Victoria's Got a Secret (22 page)

She’d had numerous television appearances and interviews.
Entertainment Tonight
had her on repeatedly. She no longer worried about being in front of people or what people would say. She’d ventured so far beyond that.

When needed, she stripped off Jennifer from Sarnia and tucked her away for private. She put on her Victoria Sinclair personality cloak and wowed them far beyond Canada.

Money and opportunities constantly came her way. The directors at Naked News listened to her views. She trained all of the new anchors. In many ways, she’d gone from a mere employee to someone who helped run the show. She had a cut of the franchise and the fat bank account to prove it.

She quietly thanked the owners every day for taking her seriously and including her. They never made her feel little or unimportant. Every promise Walt had made had been fulfilled.

Her professional life was on fire.

Her personal life was exploding into a million terrified and lonely pieces.

Preston made every minute miserable. She’d long ago gone from liking him to tolerating him. She didn’t want him guiding her. Didn’t even want to see him most days. He’d gone from controlling her wardrobe to picking at everything she did and said.

He acted like she didn’t have a brain and wasn’t worthy of his time.

But the slow destruction of her mental hold on reality was the worst. They’d have arguments, and he’d later deny they even spoke. He started leaving the apartment in the morning and not coming back until late and reeking of cheap perfume.

Today was one step too far. She stared down at her bank statement and tried to make sense of all the withdrawals.

“What are you doing?” His voice slithered through the apartment as he headed for the door, adjusting his tie.

“Did you use my bank card?” She turned around to face him with the paper still clenched in her fist.

He stared her up and down, judging but not seeing her. The dismissal showed in every muscle. “I have my own.”

A typical nonanswer. That’s all he gave lately. He didn’t even try to explain or excuse his behavior. He just acted like everything he did was right and everything she thought was wrong.

“I have all of these deductions listed, and I didn’t do any of them.”

His eyes narrowed. “You kept taking out money. Don’t you remember?”

The room danced in front of her eyes, but she adjusted her stance. She would not back down on this one. No matter how angry or belittling he became. “When?”

“Last week.”

Everything shifted and kept moving. It was as if her brain had deteriorated overnight. She’d spent hours dissecting their conversations and rerunning his denials until she thought she was going insane.

“What are you talking about?” Her spine stiffened.

He casually buttoned his jacket. “I told you I thought it was excessive. You don’t need all that cash at one time.”

He was making it up. She didn’t know why, but he was. “That never happened.”

“The stress is getting to you.” He managed to sound concerned as he said it.

“No.” She held out a hand to fend him off when he tried to hug her. The motion proved useless when he pulled her into his arms.

“Victoria dear, it’s okay.”

She shook her head. “I didn’t take the money.”

“Of course you did.” He brushed a hand over her hair as he pressed her face into his shoulder. “It’s like the thing with the stove yesterday.”

“I never turned it on.” She knew she hadn’t. He yelled at her for trying to burn the house down, but she had never even been into the kitchen.

He did it. Did it and wouldn’t admit it.

The countless scenes played over and over in her head. So many things he insisted happened or didn’t. So many facts she knew were wrong.

Something was happening to her. Something that took the reality she knew and twisted it into something sick.

“It was off when I left and on when I got back.” He pulled back to look down at her. “It was a mistake. You can admit that you messed up.”

“I didn’t do it.”

He sighed. “I really think you should see someone.”

“This isn’t about me. It’s about you.”

“You keep telling yourself that, but it’s only a form of denial.

You won’t be able to go over this until you deal with it.”

She gave him credit. In a way he was right. She had to confront the truth. “Where were you yesterday?”

“Work.” His hands dropped to his sides. “We talked about this.”

They hadn’t. The night replayed clearly in her mind. She’d refused to talk when she suspected he’d been out sleeping with someone else. She’d heard the rumors. Saw women whisper behind their hands in the bathrooms of the clubs.

Call it denial, but she smelled the sickly sweet scent on him one time too many. Rather than face the argument she knew they had to have, rather than make the decision to end it, she’d pulled in tight.

That’s how she knew this time he was definitely wrong about what transpired between them. Having that knowledge, she now started to question every time he insisted one thing happened when she believed another.

He had her so wound up and confused that she honestly didn’t know what was happening to her. Until now.

This wasn’t about depression or needing therapy. This was about him. He was playing a sick game that warped their relationship even further and threatened to drive her mad. She just wished she understood why.

He brushed a hand through his hair. “Why don’t we—”

She backed away, putting as much room as possible between them. “No.”

“Victoria.”

“My name is Jennifer.”

“It’s whatever I say it is.” His growl bounced off the walls, making her flinch.

She grabbed her purse. “I’m going to Heather’s house.”

“Running to your big sister. You’re pathetic.”

“I’m leaving.” She rushed to the door, afraid he would try to stop her.

“Wait until you try to get back in here.”

She spun around. Did a quick glance around the apartment and decided she could replace anything. Him, the furniture, even her paperwork. But if she didn’t leave soon he would suck out her soul. “I’ll be back later.”

“Don’t bother.” He swept his hand over the kitchen table and knocked her empty glass to the floor. It shattered with an earsplitting crash against the hardwood. “You know what you are?”

His words stopped her hand from turning the knob. “An idiot for staying with you.”

“You take off your clothes for money. There’s only one definition for that type of work.”

In two sentences he’d said all the accusations she feared when she took the Naked News job. “Don’t say it.”

“That makes you a whore. One I created. A pure invention of my imagination.”

“
You
get out.”

“Why should I? You don’t have the strength to make it without me.”

Backing down didn’t calm him. Fighting just inflamed him.

There wasn’t a good choice, so she went with the truth. “At least I don’t sleep around. That’s you.”

“Do you blame me?”

She refused to let his words slice and dice her. With her heart thudding and her mind buzzing with the possibility of a life without him. “You’re a shadow of the man you once were. And, honestly, you weren’t that great to begin with.”

He pointed at her. “You will learn to obey me.”

“Never.”

“I will not let some whore try to run my life.”

“I don’t want to have anything to do with you.”

He swore. “I guess you plan to run back to Paul. Now that he’s finally called, you can beg him to take you back.”

She blocked out his words. She couldn’t let her mind go to Paul, or Preston would see the weakness and exploit it.

“Is that it, Victoria?” Preston took a step toward her.

She held up her hands but was prepared to do whatever it took if he even tried to touch her. “Stay away from me.”

“All you’ve ever wanted was some construction guy from a small town.”

It made her sick to think Preston had ever spent one second thinking about Paul. Preston wasn’t good enough to wash Paul’s clothes.

She slid to her left to get away from him and lost her balance. Her feet tangled beneath her and she went flying, air sucking past her as her face headed for the hard floor. At the last minute, she turned and landed with a groan on her shoulder.

Glass crunched under her. She couldn’t remember where it came from, but it was in her hair and cutting into her palm. Her bones creaked and jaw rattled. She’d never seen stars before, but she made them out clearly in the darkness that fell over her eyes.

Preston crouched down with his face close to hers. “You can’t do anything right.”

When he stepped around her and walked out the door, she let out the jagged breath she’d been holding.

Two hours later, Jennifer scanned the concerned faces across from her on the couch. She sat bundled up in a throw and curled on a chair. “I’m fine.”

Her best friend and true confidante, Andrea, stared back with hollow cheeks and flat lips. She wore her straight blonde hair in a ponytail, making her look years younger. They were ten years apart in age, but saw so many things the same way.

People mistook her quiet watchfulness for something else. One look in those soulful blue eyes and the intelligence behind them was obvious. The woman was a private investigator after all.

Jennifer depended on her friendship and missed spending time with her as Preston became more demanding and so insulting. And she had never seen her friend so serious or sad. She knew the worry was for her. The people she loved looked at her with a mix of concern and anger.

She recognized the emotions because they warred within her. “I panicked when I called you. I calmed down right after.”

“You are not okay. You are a mess.”

“I gotta agree with Andrea on this one.” Andrea’s husband, Will, glanced at Jennifer’s hand and then to her face.

“It was a fight that got out of hand.” Jennifer kept rising to Preston’s defense. It was an ingrained reaction. One she couldn’t seem to skip even when he scared the hell out of her.

Heather stood up. “Enough.”

All eyes went to her.

Andrea rushed to diffuse the situation. “Heather, I don’t think this is the time.”

“He is an ass. He’s been one for years, and you keep taking it. You are smarter than this. Walk away.”

“Hey.” Andrea demanded Jennifer’s attention simply by shifting forward on the couch cushion and holding Jennifer’s hands in her own. “We are all here for you.”

“I want to move you out and hide you somewhere that idiot will never find you,” Will mumbled.

Andrea did not take her gaze off of Jennifer. “What we want isn’t the issue. This is about you. What you need.”

Jennifer shook her head, lost in the pain of having her life run so far off course. “I don’t know how I got here.”

Heather closed her eyes. When she opened them again, the lashes were suspiciously wet. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

Deep inside Jennifer knew that. She’d been beaten down but not destroyed. Preston had tried to wipe the Jennifer she knew off the planet and replace her with his vision of Victoria. He banged away, chipping at her self-confidence day by day while she let him take that level of control over her.

But she always reserved something for herself. She retreated in her memories and forged a path around him. She failed in some respects and she needed to own up to that, but she could turn everything around. Take control.

Jennifer stared at her hands, at anything but the caring eyes in front of her. She knew she’d disappointed them on some level. They would never say it, but it would take her a long time to recover from it.

Andrea squeezed Jennifer’s hands. “He’s threatened by you. By your success.”

Will put a hand on his wife’s shoulder. “She’s right. Preston looks together but he’s a complete—”

“He’s unstable,” Heather said.

“On the inside he’s a little boy and you’re this toy,” Andrea said.

Jennifer couldn’t help but laugh at that one. “Thanks.”

Andrea smiled, but it lacked her usual warmth and charm. “You know what I mean. He doesn’t respect you as a woman.”

“He wants you to be how he sees you.” Heather crossed her arms in front of her.

Jennifer glanced at the wall of concern and realized how lucky she was. These people cared about her. She called, and they dropped everything to come running. Will left work and Andrea wouldn’t talk about the investigative assignment she was supposed to be working. They loved her unconditionally. As real love was supposed to be.

And they’d obviously been talking about her. “How long have you guys been saving all of this up?”

Will shrugged. “They talk about you all the time.”

Andrea gave him the wifely evil eye she did so well. “You’re not helping.”

“Sorry.”

Andrea shook her head. “The bottom line is you deserve better. I don’t know exactly what he said or did, but I saw the one thing today I never wanted to see.”

Jennifer had seen so many terrible things. She didn’t even know how to start the list. “What?”

“You afraid.” Andrea’s words brought a fresh well of tears to Jennifer’s eyes.

Will nodded. “You deserve so much more.”

Jennifer loved Will for loving Andrea. Now she loved him for saying that. She could never imagine him calling her names. Andrea wouldn’t tolerate it, but Will wasn’t that guy. “You’re a good man.”

“And you will find one of your own.”

“Preston isn’t it.” Heather added the comment as if they hadn’t all already made that clear.

That was the one point Jennifer didn’t need help to understand. “I know.”

Heather’s eyes widened. “You do?”

Will smiled. “Looks like she does.”

“I’m not going to sit here and make excuses for his behavior.”

Jennifer let her feet fall to the floor and shrugged the blanket to the side. “But I do need your help.”

“Anything.” Andrea sat back into Will’s waiting arm. “Will will hit him with a stick.”

“Gladly.”

“Tempting, but I think I know a better idea.” Jennifer stood up.

Fueled with their support, she could do this. Had to do this. “We need boxes.”