Page 101 of Games We Play
“Who the fuck are you?” Even with cake on his face, Aaron was still an intimidating menace when he barked like a rabid dog. Leah kept her fear inside and only showed him a brave face she mustered when she glanced back at Sloan, who kept careful distance with one eye on the scene unfolding before her. “What the fuck do you know about my marriage!”
“I know you stole over ten years of her life.” Leah’s balled fists hung at her sides. She would never lash out and strike the man, but damn if her anger didn’t want to explode! “You took someone and made her unable to trustherselfin relationships. The only reason I’m here today is because I love her enough to help her through whatyoudid to her!”
“Love her?” Aaron scoffed. “I’m the only person capable of loving that bitch. You have no idea what it means to deal with therealher. She’ll chew you up and spit you out faster than you can beg for it.”
“Let’s calm down now…” Peter the divorce lawyer said. Maxine remained beside him, on her phone and calling God knew who. “We can resume these discussions as soon as your lawyer is here, Mr. Giles.”
“Fuck all of you!” Aaron threw his fist in the lawyer’s direction. Sloan sat up straight in her seat. Leah took a giant step back, but it wasn’t quick enough to outpace the man coming after her. “Do you know what she’ll do to you? She’ll hurt you worse than I ever could!”
Leah couldn’t hide her fear any longer. She had used up every reserve of courage she had in her gut, and God only knew how long it would take to build up enough to face him again.
He obviously was the type who loved a good wounded puppy. Because that was his fist coming for Leah’s face, convinced that she wasn’t quite wounded enough.
Her scream once she realized what was happening could have shattered cheaper glass.
Not that she needed to scream. Sloan was already out of her chair the moment her husband raised his fist. Either she had a keen sixth sense for what he was about to do, or this played into the fears Sloan had harbored since kindling a relationship with Leah.
Perhaps both.
She threw herself between Aaron and Leah, but not to take the hit on her girlfriend’s behalf. Sloan was too quick for that. Aaron, the cupcake-stained fool that he was, soon received a slap on the face and a firm push to the chest. He stumbled backward and landed in his chair.
“Don’t. Touch.Her.” Sloan slammed her hands on the arms of his chair and heaved fire in his face. The man was too shocked to say or do anything. “You’re right, Aaron.” Her maniacal hiss kept Leah at a fair distance. Maxine was out of the room, demanding that the receptionist get security up there faster. The only person to get closer was Peter, and his hand was firmly on his phone, recording the moment for posterity. “I’m a fucking cunt. I own that. I always have, you good for nothing piece of shit. Because I’d rather be a cunt than a dick. You know why?” She pinched his greasy cheek. “At least cunts taste good.”
Security arrived ten seconds later. Aaron barely had his bearings back, but he wasn’t about to intimidate anyone with that much confection on his complexion.
“Do you wanna play a game, Aaron?” Sloan stood a few feet away, arms crossed while security got the scoop from Peter and Leah. “How about Monopoly? Because I’m about to own your Boardwalk.” She stomped her foot. “This building. The penthouse. The vacation house in the Poconos.All of it!You don’t get anything anymore!”
She grabbed Leah’s hand and pulled her out of the conference room. Half of the staff in the main office pretended to not have heard or seen anything as they went back to their emails and tribulations with the copying machine. Leah wondered if any of them would come bear witness in divorce court.
She didn’t have much more time to wonder. The first thing Sloan did when they were in her high-rise office was kiss her girlfriend and promise that the worst was over.
It was only then that Leah let her fears spill out of her. Her trembling earned her the hardest hug any woman had ever given her.
Chapter 32
“I still can’t believe you hit him with acupcake.” Sloan laughed into her cocktail, freshly made and delivered to her temporary accommodations six blocks away from The G&S Building. “The only way that could’ve been better was if it were a pie.”
Leah, dressed in a comfortable shift dress, stifled her own laugh. “I didn’t know what else to do. He was saying such terrible things about you!”
You should’ve heard what he often said in private.Sloan had brushed most of it off over the years, because what was the point of internalizing one man’s disdain for her? She wished she could say it started when she broke up with him, but when she thought about it, she realized that her ex had been getting under her skin from the first night they spent together.
That had been part of his appeal, since it was rare for a man to make her think of him for days afterward. Most men were quickly written off as either inconsequential or nothing but trouble. Aaron? He had played his seduction so well that Sloan hadn’t realized what happened until she was in love with him.It wasn’t real love. I know that now.It was dependency. Something not even she could avoid when confronted with the wrong person.
Her therapist had been trying to get her to see that for years. Yet Sloan, being who she stubbornly was, had no desire to say,“I had no control in the situation. He did it. He has the blame. Maybe I was a victim.”
“Are you okay?”
Sloan looked up from her cocktail. Night had fallen in Chicago, and after such a long day, Leah was still the pinnacle of effortless beauty. Sure, she had bags under her eyes, and her hair needed a good wash, but who cared when she looked like that in her most natural state? She didn’t need makeup, which she had washed off as soon as Sloan announced they weren’t going out again that night.
“Why?” Sloan forced another smile of grand amusement.
“You look a little out of it. That’s all.”
“It’s been a long day.” Sloan swallowed the last of her cocktail.I should’ve ordered two.Her current stay in a hotel suite meant the hotel bar was more than accommodating with delivering drinks. Sometimes, Sloan ordered more drinks than food. “I wasn’t expecting this morning to bethateventful. I thought we would shake him up a little. Maybe make him cry. Tears would’ve been nice.”
“I thoughtIwas going to cry.” Leah had barely touched her snack. Unfortunately, this was their first time having any true privacy, since the afternoon was nothing but infighting among lawyers and dinner was had with Peter and Maxine. The experienced divorcee hadn’t been kidding when she said Peter was the best in the business, and it tookherreferral for him to look twice at Sloan’s impending divorce.Getting video of that altercation earlier was genius.Almost as genius as Sloan recording their private conversations.
The man had been shaken enough to start talking about what it would take to get Margaret Sloan out of his life forever. Peter was certain they had a strong case on their hands. Between that day and Aaron immediately going public with a new girlfriend, Sloan would have no issues negotiating for some of the higher priced properties from her marriage.I put in the time. I gave him my youth. It’s time to take what’s mine and move the fuck on.
