Chapter 10: Revenge
Divorce agreement.
The moment I saw those words, something cold settled deep in my chest. My fingers hesitated, trembling slightly, like that piece of paper suddenly carried more weight than I could handle.
When my bodyguard handed it to me earlier, it was flipped over, and no writing was showing. I tossed it on the desk without looking, assuming it was just another contract.
Now, I knew better.
My chest tightened as I picked it up and slowly unfolded it. Each page made it harder to breathe. The bloodstain in the corner had dried, but it jumped out at me like it had just been made.
Then I got to the last page.}
Her handwriting stared back at me.}
[Russell, I need to talk to you about something important.]}
I remembered that day. She stood in front of me, serious, steady, trying to be heard. I had looked her in the eye and walked away to be with Claudia instead.
I let the paper slip from my hand. My jaw locked. I couldn’t move.}]
Then, without thinking, I ripped it apart. Tore it again and again until it was just scraps of paper scattered across the floor. Like destroying the damn thing would change anything, like I hadn’t already torn everything to pieces inside.N
We were divorced. That was the cold, hard truth.
And in those shredded bits, I still saw her.”
Her stubborn refusal to apologize, kneeling as if she wouldn’t give in.”
The way she limped, giving up her hospital bed.
The bruises on her skin.
The doctor’s warning–that one second more and I could have killed her.
Every memory stabbed deeper. I couldn’t hold it in anymore. I swept everything off the desk with one hard sweep. The crash echoed in the silence.
“Mr. Fraizer-“}
My assistant’s voice cut through. I barely glanced up as she dropped a thick file on the desk in front of me.”
“These are all the findings you asked for… and also… Miss Claudia’s file.”
My eyes stayed on the folders. I didn’t reach for Nadine’s.
Not yet.
Instead, I went for the one marked Claudia.
The first thing I saw was the photos.
Claudia, in hotel rooms with strangers. Kissing them. Wrapped around them in clubs. Leaning into them in dark alleyways. It wasn’t just once. It wasn’t just carelessness.}
She was smart. She never picked powerful men. She chose nobodies–guys with no reputation to lose. They were disposable.
That way, her ‘pure and innocent‘ image stayed clean.”
My hands went pale from how tightly I held those photos.
All this time, I thought Claudia was different. Simple. Genuine.
She came from the countryside, didn’t care about money, and didn’t know who I was when we met.
That’s what I told myself.”
She didn’t chase power.N
I reflected on that day when the balloon got stuck in a tree, and she climbed to retrieve it for a crying kid. She fell, got hurt, and brushed it off as if it were nothing.”
That was the moment I realized she was someone genuine.
In a world full of lies and gold–diggers, Claudia felt like a breath of air.
I was wrong.”
The people who’ve known poverty the longest? They’re the ones who crave power the most.
Claudia didn’t reject this world
–
she studied it, then played it better than anyone else. She wore kindness like a costume. She played helplessly and sweetly until she had what she wanted.
Photo after photo, I turned the pages. The corners started to cut into my fingers.
The woman I thought I loved didn’t exist.
And for that illusion, I had thrown Nadine away.”
My chest burned. My throat closed up.
I reached for Nadine’s file.&
It started with a reminder–two years ago, the James family held a party to welcome Claudia home.
720 AM
D
Nadine wasn’t allowed through the front door. She had to crawl through the doggy door. They treated her like a stray.”
Claudia took her bedroom. She took her boyfriend. She sabotaged her scholarship. She stole her art show. And finally, she took me. Then came a message on my phone–surveillance footage.}
I opened it and watched Nadine get hit by a car. Her body flew across the street like she was made of paper. She tried to move, tried to cry out.”
No one helped her.
And where was I?%
In bed with Claudia.
I felt like I’d been hit in the head. Everything blurred. I staggered back and threw the phone. It shattered against the wall.”
I thought about that restaurant. When Nadine slapped Claudia. I remembered noticing something wrong–the handprint had been backward.
Claudia had hit herself.
I saw it. I knew it.
But I didn’t want to believe it. I told myself I didn’t.
Then I ordered the torture. Told them to crush Nadine’s hands. The hands she painted with. The hands she lived through.2
What kind of man does that?
I claimed I wanted someone kind. Someone honest.>>
But when I had her, I broke her.
I’d confused innocence with an act. I mistook noise for love and threw away the one person who ever gave a damn about me. Now I couldn’t stop the memories.
They hit me all at once. I couldn’t breathe./
Outside, the sky was starting to lighten. Morning was close.}
But inside, everything stayed dark.”
I moved slowly, like my body wasn’t mine anymore.”
It was time to stop pretending.
Time to face what I’d done.
And time to make things right for her.”
For Nadine.
…B
Claudia’s POVE
I was falling apart.
Last night, I planned a hot, steamy evening with a guy who’d been flirting with me for weeks. Just some fun, a little distraction from everything going on. But out of nowhere, a snake appeared in the room.
¡ froze, completely paralyzed with fear.”
I screamed, desperate to get away, and tried to run to the bathroom. But he got there first and locked the door behind him.
The hotel was some cheap, grimy dive, and not at all like the fancy suites Russell usually booked for me.”
I ducked and dodged as the snake lunged, my heart pounding in my chest.”
I managed to call the front desk, but no one answered.”
I tried to call my girlfriends, but I couldn’t risk anyone finding out I was here with some random guy. My reputation would be ruined. So I did the only thing I could. I threw open the window and screamed for help.
My throat burned, but no one came.
That snake wouldn’t leave. Its glowing green eyes never blinked. They locked onto me like I was prey, like it wanted to swallow me whole. My arms, my legs, even my neck, were covered in bite marks.W
Dizzy and dazed, I collapsed back onto the bed. The snake coiled tighter around my legs, squeezing me.}}
Dawn finally broke.
I couldn’t take it anymore.
Tears started strearning down my face.”
I picked up the phone, my fingers shaking, and called Russell.
“Russell, please pick up…”
