Chapter 8 - Begging in the Dust
That evening, as I walked out of the underground parking garage of my apartment building in San Diego, a shadow stepped out from behind a concrete pillar.
“Victoria!”
I stopped. Two private security guards I had hired stepped forward immediately, blocking the figure.
It was Christopher.
He looked unrecognizably broken. He was wearing the same stained shirt he had worn days ago. His cheeks were hollow, his eyes red-rimmed and bloodshot. He looked like a man who had been sleeping in his car.
“Victoria, please!” Christopher cried out, dropping to his knees on the cold concrete floor, right in front of my leather heels. “Please! Just give me two minutes! Don't let them push me away!”
I signaled for my security guards to hold their position. I looked down at him with an expression of calm, detached curiosity.
“What do you want, Christopher?”
“I was wrong!” he sobbed, burying his face near my boots. “I was so wrong, Victoria! Michelle tricked me! She lied to me! The babies aren't even mine… they’re Julian’s! She was using me the whole time!”
“I know,” I said quietly.
Christopher looked up, his face painted with desperate hope. “You knew?! Victoria, if you knew, why didn't you stop me? You loved me! We were married for five years! We can fix this! You can reinstate me at Vextor Dynamics! We can start over! I’ll never look at another woman again!”
I let out a soft, single laugh. It wasn't bitter. It was purely amused.
“Christopher,” I said, leaning down slightly so he could see the cold clarity in my eyes. “When you called me on the day I signed the divorce papers, you told me I was cold. You told me I was broken because I couldn't give you a family. You wanted to watch me cry.”
“I was angry! I didn't mean it!” he pleaded, grasping at the hem of my coat.
I pulled my coat back from his fingers.
“You didn't care about a family, Christopher,” I told him softly. “You cared about your vanity. You wanted a trophy wife and twin trophies to parade around so you could feel like a real man. But you weren't even man enough to get a proper medical test.”
“Victoria, please! I have nothing left!” he wept. “My mother disowned me! My credit is destroyed! I’m sleeping in a motel! Please, just give me a second chance!”
I took a step back, stepping into the private elevator.
“I don't give second chances to bad investments,” I said smoothly.
May you like
The elevator doors began to slide shut.
Through the closing gap, I watched Christopher Lawson kneeling on the dirty garage floor, screaming my name into the empty air, completely, utterly ruined.
