Then she had an idea. As long as the phone remained in the bookstore and she wasn’t away from it for too long, Kyle would think she was there working.
Abby glanced at the clock on her phone and figured that afternoon’s matinee show of Chicago was about to end in less than half an hour. She had no time to waste. She shot to her feet, drank the last of her coffee, and stepped out of the backroom to look for her boss. She was determined to go to the theater that day. She knew she was taking a big risk, but she couldn’t help herself. Besides, she was only going to be gone a few minutes. What could possibly go wrong?
Abby found Jeremy behind the register talking to the other cashier. Abby stepped behind the register and stood next to him. “Hey, Jeremy, I need an hour off work,” she whispered in his ear.
“What for?” Jeremy asked.
“I need to go take care of some personal business. It’s really important and cannot wait. I’ll stay an hour later if you need me to.”
“Sure, Abby. No problem. Is everything okay?”
“Yes, everything is fine. I just need to go see someone, and I can only see them now.”
Abby thanked Jeremy and reached for her purse hidden under the register. She slung it over her shoulder and turned her attention back to her phone. After making sure the iPhone had enough battery and was still connected to the internet, Abby tried to discreetly leave it under the counter and just take her bag, but Jeremy caught her and shot her a curious look.
“Don’t ask me any questions, please. Everything is fine,” Abby said to Jeremy as she stepped from behind the register.
Jeremy nodded and watched her walk away. For weeks, Jeremy had been noticing changes in Abby’s behavior. She was no longer the bubbly, smiling girl he knew. She was often distracted, lost in her own thoughts. There was a sadness in her eyes that told Jeremy something was wrong. He had tried a couple of times to get Abby to confide in him, but Abby kept insisting everything was fine.
Jeremy had a suspicion that whatever was going on with Abby had something to do with her boyfriend Kyle. Lately, Kyle had been calling Abby nonstop and distracting her from her work. Jeremy had seen tears in Abby’s eyes after some of those phone calls, but Abby refused to talk about it. Jeremy was very protective of Abby and wished there was something he could do to help her with whatever it was that was troubling her.
Outside the bookstore, Abby hopped in a cab, and a few minutes later, the cab pulled up in front of the stage door of the theater where Chicago was playing.
Just like Abby had anticipated, the sidewalk was packed with theater fans yelling and waving their posters and sharpies in the air. Several of the actors from the musical had come out to sign autographs, and the fans were calling their names to get their attention. The scene was a bit chaotic, but it looked like security had everything under control.
After paying her cab fare, Abby hopped out of the taxi and stood at the back of the crowd. She craned her neck trying to see the faces of the actors that were out there. She quickly discovered Brianna was not among them. She kept looking at the stage door, hoping that at any second it would swing open and Brianna would walk through it. Fifteen minutes later, Brianna had not come outside.
Abby was crushed. She thought she had either missed Brianna or Brianna wasn’t going to come out at all. Abby was about to turn on her heel and hail a cab when the stage door swung open. Abby’s heart skipped a beat when she saw Brianna looking happy and casual in a pair of denim shorts and a fashionable off the shoulder t-shirt. Brianna’s reaction when the crowd cheered and started chanting her name was priceless. The smile on her face could’ve lit up the entire Empire State building.
Abby’s lips curled into a huge smile as she watched Brianna soak in all the adoration from the huge gathering of theater enthusiasts. She was happy to see Brianna achieve so much success and radiate so much joy after all the pain she had endured her entire life.
Abby wanted to kick herself. It was evident she had made the wrong choice. Her life would have been so much better if she had chosen Brianna over Kyle, but it was too late to do anything about it. Besides, if she had chosen Brianna, Kyle would have probably done everything in his power to keep them apart. They were simply not meant to be together.
Abby watched an overwhelmed but delighted Brianna move from one fan to another, signing autographs and thanking them for their support. Abby kept watching her without making any attempt to hide her presence or disguise her appearance. The crowd was so big and rowdy and Brianna was so focused on signing the posters being shoved in her face, Abby was confident there was no way Brianna was going to see her. Abby was wrong.
Brianna must have felt Abby’s presence in the crowd and her eyes boring a hole in her because she raised her gaze and her eyes easily found Abby in the large crowd. The smile in Brianna’s face vanished when she locked eyes with the love of her life. She stared at Abby as if she had seen a ghost, a beautiful and broken ghost.
Abby’s stomach flipped when Brianna’s vibrant, ocean blue eyes landed on her. Abby’s first instinct was to duck. She cursed her bad luck as she crouched behind the crowd. The last thing she wanted was for Brianna to see her there. She couldn’t believe Brianna found her in that huge crowd. While crouching in the middle of that busy street, Abby felt the overwhelming need to run as far away as possible from that theater and from Brianna. And that’s exactly what she did.
Before Brianna could react to Abby’s presence in the crowd, Abby was already sprinting down the street. With a mixture of shock and amusement on her face, Brianna watched Abby flee the scene. She wanted to go after Abby, but she couldn’t just push her way through the crowd and go chasing after her. So she kept smiling and signing autographs while her mind tried to make sense of the strange encounter.
When Abby made it to the end of the block, she hailed a taxi and hopped in. She realized she had made a huge mistake by going to that theater and promised herself not to do it again. She was still trying to catch her breath when the taxi pulled in front of the bookstore twenty minutes later.
She was still shaken up when she walked through the double doors of the packed establishment. When she stepped inside, she immediately locked eyes with Jeremy who was standing behind the register. The worried expression on Jeremy’s face told Abby something bad had happened while she was gone.
“What is it, Jeremy?” Abby asked her boss as she stepped closer to the register.
“It’s Kyle. He called the store a few minutes ago because you were not answering your phone. He sounded pissed.”
“What did you tell him?” Abby asked, her pulse quickening.
“I told him you weren’t here. I told him I had sent you to check on some book orders I had placed with a distributor uptown.” The look of panic in Abby’s face told Jeremy he had done the right thing by lying to Kyle about Abby’s whereabouts.
“What else… what else did he say?” Abby stammered.
“He asked how long you were going to be gone. I said about an hour. He said he was coming here to talk to you.”
Abby rushed to get her phone from behind the register and saw Kyle had called three times while she was out seeing Brianna. She cursed softly under her breath and mentally kicked herself for being so stupid and reckless. Going to see Brianna was turning out to be a bigger mistake than she had thought.
Abby began to have a mini panic attack. Kyle coming to the bookstore meant he didn’t believe Jeremy’s attempt at covering for her. She was a terrible liar, but somehow she was going to have to convince Kyle she was in fact conducting bookstore business and not doing something else. She feared that if Kyle figured out she was out seeing Brianna, he was going to carry out his threat of destroying Brianna’s career.
Abby couldn’t let that happen, especially after seeing how well Brianna’s career was going and how happy she looked. Abby took a deep breath and tried to get her nerves under control before Kyle arrived. She was determined to protect Brianna and her career at all costs.
; “Is everything okay, Abby?” Jeremy asked, concerned over how freaked out Abby looked.
“Yes, everything is fine,” Abby replied, giving Jeremy a half smile and dropping her gaze to the floor. She didn’t want Jeremy to see how terrified she was and ask more questions.
But Jeremy cared too much about her to stay out of it. “Look, I don’t want to meddle in your personal life, but if you have a problem, you can always come talk to me. I’m here for you. Anything you need, just ask.”
“Thank you Jeremy. I appreciate your concern, but everything is fine.”
“Where the hell were you?” Kyle barked as he stormed through the door.
Dead silence descended on the bookstore as the eyes of every person in the place, including Abby’s and Jeremy’s, flew to Kyle.
With her heart beating at a troubling rate, Abby stepped from the behind the register to meet Kyle who was huffing and stumping towards her.
Jeremy, sensing trouble, also stepped from behind the register and rushed to stand between Abby and Kyle.
“Why did you leave your phone here?” Kyle barked at Abby, his eyes darting between Abby and Jeremy who was blocking his path. Kyle was no dummy. He knew that as absent-minded as Abby was, she would never forget to take her phone with her. He was convinced she had done it on purpose.
“Hey man, take it easy,” Jeremy interjected, placing his hands on Kyle’s chest and preventing Kyle from walking around him. “I told you she was checking on some book orders for me uptown.”
“Don’t touch me. This is none of your business, Jeremy,” Kyle growled, swatting Jeremy’s hands away and pushing him out of his way. Gasps and murmurs could be heard coming from the other side of bookstore when Jeremy stumbled and knocked down a small book shelf nearby.
With Jeremy out of his way, Kyle lunged at Abby and gripped her forearm. “Now you have your friends lying for you? Where were you?”
“Kyle, please. Not here. Let’s talk about this tonight after I get home,” Abby pleaded while glancing around the room and seeing all the customers gawking at the scene Kyle had created.
“Let her go, Kyle. Let her go and get out of my store. Leave or I’m going to call the police,” Jeremy warned.
Kyle looked over his shoulder and saw Jeremy and all the bookstore customers staring at him. He realized it would be better for him if people didn’t see him verbally abusing and manhandling Abby. He took his hands off Abby and took a couple of steps back.
“Come straight home after you’re done here,” Kyle instructed Abby through gritted teeth. He then turned around and shot Jeremy a quick, angry look before storming out of the bookstore.
Abby let out a sharp breath once Kyle was out of the store. She couldn’t feel her legs, and her heart was beating in her ears. She gripped the counter to keep herself from falling down. She glanced around the bookstore, mortified at the concerned stares all the customers were giving her.
Jeremy rushed towards Abby. “Are you all right?” he asked.
Abby waved a hand at him trying to pretend Kyle’s freak out was not a big deal. The customers quickly returned to their books and conversations, but Jeremy was not buying Abby’s assertion that Kyle’s violent outburst was nothing to worry about. Abby stepped behind the register, and Jeremy followed her there.
“Abby, you’re not just my employee. I consider you a friend. What I said earlier about you being able to come to me with any problem you have… I really meant that.”
“I know. Thank you. But I told you I’m fine.”
“Look, if he’s hurting you…”
Abby cut him off and forced a smile. “He’s not. He’s just a little stressed out these days because of his internship. He’s not hurting me. I promise.” Abby was technically telling Jeremy the truth when she said Kyle was not hurting her. As vicious as Kyle had been, he hadn’t raised his hand to beat her. The verbal abuse he had been subjecting her to was another story.
Jeremy was still not buying it. He could sense the situation with Kyle was more serious than Abby was letting on. “You have my number. Call me if you need help with anything,” Jeremy whispered, putting a little extra emphasis on the word ‘anything’.
Abby grinned and placed her hand on Jeremy’s shoulder. “You’re very sweet Jeremy, but you don’t have to worry about me. I’m fine. Kyle and I are fine.” Abby walked around Jeremy to get to a huge stack of papers sitting on tray. “I’m going to go to the back and enter these invoices into the system.” She went to step out from behind the register, but Jeremy grabbed her wrist, forcing her to twist around and face him.
“Remember, Abby: You are not anyone’s property. No one has the right to mistreat you. Never forget that.”
Abby nodded and smiled sweetly. Jeremy let her hand go, and Abby disappeared among the book shelves. Abby was touched by Jeremy’s wanting to protect her. Jeremy had had a crush on Abby ever since she started working for him. Jeremy never did anything about his crush because Abby had a boyfriend and because pursuing an employee was against store policy.
Abby pretended she was not aware of Jeremy’s crush, but she had known from day one. She was grateful he had never tried to pursue her. She liked him but only as a friend and would have hated to have to break his heart if he had expressed his true feelings for her. Jeremy had become a good friend to her, and she was thankful to have him in her life.
Abby wished she could’ve told Jeremy what was going on with Kyle. She desperately needed to confide in someone, and Jeremy was the only friend she had in New York at the moment. But she understood that telling Jeremy everything would’ve created more problems than it would’ve solved. So she kept her mouth shut and went on with her day. She spent the rest of the afternoon entering invoices and pretending there wasn’t a shit storm waiting for her at home at the end of the day.
****
After her shift at the bookstore ended, Abby went straight home just like Kyle had instructed her. She held her breath as she stuck her key inside the lock of her apartment’s door and twisted the handle. She braced herself for all the yelling and threats that were about to rain upon her once she set foot inside that apartment.
Kyle was convinced Jeremy was covering for her and was not going to rest until Abby told him the truth about where she really was that afternoon. But Abby was dead set against telling Kyle the truth. For Brianna’s sake and her own, she had to make Kyle believe that she was, in fact, doing bookstore business that day.
While at work, Abby used the bookstore’s computer to doctor some invoices and make them look like she was at a meeting with a book distributor during the hour she was absent from the bookstore. She had the invoices in her purse and was going to show them to Kyle. She crossed her fingers and hoped they’d be enough to satisfy Kyle.
When Abby walked inside the apartment, she found Kyle sitting on the couch with a shot glass in his hand. She spotted an open bottle of Jack Daniels on the coffee table. She could only see the back of Kyle’s head from where she was standing, but she could see the bottle of Jack Daniels was almost empty.
Great, she thought as she shut the door. Over the last four weeks, Abby had found that a drunk Kyle was much more vicious and unbearable than a sober one. She had a feeling that it was going to be a long night for her.
Before Abby could say or do anything, Kyle slammed the shot glass on the table, got on his feet, and walked to where Abby was standing. Abby could smell the strong stench of alcohol on his breath from a mile away. She had guessed right. He was drunk but not falling down drunk.
“Where were you this afternoon?” Kyle slurred, hovering over Abby. “And don’t tell me you were running bookstore errands. I’m not an idiot. You left your phone at the bookstore on purpose. You left it behind so I couldn’t track where you were going. You left it behind because you wanted to go to a place I had specifically forbidden you to go to, and there’s only one place I forbade you to go to. So tell me, Abby. I want to hear it from your own lips. You went to see Brianna. Didn’t you?”
“You’re wrong, Kyle. I can prove I was at a meeting with a book distributor this afternoon. I have the invoices right here…” Abby went to pull the invoices out of her purse, but Kyle didn’t even let her unzip her purse.
Shaking with all-consuming rage, Kyle grabbed Abby by the throat and swung her around until he had her pinned against a wall. “Don’t lie to me. Don’t you fucking lie to me. You went to see her, didn’t you?” Kyle barked, tightening his grip around Abby’s neck while his cold, dead eyes bugged out of his head.
Abby’s face began to contort and turn red as she gasped for air. Her terror-filled eyes widened and her tongue hung out of her mouth. Her worst nightmare had finally come true. Kyle was going to kill her, and there was no one around to save her. She gripped Kyle’s wrist with both hands and tried to push his hand off her throat. She made him loosen his grip long enough for her to say a few words.
“Yes, I went to see her. I went to the theater where she was performing.”
Filled with disgust, Kyle released Abby’s throat, turned his back to her, and stumped to the other side of the room. He ran his hands through his hair and rubbed the back of his neck while Abby, hunched over and shaking, rubbed her bruised neck and coughed.
With her eyes welling with tears, Abby continued with her confession while Kyle, who was still facing away from her, stared at the wall.
“I just saw her from afar. She didn’t even know I was going to be there. Please don’t hurt me and don’t ruin her career. I messed up. I’m sorry. I promise I won’t do it again.”
Abby’s entire body continued to shake with fear. She had not planned on telling Kyle the truth about her afternoon trip, but she feared for her life. Kyle had never turned physically violent against her up until that night. She didn’t know what the new Kyle was capable of or how far he was willing to go in his quest for revenge, so she thought it’d be better to tell him the truth and plead for forgiveness.
Betrayal: Kyle's Revenge (The Betrayal Series) Page 14