” She laughs, pressing the down button. “Chet and I are meeting up tonight. I’m giving him a second chance.”
“Hopefully he’s less of a fuckboy this go around.”
“He better be! He says he has something important to tell me.”
We part on the ground floor. Brenda leaves through the front. I hesitate a second and then turn down the corridor that leads to the rear side of the building. Erick, one of the overnight security guards, wishes me good night. He makes the same offer he did the night of my assault—he can take his break and walk me home.
“I’ll be fine, but thank you.”
As I enter the breezy night, my heart races. I’m nervous... but strangely excited. This is the first night since my attack I’m on my own after dark.
No Salvatore. None of his security. No Chadwick or Brenda or anyone else.
Just me.
I draw my hoodie up and set off down the side street outside the rear door, my hands buried in my pockets.
At a distance, I look nothing like myself on a normal evening after work. My neat dress clothes are gone. I’m rushing off in sneakers instead of heels or flats. No one on the street recognizes me as I head for the subway.
People dressed in costumes come out in droves. Most are on their way to a Halloween party or nightclub to celebrate the occasion. Others set up camp on sidewalks or in the underground subway station and perform music or live tricks for donations. I walk past a breakdancing Mario and Luigi on the platform and board the subway train traveling to Northam Park, my old stomping grounds.
By the time I arrive, it’s begun raining. The droplets are tiny but freezing cold. I pull my hoodie tighter about myself and then journey to my high-rise building. On my way up, I encounter one of my old neighbors. Before she can trap me in tedious small talk about my day I cut in and tell her I’m in a rush.
When I make it to my floor, I slow up at the disturbing sight before me—my door sags against the frame, halfway off its hinges. It’s been taped off, presumably by the building super. I had told Rachel not to involve the police. She wasn’t exaggerating when she said the guy who broke in damaged my door.
I puff out a difficult breath and then force my legs to move. Inside, the apartment is no better. My belongings lay broken and discarded throughout the open-space, like my own personal junkyard. The curtains have been torn off the rods and glass from my mirrors and vases and candles litter the floor. My sectional sofa, where I’ve spent so many evenings curling up to watchHousewives of South Valley, has been violently slashed in half.
Tears brim in my eyes when I spot Salt and Pepa’s beds shredded. There’s something even more disturbing about seeing their things ruined than mine. Whoever is behind this hates me so much he wanted to make my innocent pets suffer, too.
Just to hurt me through them.
Room to room I go, laying witness to the carnage. Finally, I stop in my bedroom. My clothes spill out of the open closet doors.
So far there doesn’t seem to be any clues or messages left behind. Just chaos. Just pure, unfilteredhate.
I’ve always known a segment of the population hated my guts—many of them criminals who despise me for what I do—but this is yet another reality check. What happened to me the night of my assault was no fluke. It was no random attack by a faceless stranger who had no clue who I was.
This... this was all intentional.
My hand drifts up to my neck and discovers it naked. My rose necklace is long gone, yet I still reach for it. I still reach for it as if I can return to the past.
