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I pick up the jug and throw it against the wall with a scream of frustration. I don’t even bother to sweep it up afterward.
I barely sleep all night and wake up feeling drugged with exhaustion. Fortunately, the next day is Saturday, so I don’t have to work.
The bank is only open until noon, so I have to hurry. With my driver’s license gone along with my purse, I get a copy of my passport and go to the bank to take out the money I owe her—and they tell me that I’m a thousand dollars overdrawn.
Bastien.
He’s everywhere.
He drained my checking and savings accounts. But if I tell the police… his threat still rings in my ears. Acid churns in my stomach as I head to a pawn shop and pawn the diamond tennis bracelet Landon gave me. It’s worth ten thousand, and I get seven for it.
I meet Pandora at the coffee shop and give her $150 for the hotel room. And then, hopelessly, I head back home and try to figure out what to do next. I’m not safe in my house, but I can’t spare what little money I have for another hotel room, and apparently, Bastien can find me anywhere I go.
I could go to the police and report this. I could tell my mother and Landon and Pandora. But what would they do, even if they believed me? Go into hiding for the rest of their lives? Bastien would find them. He has an incredibly wealthy family, and either they’re still funding him, or he’s making a lot of money on his own, based on the suit, shoes, and watch he wore. He’s obsessive and brilliant, so who knows what he could be up to these days. He was a computer whiz in high school, so he’s probably even better now.
And at the very least, Emilie backs him up and heaven knows who else. He has a way of making people follow him fanatically. I was one of his followers at one time. I’d have died for him.
Despair threatens to choke me. What am I going to do?
He loved me once. And I ruined him.
Maybe I can make him love me again. It’s my only hope. I don’t stand a chance trying to fight against a man like him.
CHAPTER15
Camille
I usesome cash to buy a cheap new cell phone and text Landon the number. I tell him I lost my phone. I also sleep in my car in the garage. That way, if Bastien breaks in to slash my tires again, I’ll catch him in the act. I have a can of bear mace clenched in my hands as I curl up on the back seat, but he never shows.
Monday morning, I show up half an hour early to work and kill time by drinking coffee for a while. I can’t risk being late. But when I walk in the door, the receptionist has a grim look on her face, and she tells me to go to human resources.
My heart drops to the bottom of my feet with a dull thud. What could possibly be wrong now?
I hurry in, thick-headed from lack of sleep. My manager sits there next to the head of the human resources department. The two of them have the look of a firing squad watching the condemned man walk up to the wall.
My mouth dries up, but I force a carefree smile. “About the hotel,” I say. “I can explain.” I’ll lie, tell them it was my fiancé and me, we were just fooling around, and there was a misunderstanding.
“Whathotel?” My manager stares at me.
I hesitate. Crud. I just gave him more ammunition. “Why did you call me in here?” I ask him.
He looks at my forehead. “What did you say happened to your head again?”
I hadn’t. “I tripped and banged it on the wall.” Great. That makes it sound as if I’d been drunk or high. Or a victim of domestic violence covering for her abuser.
He frowns at me skeptically. “There’s been another complaint,” he says. “I’m afraid we’re going to have to suspend you immediately, without pay this time. It would be best if you seek employment elsewhere.”
I struggle for breath, but someone’s sucked all the oxygen from the room. “What kind of complaint?”
“Another complaint of a sexual nature. One of your clients says you sexually propositioned him.”
“Oh, come on! I’ve worked here for years!” I cry out in protest. “And the other person who made a claim about me has a history of making false claims and is a diagnosed schizophrenic.”
But he’s staring at me, and I know what he sees. A wild-eyed, frazzled woman with circles under her eyes and a bandaged forehead, a woman who just said something about a hotel but won’t explain herself. A woman who frequently comes in late or takes half a day off with crazy-sounding explanations.
“I’m sorry,” he says, shaking his head. I leave the office without a word because I don’t want to make things worse by crying or begging or screaming.
I’m filled with rage as I head home, thinking about all the ways I’ll take Bastien down for all he’s done. I might’ve ruined his life when we were young, but it appears he’s done just fine regardless. Isn’t it high time to let bygones be bygones?
