Page 74 of The Client
He scoffs but there’s no volume behind it. “She’s pregnant with mysibling. It’s my duty to help her for the sake of my brother or sister. I’m sure you understand loyalty to a sibling.”
“Howdare you,” I seethe, my voice dangerously cold. “You don’t have the first clue what I’ve been through for my sister, and you never will.”
His expression turns stricken. “You’re right. I shouldn’t have said that. I’m sorry—”
“I’m done with this conversation. I don’t have to listen to you anymore,” I say, my body vibrating with anger and hurt. “You know what the hardest thing about all of this has been? The fact that you can’t see me as an equal. You want me to be the pretty thing on your arm, to cater to your desires, your whims. To be your plaything. But that’s all I’ll ever be to you. You’ve never had a meaningful conversation with me about anything that’s happening in your life.”
“Maybe you don’t love Celine, and maybe you are helping her for the sake of your sibling. But even if that’s true, I can’t trust any of the words coming out of your mouth, because you never breathed a word of this to me. You don’t think enough of me to let me in on pieces of your life that will also affect mine.”
“Izabela, wait—”
“No! I’m not going to wait. You don’t get it, do you? For some unexplainable reason, I’ve fallen in love with you. I know you told me that if that were to ever happen that I’m required to keep it to myself. But I’m telling you just this one time so you fully understand why I refuse to be one of your Celines.”
He’s quiet again, but I hear his breathing go ragged.
“You’re not one of my Celines. I don’t have other women, Izabela. It’s just you.”
It hits me that I’m not the least bit interested in whatever he has to say next. I have reached a level of doneness that completely consumes me, strengthens my spine, and gives me the confidence I need to make a change. They always say when a woman is done, she’s done.
“You’re a bad liar,” I hiss. “Once I walk out that door, I don’t ever want to see you again.”
My body courses with the feeling of a healing bruise that’s been poked too many times. It hurts but it feels good. As I hurry to my bedroom and toss my minor things into a duffel bag, it heals a little more. Clothes, makeup. I have money in my purse.
Everything I truly need to get by is in the bag slung over my shoulder.
The one thing I don’t need and wish more than anything that I could leave behind is the weight of my love for Rhys pressing down on me.
I hurry down the road and out of the estate; my body tense and my brain hyper aware as I expect someone to grab me and force me into a car and back to Rhys’s townhouse. Worse, I wonder if Zoric will somehow know that I’m attempting to escape and have someone force me back into his clutches.
An hour or so later, I’ve powerwalked myself to near exhaustion. I’m at least three miles from Rhys’s house, maybe more. I find the nearest cheap motel I can and check myself into a room. It isn’t until I slide the chain lock on the door that it hits me: I’m free. No one bangs on my door. No one attempts to kick it in. No one calls my phone and threatens me to go back where I belong.
As darkness falls outside and my body becomes stiff from sitting tensely on the edge of the bed, waiting for something bad to happen, I finally begin to relax. I shower, change into sweatpants, order takeout delivery, which I eat in front of the TV news.
Rhys doesn’t text or call. He actually let me go.
Double-checking the lock on the door, I decide I feel safe enough to curl up under the covers and close my eyes.
Tomorrow will be the first morning of the first day that I finally become my own woman.
I really am free.
28
RHYS
When I hearIzabela stomp down the stairs and walk out the door, walk right out of my life, I don’t make a move to stop her. I just…let her go. It’s better this way.
Who does she think she is, to confront me about Celine’s apartment? As if it’s any business of hers. She has no right. The terms of our agreement have been crystal clear since day one. I do what I want, take what I want, cosign leases with whomever I choose, and at the end of the day, I answer to no one. How dare Izabela snoop around in my office, then have the balls to question me about the private papers she found. And yet.
I can’t deny the fact that everything she said about me was true.
No, I don’t treat Izabela as an equal. Because honestly, no, I’ve never thought of her that way. She’s a woman under my thumb who also somehow got under my skin. But considering how devastated I feel sitting here in the silence of this empty house, maybe it’s time to admit to myself that she’s also worked her way into my heart. That’s the hardest pill to swallow.
So much has happened in the span of half a fucking day, starting with my father’s attempt to blackmail me with the video of Izabela in Zoric’s office, and the weight of it all is sitting squarely on my chest. It would be nice to take a breather and figure out my next move, but I don’t have that luxury. Konstantin Zoric is still considering my offer to buy Izabela’s freedom. Without a concrete answer from him, I can’t feel settled or confident that things will turn out the way they need to. He could very well deny my offer and keep her prisoner. And then what?
As much as I’d love to threaten Zoric to get what I want, I know better than to try. It won’t get me any closer to saving Izabela. The man is a criminal—a successful one. He got that way by being smart, ruthless, and showing no mercy. If I attempt to expose him or take him down, he’ll destroy me and take my family’s business down with him. All he has to do is throw my name to the media in the middle of this bloody mess and it will be game over for me.
And quite possibly for Izabela, too.
