Chapter 8 - PENELOPE
We contacted Penelope through an old email account she and I had used as teenagers.
Her response came six minutes later.
MIDNIGHT. ST. MARK’S PARKING GARAGE. COME ALONE.
Tobias said absolutely not.
I went anyway.
He followed from a distance.
At midnight, Penelope stepped from a black sedan.
No umbrella.
No makeup.
She looked twenty years older than she had at the river.
Then she saw me.
Her knees nearly gave out.
“You’re alive.”
I walked toward her.
She started crying.
I slapped her.
The sound echoed through the garage.
She didn’t fight back.
“You stood there and watched me drown.”
“I know.”
“You kissed my husband.”
“I know.”
“You’re pregnant with his child.”
Her face crumpled.
“Not his child.”
My chest tightened.
“Say it.”
She covered her belly.
“Your child.”
The world went silent.
I grabbed the hood of the car.
“No.”
“I didn’t know at first.”
“You didn’t know what?”
“That the embryo was yours.”
I looked at her.
“You expect me to believe you?”
“Garrett told me it was ours.”
“Ours?”
Her shame was real.
At least that part was.
“We were together before he met you.”
My stomach twisted.
“He married me while sleeping with you.”
“Yes.”
I wanted to hit her again.
Instead I said, “Keep talking.”
“Victor needed Garrett married to you. I thought once Garrett controlled the company, he would divorce you.”
“You helped him?”
“At first.”
Rage climbed my throat.
“At first?”
“Then I found the clinic files.”
Her voice cracked.
“The baby is your embryo. Yours and Garrett’s.”
I nearly collapsed.
She grabbed my arm.
I jerked away.
“Don’t touch me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You stole my husband.”
“Yes.”
“You stole my body.”
Tears ran down her face.
“I didn’t know.”
“But you watched him try to murder me.”
“He told me you were already unconscious. He told me you wouldn’t suffer.”
I stared at her.
“That’s your defense?”
“No.”
She shook her head.
“It’s my confession.”
Then she reached into her coat.
Tobias appeared from the shadows with a gun.
“Hands where I can see them.”
Penelope froze.
Slowly, she pulled out a flash drive.
“Everything is on here.”
“What is?”
“Shipments. Payments. Medical files. Victor’s accounts.”
I took it.
Then Penelope whispered:
“There’s one more thing.”
“What?”
“Garrett knows you’re alive.”
A voice behind us said:
“She’s right.”
May you like
Garrett stepped from the stairwell.
And pointed a gun at my chest.
