Let me make this perfectly clear to both of you, I said, gripping my phone tightly. I am not absorbing your debt. I am not protecting your fake image. I am not sacrificing my life so you can play pretend with the Jefferson family. I am reporting this crime right now. Britney lunged forward her pristine manicure dangerously close to my face.
If you make a scene tonight, she hissed her voice trembling with barely suppressed rage. If you ruin this party, if the Jeffersons call off this wedding because you threw a tantrum over money, how exactly do you plan to pay us back? Will you pay with your life? Because that is what you will owe me.
You will owe me my entire life. She actually believed her threats carried weight. She believed she held the high ground. In her mind, the potential loss of her billionaire groom was a far greater tragedy than my certain incarceration for a crime I did not commit. Your life is built on a lie, Britney, I said coldly.
And the Jeffersons despise liars. Warren Jefferson built his empire from the ground up. If he finds out you funded this party by defrauding a bank, Terrence will drop you before the appetizers are cleared. Do not you dare say his name. Britney screamed, losing the last shred of her carefully curated high society persona. You are nothing.
You are a maid in an apron standing in a kitchen. Terrence loves me. The Jeffersons love me. You are just bitter trash trying to drag me down to your miserable level. There was no reasoning with delusion. There was no negotiating with criminals. I did not need to hear another word. The evidence was irrefutable and the confessions were complete.
I looked down at my phone, bypassing the lock screen, and opened the keypad to dial the federal authorities. ‘I am done talking,’ I declared, raising the phone toward my ear. Before my thumb could press the call button, the kitchen doors burst open with a violent crash. Brenda charged into the room like a bull seeing red.
Her eyes were wide with manic desperation, her expensive heels slipping dangerously on the wet floor. She did not yell. She did not hesitate. She launched her entire body weight at me, reaching out with clawed hands, and forcefully snatched the phone right out of my grip. Brenda’s manicured hands clamped down on my wrist with the force of a vice.
