Page 127 of The Unraveling

I hand it to her and she sits down on the ground next to me, opening one of the apps that came with the phone. The Find My app, which is supposed to be used for finding lost devices and sharing locations with trusted people.

And yet, under the People tab, I can see that my location is shared with Arabella.

“What the fuck?”

“Yeah, she did the same thing to me when we first started hooking up. That’s how I knew to look. That was back when she gave a shit about stalking me.” She laughs gravely.

“This is insane. How long has she been—”

As I ask the question, I realize that there’s a very good chance she was the one to send the paparazzi to the Seven the other night. That would make sense. But why? Why does she want me punished?

I remember now that, last night, I’d had a moment of confusion about how she knew where to take me when we got in the cab to go home.

“She’s pretty nuclear when she wants to fuck someone up,” Cynthia says.

“Why does she want me destroyed like this? If she wants me fired, why the hell did she ever even get me connected to the company? It was her help that got me in. I would have had no way in. She worked so hard to help me in the beginning.”

“I don’t know. I’m sorry. The only thing I know is that it probably has something to do with the fact that…fuck.”

“What?”

“Last night, after she went to sleep, I went through her phone. Everything seemed off, and I’m not proud of it. I shouldn’t have done it, except—I don’t know, if I hadn’t come over here…” She gives me a look and then says, “You were in pretty rough shape.”

“Thank you for helping me.”

“That’s not why I’m saying it, I’m saying it because I kind of can’t believe that she left you like that. I knew she was catty. I knew she was a bitch when she wanted to be. But you could have died. You were on your back in the bathroom—I mean, if you’d been sick again…”

The awful truth of what could have happened hangs between us.

“Thank you,” I say again.

She waves away my gratitude, blushing a little. “Anyway, when I was going through her phone, I discovered that she’s been cheating on me. Or I guess not cheating, since she wouldn’t commit, but she’s been having a full-on…I don’t know, thing with—god, this is so weird—it seems like she was having an affair with Clementine.”

This shocks me, somehow. After everything.

“Oh my god. That explains so much.”

“Right?” she says, bitterly.

Yes. It does. I had thought, at some point, that maybe she had a thing going with Alistair. The way she acted was like a jealous lover. I knew she couldn’t feel that strongly about me, and the fact that she seemed so weird when I got sponsored by the Cavendishes—it makes so much sense now.

I’m so disgusted with Alistair, I can hardly breathe. He left me there. They all left me there on the floor. Regardless of whether they thought it was my own fault or not, they knew I was sick.

My memories may be vague, but I remember that he said they needed to call 999, but when Clementine threatened to leave, he followed her. He’d rather walk out the door with his meal ticket than take care of me when I really needed him. Needed anyone.

“It seems like Clementine is going to, or is at least saying she’s going to, leave Alistair. He’s running around trying to make money and hide it all over the place and Clementine knows all about it. She just didn’t know about you.”

Shame swirls in my chest. I take another life-giving spoonful of the soup and then chug some water.

“So did Arabella drug me?”

She nods her head sadly. “I feel like she did. It seems like it was her whole plan. To frame you. To show Clementine the apartment and fuck you up so you looked like a mess. Get you fired.”

“Yeah, I’m definitely fired.”

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry for Arabella and what she did. She’s like a one-woman Shakespearean play. I’m sorry you got swept up in it. I’m sorry I did, too, but at least she didn’t come after me. She used to go through my phone and read everything and block people she thought were going to steal me away or who she just didn’t like or whatever. She’s vicious like that.”

“Right.” Then something occurs to me. I open my phone and go to Jordan’s phone number.

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