Cruel Fortune

by K. A. Linde

  My friendship with Lewis had always been a tenuous thing. It had been built on secrets and competition. Loyalty born of the fact that we both knew enough to bury the other, but the fight would be to the death if either of us ever tried. It wasn’t a real friendship. And I’d known that the minute he went after Natalie.

  “Lewis knows that the fault belongs with me,” I said.

  Lewis’s eyes swept to hers. I could read the desperation there. And he didn’t even know what she knew yet. “He used you again, Natalie. Manipulated you into this.”

  Natalie huffed when I cut off her response, “It’s too hard to recognize that she wants me and not you? You didn’t see that all along?”

  Lewis’s voice dropped low, full of venom. He pointed his finger at me. “I will fucking kill you for this.”

  “We both know you won’t do it. I have enough on you, too.”

  “Would you both shut up?” Natalie finally cried. “This isn’t about your little friend feud. This shit is about the fact that you lied to me,” she accused Lewis.

  “Natalie, I haven’t lied to you,” Lewis said in the most obnoxiously placating tone.

  I snorted. “Like hell you haven’t.”

  “Shut your fucking mouth, Kensington, before I fucking throw you out of this room.”

  Natalie ignored us both. “You lied to me. You didn’t just get me the money and arrange for me to come to New York. You kept a fucking file on me, Lewis!”

  Lewis stilled. His eyes widened in shock. “How?”

  “And you don’t even deny it.”

  Check-and-mate.

  Natalie

  38

  “Natalie, I…I don’t even know where you heard that.”

  “Heard it?” I snarled. “Oh no, I didn’t hear it, Lewis. I saw it. I saw the whole goddamn thing. You bought my building. And took pictures of me. You spied on me.” I glared at him with all my pent-up fury. “And then you read my books. The one thing I told you that you could never do, you went behind my back and did anyway.”

  “There’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for that file,” he said calmly.

  He stepped forward as if he was going to reach out for me, but I drew back. Closer to Penn, but not touching him. Far enough back to draw a line of demarcation.

  His eyes narrowed at that step. “But you would have heard that if you’d talked to me. If you’d just come to me with these concerns. But no, you ran to him.”

  “I didn’t run to anyone. I was presented with facts,” I spat. “And was able to interpret that you did all of these things and lied about them. There’s nothing for you to explain.”

  I still couldn’t even believe how this day had shifted. Seeing that file had broken me. Taken the last innocent piece of my soul and crushed it under the weight of the Upper East Side. Because there were no depths that these people wouldn’t stoop to. There was nothing they wouldn’t do to get what they wanted. They would lie, cheat, and steal for what they thought belonged to them.

  And when it had hit me, I’d fallen apart.

  I wasn’t back together yet. I was still scattered on the floor. But I would not stand here and allow these men to fight over me. I would not allow them to mock and goad each other for another chance at drawing blood. Not when the real culprit hadn’t owned up to his faults. When he didn’t even know what had happened that pushed me straight into Penn’s arms.

  While I knew that I probably shouldn’t have done that, I didn’t regret it. I couldn’t regret it.

  “I can’t believe that you just cheated on me, and you have the audacity to call me a liar,” Lewis said. He stood taller, indignant.

  “You are a liar,” Penn spat.

  “Don’t,” I warned him.

  “Natalie,” Lewis said with a shake of his head, “I loved you. I love you. I just…can’t even believe that you would do this to me. After everything I’ve done for you. Everything was for your benefit.”

  “You keep saying that, but I don’t think it means what you think it does,” I said.

  His eyes narrowed. What did he think, that I’d hear him say he loved me and cower and beg forgiveness? I didn’t need forgiveness for what I’d done.

  “And I didn’t cheat on you,” I told him plainly. “We were over the minute I found out about that fucking file.”

  Lewis shook his head. All high and mighty. “This is disgusting.”

  “You can’t even talk about it, can you? You haven’t given me your supposed reasonable explanation because there is no explanation for your behavior. You can blame me for what happened with Penn, but at least I own up to it. We were together because there’s no possible way that I would ever be with someone who did what you did to me.”

  “I’m the one who has been there for you and helped you. I’ve done everything I can for you to be happy.”

  I almost laughed at how pathetic it sounded. But I could see his anger burning hot again, and the last thing I wanted was for another fight to break out. “Don’t try to spin this shit. That’s what you always do. I gave you the opportunity to come clean, and you held back everything. Everything!”

  “You heard what you wanted to hear,” he finally snapped. It was as if he’d lost his cool, and he didn’t even fucking care anymore. “You didn’t want to know the lengths that I had gone for you. You think that you would have gotten where you were without me? I got your book published. I convinced you to move here, so you could write. I got you a reasonable apartment in Manhattan. And suddenly, you think I’m the bad guy here?”

  I shook my head in disgust. “You are totally delusional.”

  “Natalie, we should just go,” Penn said. Whatever he must have heard in Lewis’s voice made him nervous.

  “You’re not going anywhere with him,” Lewis said. “I’ve given you everything. And now, you’re listening to his bullshit. He’s turned you against me.”

  “He really didn’t.”

  “How did you get the file then?” Lewis asked.

  I glanced over at Penn, and Lewis just laughed. “That’s what I thought. And you don’t think he manipulated it in any way? You think he told you the complete truth? Not to fool you in getting you back? Did you even fucking consider that maybe he was the one who was lying?”

  I hadn’t. Not once.

  Lewis choked on a laugh. “Of course not. Because Penn Kensington is a fucking saint. He didn’t put a fucking bet on you to screw with your head. He didn’t have sex with random women constantly just to toy with Katherine. No, he’s perfect. And you believed his lies without even a thought.”

  “Lewis, drop the charade,” Penn said. “You know that I didn’t lie about this shit.”

  “I’ll admit it. Yes, I have a file on you, Natalie. I keep a file on everything. It’s how I organize my life. It’s not a secret to anyone who knows me. Which is why Penn obviously knew there would be one,” Lewis said calmly. “But I’m a thousand percent certain that whatever file you were shown isn’t the real one. That it was manufactured against me.”

  I shook my head. I hadn’t considered that. I hadn’t considered it…because the evidence was right in front of my face. How would Penn have gotten access to my manuscripts? Lewis had an obvious way to get them. A way I had never thought of until I’d seen them there.

  “Stop twisting shit around,” Penn said. “You told me last year that you liked Natalie, and you’d fallen in love with her words. But I know for a fact that she had never let you read them. She didn’t even let me read them.”

  “You can’t lie your way out of this,” I told Lewis.

  “You have no proof that any of that is even mine. You want to believe the worst of me,” Lewis said, taking a step forward. Penn stepped between us. “I don’t even know why you were with me if you wanted to fuck him instead.”

  “That’s not what this is about,” I spat. “This is about you stalking me, Lewis. For a year before we dated and then while we were dating. You didn’t need to do any of this. You didn’t need to take
pictures of me or have video surveillance of my building. You could have waited for me to give you my manuscripts. But you don’t respect me. You think that I’m a game piece that you can move around.”

  “Natalie, I don’t…” His voice was strained.

  I held my hand up. “I’ve made up my mind. It’s over. Stop what you’ve been doing. Stop following me around and trying to supposedly help me. I don’t need your help anymore.”

  “Please, we can work this out. It’s him that’s the problem.” He pointed at Penn.

  “If you continue this behavior, I’ll file a restraining order,” I said breathlessly. The threat hung between us.

  Lewis clenched his hands into fists. “You wouldn’t.”

  “I don’t want to. I didn’t want any of this.” My voice wavered on the last line. My strength was ebbing.

  I was mad at Lewis, but I had cared for him. The time we’d been together hadn’t been a lie for me. He’d just lied to me through it all. And now, that was all I saw.

  “Just…let me go.”

  “I can’t,” he said, his eyes wide.

  I shook my head. And I knew that he meant it. That he wasn’t going to let it go if I didn’t stop this.

  “I’m sorry,” I finally said. “Sorry that you felt you had to lie to get me, to keep me. Sorry that you’re still doing it now, even when all the evidence is in front of us. But I’m not sorry about Penn. And I’m not sorry about leaving.”

  I stalked across the room, stepped into my heels, and snatched up my purse.

  When I turned back toward the door, Lewis lunged for me. He grabbed my elbow, preventing me from leaving. “Don’t.”

  “Let me go,” I said, calm but firm.

  “Lewis,” Penn growled. He was there in a second, ready to stop it if anything happened.

  But Lewis just looked dejected. Like my words had finally sank in. “Don’t go like this. We can try again.”

  “No”—I extracted my arm from him—“we can’t.”

  My heart constricted as I eased past him and out the door. I hated what had just happened. How it had all gone down. The fact that Lewis had seen what we’d done, so he now clearly blamed Penn for our breakup. When it was all his lies. And secrets. And obsession.

  I was nearly to the elevator when I felt Penn catch up with me. Our eyes met for a minute, and then I turned away. He knew me well enough not to say anything.

  His shirt was still undone. His tie had vanished, likely never to be seen again. He hastened to right himself. Though it was obvious that we were both more rumpled than we’d been earlier.

  I’d come to Katherine’s wedding to prove a point. That I wouldn’t back down from a challenge. It had all unraveled from there, and now, there was no reason to be in attendance.

  But when we bypassed the entrance to the Grand Ballroom, there was a crowd of people standing around, reading on their phones. Not what I would have expected of a reception party. Then, Jane appeared. Her eyes rounded when she saw me, and she darted toward me.

  “Oh my god, Natalie, there you are. I’ve been looking all over for you,” she gushed.

  “Why?” I asked warily.

  “Your pen name,” she said. “Someone found out you’re Olivia.”

  “What? How?” I gasped frantically.

  “I don’t know. But someone leaked it to the press.”

  I took the phone she offered me and read the headline of the article she had up, suddenly feeling faint.

  New York Times Bestselling Novel Bet on It Author Olivia Davies Reportedly a Pen Name for Former Temp Worker. Not the Insider You Expected!

  Natalie

  39

  “No,” I breathed. “No, no, no, no, no.”

  I skimmed through the article with my heart in my throat. This couldn’t be happening. This…this couldn’t be real.

  And yet, it was.

  The article was a tell-all in its reveal of me. Slamming me for writing a fucking fictional account. As if it didn’t say based on on the fucking cover. It painted me as a jilted ex. Someone who had lost in all of this and was desperate for revenge. As if I’d written it for that and not to expunge the contents of my soul onto the page.

  It claimed that I’d painted the picture to appear like I was an Upper East Sider who had fallen into this group. When, in fact, I was just the help. A washed-up temp worker who was watching a home in the Hamptons last fall. That the book wasn’t some insider information that was worth reading; it was just a boring outside perspective of someone who wished they could live in this world.

  And since the article was an editorial from someone in the know, it was clear that they didn’t think that my information was important enough to come from ‘the help.’ I effectively had no voice in this. And would be given no response. Just a salacious headline that tore me from my apparent pedestal.

  Basically, I was no one important. The book sucked. And I was kind of a whore.

  “Holy fuck. I don’t…” My hands were shaking as I all but threw the phone back at Jane.

  “How the hell did someone get this information?” Penn demanded. “Does the author list a source?”

  I shook my head.

  “This is slander. We could go after them.”

  “I don’t know what to say,” Jane said. “How many other people knew about this?”

  “Hardly anyone. Maybe a half dozen people.”

  “None of us would have leaked this,” Penn said.

  Jane agreed. “Someone else had to know. Someone out to get you.”

  “Shit, I don’t even know what this means for the book. I have to call my agent,” I gasped. “Fuck, it’s Saturday. She’s not going to answer. I’ll have to email her. I hope she doesn’t see the article before she gets my email.”

  I fished into my purse and pulled out my phone. My brain was running a million miles a second. There had to be some kind of damage control that Caroline could do. Or Gillian. This was…beyond words.

  I’d thought that finding out about Lewis and the subsequent breakup would be the death of me, but…my career was hanging in the balance. The only thing that I’d ever wanted to do with my life. The thing I’d finally secured happily. And now…I didn’t know where I stood.

  “Natalie,” Penn murmured softly.

  “What?” I asked, glancing up at him.

  But he was looking elsewhere. I followed his line of vision and found the dark-haired beauty clothed in white, walking toward us.

  “Katherine,” I muttered. I wasn’t ready for this confrontation. Not after Lewis. Not after this debacle with my pen name.

  Her smug smirk was relentless. “Hello, Natalie.”

  “Look, I’m leaving now anyway, so you can save your speech for someone else.”

  “Speech?” Katherine asked. “No, I don’t have anything planned. I’m actually glad that you’re here now that I think about it.”

  I narrowed my eyes. Not good. “Why?”

  “Because now, I get to see your reaction. See the dread in your eyes instead of imagining what it looked like back in your sad apartment.”

  “You did this,” I realized.

  “How did you find out?” Penn demanded.

  Her eyes flicked to his. Something like pain flashed across her face but was replaced with that blank stare she’d walked down the aisle with.

  “Did you honestly think that you could keep secrets in this town?” Katherine asked.

  “That’s rich, coming from you,” Penn quipped.

  “Who told you?” I demanded.

  “I have eyes and ears everywhere.”

  I shook my head in disgust. “You are a disturbed woman.”

  Katherine laughed. “Sure, Natalie. Whatever you have to tell yourself. You should have listened to me,” Katherine told me. “You thought that you could come to my city and threaten me. I told you that I own this city. And I do. You don’t belong in it. Let this be a lesson for how miserable I can make your life.”

  “Make my life miserabl
e?” I asked with a slow blink. “Why would you even care? Oh wait, we know the answer to that, Katherine. Because you are miserable, and you want everyone to join you. You want to bring people down onto your level, which happens to be at the bottom of the ocean where you’re drowning. That’s what you want in life. Misery. That’s why you had this sham of a wedding today.”

  “You know nothing about my life, Natalie. Keep lashing out. It’s not going to help you.”

  “I don’t know or care why you did it. Either way, it’s a petty, baseless move. And you’re going to fucking pay for what you did.”

  Katherine pressed a hand to her stomach and chuckled. “Oh, honey, please.”

  “I’m going to make you regret this,” I said seriously.

  “Sure you are, kitty cat,” Katherine said with another laugh. As if I’d made the joke of the season. “I’m so scared.”

  I didn’t care how she’d found out. Or what her utter damage was. I just knew that she had come after me because I was the only person who had ever stood up to her. I was the only one who had told her no and not backed down. And I didn’t want to back down here.

  Even as that string I’d been holding on to snapped. Even as I felt myself descend down, down, down into the darkest place of my being. Even as I held on to the dark and decided to call it home.

  I knew with every fiber of my being that I would not let Katherine Van Pelt do this to me. How many other women had she beaten down for having strength? She’d always gotten away with it. And I wouldn’t let her do it to me.

  My stomach might be in knots. I might want to throw up. Fear might be the only lifeline I had. Knowing I’d have to wade through the social humiliation of this revelation. Figure out how to still live my life after the death of Olivia Davies. And still, I would not break before her.

  “Go back to the hole you crawled out of,” Katherine spat at me.

  “I don’t even recognize you anymore,” Penn said with a shake of his head.