Annihilate Me 2: Omnibus (Complete Vols. 1-3, Annihilate Me 2)

by Christina Ross

  “This is going to backfire on you,” I said to him.

  “I seriously doubt that. In fact, I plan on enjoying the show tonight. You’ll see. You’re going to be reminded of your dead baby all night long.”

  I swallowed hard when he said that, and I tried to keep it together as I absorbed what he’d done to me. Then, he took a menacing step toward me, and I watched a dark cloud come over his face.

  “The banter has been fun, Jennifer, but now let me be straight with you. Wenn is mine now—get used to it. Drop your investigation of me, stop prying into my personal life, or I swear to God I will make things even worse for you and Alex. Trust me on this. I’ll make each of your lives hell.”

  “Step away from me,” I said. “Get out of my personal space.”

  “Or what? Are you afraid of me, Jennifer?”

  Before I could answer, he laughed and gallantly moved aside with a grotesque kind of flourish. “The elevator’s right there,” he said. “You should use it now before things get a whole lot worse for you.”

  * * *

  When I was in the elevator and the doors had closed, I punched the button for the fortieth floor, and the elevator sank along with my stomach. A moment later, the doors opened, and when I saw Alex standing just beyond them with a quizzical look upon his face, I burst into tears of anger and sadness, and felt an overwhelming sense of rage that I felt sure was about to consume me.

  “Jennifer,” he said as he hurried over to me and put his hands on my shoulders. “What’s wrong? Why are you crying?”

  We backed out of the elevator, and I told him what had happened.

  “Rowe did what?” He looked behind me at the bank of elevators, and I knew what he was thinking. “Where is he? Still in his office?”

  “He’s probably gone by now. He was in his tux. He was leaving for the party when I stupidly selected his floor thinking it was still our floor.”

  “You can’t expect me to stand here and allow him get away with that, Jennifer. He deserves to have his head bashed in for what he did to you. Let me do it.”

  “Don’t,” I said. “He’s not worth it. And I don’t want to give him the satisfaction of letting him know just how much he got to me. I’m sorry to be so upset. I am. This isn’t who I am. I’m stronger than this. It’s just when he said that tonight people would be gossiping about my ‘dead baby’ and wondering whether I’d be able to give you the heir you deserve, it did me in. It spoke to my darkest fears.”

  I looked down at the compact and lipstick I had in my free hand and, in an effort to diffuse the conversation, I said, “Would you carry these in your pocket for me tonight? Obviously, I can’t take a bag.”

  He took them from me. “Of course.”

  “This is ridiculous,” I said, gently running a finger beneath each of my eyes so as not to ruin Bernie’s efforts. “What an asshole.”

  “You’re in no shape to leave for the party now.”

  “I just need a drink. That will calm me down. If I could just be alone with you for a few moments and have a martini before we leave, I’ll be fine.”

  He took me by my free hand, and I felt his fingers close against my own. “Come with me,” he said. But when he said it, I heard the undercurrent of rage in his voice. I knew, that more than anything, he wanted to leave me now, find Rowe, and kick his ass for me. But he didn’t—and I was grateful for that. The last thing I needed was for Rowe to call the police on my husband and have that become news.

  When we reached Alex’s office, he made us both a martini, and when he was finished, he handed me mine. I had no plans to sip it. Instead, I took one mother of a pull from it, and then closed my eyes and took a deep breath as the alcohol sank into me.

  “Let’s sit down,” Alex said.

  I sat in the chair opposite Alex, and saw a mixture of fury and concern on his face. Beats of silence passed between us. Each of us sipped our drinks. When I finished mine, I felt more in control of my emotions—and even more focused on how important it was that we speak to Epifania and convince her to tell us about her friendship with Janice Jones. We couldn’t leave the party without knowing where she was right now.

  “He’s going to pay for what he did to you,” Alex said. “Physically.”

  “It’s not worth it,” I said. “He’ll call the police on you, and then what kind of a PR nightmare will we have on our hands? All we need to do is to get to Epifania and see if she will help us. I think she will. I’ve always been kind to her. She knows that. If she happens to know where Jones is and she tells us, then we’ve won the evening. Screw Rowe. The texts he sent out earlier were below the belt, but I’ll handle the sympathy—fake or real—as it comes. And it will come—I know it will. But it is what it is at this point. All I care about now is ousting that son of a bitch from Wenn—crushing him by exposing the truth of who he is so you can take back ownership of Wenn and fire him from the board. Then it will be over. We need to look at the big picture, Alex—and that’s it.”

  “I still want to pound his face into a wall after what he said to you.”

  “And I love you for that, because I know that you would. But we can’t. Trust me on this—we’ll get him. We’ll nail him. And when we do, we’ll expose him for who he is and ruin him.” I stood, turned to the mirror above the bar, and checked my face. To my surprise, it was fine. I lifted my hair off my shoulders, slung it down the length of my back, and then, despite knowing how difficult tonight was going to be, I just sucked it up and turned to Alex. “Let’s go,” I said. “Let’s get to Epifania. And then let’s get him.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR

  As Tank drove us to Henri’s building on Fifth, which he owned, including the penthouse on the top two floors, where he lived and entertained, I prepared myself for all that was to come.

  If questions were asked about the child I’d lost, I was prepared to tell the truth. Rowe might have leaked the news, but that didn’t mean that I couldn’t manage the fallout. I had nothing to be ashamed of—I did nothing to cause my baby’s death. If anything, I’d tried my damnedest to save it, even though at the time I didn’t know that it was already gone.

  When the car slowed to a stop alongside Henri’s building, I saw a line of well-dressed people moving inside as a crowd of paparazzi snapped their photographs.

  “Are you ready for this?” Alex asked.

  “I am. But I need you to know that I’m prepared to be honest. If people ask if it’s true that we lost our child—which they will, as will the press—I’m going to tell them that it is, in fact, true. We lost our child in the crash. And then I’m going to tell them that I’m fine, and that my doctor sees absolutely no reason why we can’t try again soon, and be successful when that time comes. I plan to be brief and on point, but I’m ready to go there. That said, I need to make sure that you are comfortable with that.”

  “I don’t see another way,” he said. “Meeting this head on is, in fact, the smartest way. Otherwise, if we don’t answer truthfully, speculation will just build and run wild. The only way to put an end to this is to come clean, but with a clear message that we want a child, and that there will be a new Wenn sooner rather than later.”

  “I love you,” I said to him.

  “I love you more than you could ever imagine, Jennifer.”

  “So, let me ask you. Are you ready for this?”

  “We’re a team. I’m ready if you’re ready.”

  “Then let’s do this, because I’m more than ready. Tank? Let’s go.”

  “You’ve got it.”

  Tank stepped out of the car and opened my door for me. Immediately, flashes of light began to pop as the crowd of reporters and the paparazzi standing along the sidelines realized that it was Alex and I who had arrived. And when they did, I could feel an electrical burst of excitement sizzle through the night air.

  I held out my hand to Tank and stepped onto the sidewalk as elegantly as I could given how limited I was with my arm in its sling. And almost at once, I was s
heathed in an unimaginable display of light as Alex emerged from the car and stood alongside me while our photographs were taken. I felt him put his arm around my waist as questions were hurled at us—was it true? Were we pregnant and had I lost the child? To get this over with and to shut them up, I raised my hand and answered their questions while the partygoers moving inside stopped to look at us.

  And listen.

  “As you can imagine, this is a private and painful time for Alex and me, but yes, we were pregnant and I did lose the child in the crash. We are devastated by the loss, but each of us is resolved to move forward and to honor our child’s life by living our lives to the fullest—by being grateful that we’re allowed to do so, and also by trying for another child soon. My doctor has already assured me that that will be no issue. Despite how it looks with my shoulder, which is healing well, I’m in excellent physical shape, and we look forward to sharing the good news with all of you when the time comes. We’d like to thank everyone for their concern and support, and we hope, that going forward, that everyone will understand that this is a difficult subject for both Alex and me to talk about, so we won’t be saying anything more on the matter. Thank you for your support. And thank you for understanding.”

  Not that they understood a damned thing, because as we made our way into Henri’s building, the questions kept coming in earnest. I managed to ignore all but one of them before we disappeared inside: “Mrs. Wenn, who leaked the news? We understand it was delivered to multiple people via an anonymous text.”

  I turned to the reporter who’d asked that question, and hesitated before I spoke. If I told the truth, Rowe would sue me for libel. So, I chose a workaround. “We know for a fact who leaked the news,” I said. “And we also know that he did it out of spite.”

  “So, it’s a man?”

  “It is,” I said. “And if you think quickly enough on your feet—if you consider where Alex is now when it comes to his position at Wenn, the company his father founded—you might just figure out who that man is for yourself.”

  “Are you saying that it was Stephen Rowe?”

  Quick on their feet, indeed… I looked at the reporter who’d asked the question, and my only response was a lifted chin—and a tight smile.

  * * *

  “Jesus, I’m glad that I married you,” Alex said as we followed Tank through the crowd and moved toward Henri’s private elevator. “That was brilliant.”

  “I’m not the one who said his name—the reporter did. And because I didn’t say his name, Rowe’s got nothing on me. Let the world speculate. Let the press ask Stephen himself if he sent out that text. Since he left before us, he’s probably already in here somewhere, and the press know it. I’m betting that some enterprising journalistic soul will seek him out and ask him if he’s behind the bad news. And how will he answer? Naturally, with a lie. But if it comes off as a lie, things won’t go well for him. I have a feeling that tonight is going to be very uncomfortable for Mr. Rowe.”

  Tank stood beside the elevator waiting for us. Earlier, when we were shopping, Blackwell told me that Henri himself had called that morning to say that we could use his private elevator if we wanted. He knew that this was our first time out in public since arriving back home, and he’d said that he wanted to make our entrance as easy and as seamless as possible.

  “Would you like me to stay?” Tank asked.

  “We’ll be fine now,” Alex said. “But thank you, Tank. I’ll call you when we’re ready to leave.”

  Once we stepped into the elevator and the doors had slid shut behind us, I turned to Alex. “All eyes out for Epifania,” I said. “We need to find her, and talk with her to see if she knows anything and is willing to help us. And then I want to go home because I certainly don’t want to mingle with this crowd. Henri will understand.”

  “Whatever you want.”

  “What I don’t want is all the gossip and the looks that are about to come our way. But they’re inevitable, aren’t they? Rowe made sure of that. Crashing on that island cemented it. We’ve caused a stir before, but nothing like what’s about to come.” I straightened his bow tie for him. “But what can we do? Nothing. Are you ready?”

  “I’ve got you on my arm,” he said. “That makes me ready. How about yourself?”

  “I’ve got the best-looking man in this joint—what woman wouldn’t be ready?”

  We shared a kiss when the elevator started to slow and then the doors slid open—not that anyone could see us. The elevator was tucked away from the fray in a small alcove hidden beyond the massive entertaining space.

  Unnoticed, Alex and I stood there for a moment. We were in shadow, but beyond us, the gigantic, mahogany-paneled space that Henri had crafted with such decadent care was teeming with the wealthy well-dressed. Off to our left, an orchestra was playing. All around us was the grayish din of people talking. To our right would be the bar. I needed just one more martini to make it through this, so Alex and I went for a drink, knowing full well that when we stepped into the room, the rubbernecking would begin.

  In our case, it began in earnest, because coming straight toward us was Tootie Staunton-Miller with her closeted gay husband, Addy, whom I adored in ways that I would never adore Tootie. I caught his eye as they sailed toward us, and we exchanged a wink and a smile because he and I had always had a solid connection, but then it was all about Tootie, who took charge of the moment—and ruled it.

  There she is, I thought as I watched her close the distance between us. Evil incarnate.

  She was wearing a form-fitting, bright-yellow evening dress that, even at her age, showed off her slender figure. The woman had to be somewhere in her mid-sixties, but I had to give it to her—she was nothing if not fit and well preserved. And also a pure pocket of social poison. The woman hadn’t liked me from the day we first met, and nothing had changed since then.

  And because of that, I kind of enjoyed toying with her.

  “Alex!” she said as she came toward him with outstretched arms. “Sweet, sweet, Alex! Alive and well. Alive and here! And still breathing despite the impossible odds that were against you on that awful island with those horrible hippie people. I can’t believe it, but my eyes tell the truth. Give Tootie a kiss.”

  “Hello, Tootie,” Alex said as air kisses were exchanged—though not because of Alex. Alex would have embraced Tootie if she’d let him, but that would never happen in this world. She had been whipped into shape by God knows how many people, and because of that, she would allow no one to mess with what I had to admit was perfection. Her face had been pulled a few good inches—there was no doubt about that. But Tootie was smart. She hadn’t gone too far.

  “What a time of it you’ve had,” she said. “It’s a miracle that you’re here. A miracle!”

  “I have my wife to thank for that, Tootie. Jennifer took a bullet for me. She saved not only my life, but the lives of our friends and family who were on that island with us.”

  “I read all about it,” Addy said to me. “Jennifer, you’re a hero. I don’t know a more impressive person, and I mean that.”

  “Thank you, Addy. And I’d do it again in a second. After two weeks on the island, we were all at a point that something drastic had to be done. I played just a small part in our getting out. Everyone had a role.”

  “How modest of you,” Tootie said. “You know, Jennifer, it seems as if trouble follows you everywhere.”

  And so it begins…

  “Hello, Tootie,” I said, extending my hand to her. “I have to say that I’m surprised that you actually saw me standing next to Alex this time. In the past, it often has seemed as if you don’t notice me at all. I wonder why that is?”

  “I don’t know what that means.”

  “Don’t you?”

  “I don’t. And besides, who couldn’t see you given your dress, those diamonds, and particularly that sling of yours?” she said after taking my hand for an instant and then dropping it. “You know, darling, I have to ask since everyo
ne will be talking about it, if they already aren’t. Why that sling? Is it meant to draw attention to your injury?”

  “It’s actually meant to enhance the gown in ways that a standard cloth sling wouldn’t have. Think of it as a piece of Swarovski fun. Everyone knows that I was hurt. This is my way of owning it.”

  “Is that what it is?”

  “What else could it be?”

  “Well, I’d never go so far to say that you are rooting for a vote of sympathy by drawing attention to your, uh, bullet wound, but I’m certain that others would.”

  “Others will always talk, Tootie. Certainly you must know that by now.”

  “I eschew gossip.”

  “Even when you’re the center of it?”

  “Even when I’m the what?”

  “Never mind. By the way, you look fresher than you did the last time I saw you. You’ve got a glow about you.”

  “And I just heard tonight that you were cheated of your own.”

  “Tootie,” Addy said.

  “Oh, come on,” she said. “Obviously we’ve heard the news. Addy and I learned about your loss from some odd, anonymous text that came with a rather revealing document this evening. A miscarriage. I’m terribly sorry for each of you. I can’t imagine it—I really can’t. The idea that you might not be able to get pregnant again and give Alex the son he needs. I mean, from what we heard, you lost the child in the crash. What if there are issues now? How will you conceive? And if you can’t, how will you two overcome?”

  “Tootie,” Addie said again, this time with a clear warning tone.

  “I’m just concerned,” she said.

  “Then don’t be,” I countered. “I’m as healthy as a horse—”

  “Well, there’s an image…”

  Oh, bitch, you are so going down.

  “We’re very sorry for your loss, Jennifer and Alex,” Addy said. “But we also know that you probably would rather not discuss it, so we’ll respect that going forward.” He put his hand on his wife’s arm. “Isn’t that right, Tootie?”