Glass Towers: Surrendered (13 page)

He grunts, “Yeah
, well I am beginning to wonder if he is obsessed with you.”

“No
, of course he’s not. He just doesn’t know how to move on.”

“He’d better figure it out quickly before I start legal action to force his moving on.”

“Oh Harrison, let’s just focus on keeping that crazy woman away from us. Have you heard anything?”

“Not exactly. She seems to be keeping her distance after the board served her a formal warning
following her text message to me. My father did say that she is hiding out at the Devereaux compound. That is all I know.”

“I still have my suspicions that we haven’t heard the last of her. I wonder what she will do once she learns that we will be marrying on
her
turf on
her
wedding day?”

He looks stricken,
“Oh Danielle, I can’t believe I didn’t even think about the date. It had not even crossed my mind. She can’t do much, as I will see to it that we are heavily secured. Let’s talk more about this later. We have guests to see to out there, and I plan to ravage your body the minute everyone leaves.”

Oh! There goes my body responding to him as it normally does. As inappropriate as it is at times, I hope that I always react to my husband with such abandon for years to come.

True to form, after everyone left, Harrison takes me to our room and devours every inch of my body. We explore each other’s bodies for the better part of the night. When I finally fall asleep, another nightmare greets me. I dream, once again, of the dark hooded man chasing me down the corridors, out into the street. I turn to look behind me, and he is no longer there. I look forward again and there he is, standing in my path and I am about to hit him head on. I scream at him, but no sound comes out of my mouth. I feel my heart pounding, and I can barely breathe, as if his hands are around my neck. I hear a sinister laugh. Then, I wake up. I lie there for a moment, as my breathing slows back down to normal and my heart stops racing. I turn toward Harrison, but he is not there. I sit up and look at the clock on my phone. It is 1:48 AM. I climb out of bed and put on my robe. I am sore from all of our recent lovemaking. I slowly walk out into the hallway and I about to call out his name, when I hear the tinkling sound of a woman laughing. I strain to hear. Is it the television? It is coming from the direction of the media room, so it is possible, though watching TV is not something Harrison engages in very often. Maybe Albert is up. I tiptoe across the cold travertine floor, wishing I had worn slippers. You would think that I would have learned by now. Just as I am about to enter the room, I hear the giggling again and it is definitely not the TV. I walk through the door, into the media room, and there are Harrison and Alicia sitting on the sofa together, talking.

“What the hell is going on here?” My mind is racing a mile a second.

Harrison looks at me, with a surprised expression. “I couldn’t sleep and I didn’t want to wake you. I came out here and found Alicia up watching TV, so I came in to join her.”

She looks at me with a smugness that I would like to slap off her face. “Harry has been lecturing me about going back to school. I think I am convinced,
but I just need to find the funding.” She giggles.

Harry? Did she just call my husband Harry?

“I see, well
Harry
, perhaps you would like to join me back in our bedroom?” I look at Alicia, “Don’t you have a TV in your room?”

I notice
that she is wearing a pair of slinky pajama bottoms and a low cut, practically threadbare, light pink colored t-shirt. I swear that I can see her perky nipples through the fabric. Oh my gosh, I am losing it. I just need to have Harrison get rid of her.

“Yes
, but this one is bigger.” She doesn’t seem to have once ounce of humility.

I look at Harrison and turn to leave. I hear him get up and follow me out into the hallway. Turning back to Alicia, “You might want to get to bed too. We like to get things started early around here.”

She mumbles something, switches the TV and lights out, and then heads the opposite way to her room.

Once back inside our bedroom
, I turn to Harrison “What the fuck was that all about?”

He actually has the nerve to give me a perplexed look. “What are you getting at?”

“What am I getting at? That girl is seriously trying to come on to you that’s what!”

He laughs, “She is not coming onto me. I am sure I am a little too old for her. Besides, I am taken by the most beautiful woman in the world. How can she compete with that?” He grabs me and suckles at
the magic spot on my neck. I try to push him away, but it feels too good. I guess this can wait until the morning. We make love again before I fall back into a fitful sleep.

The next day
, Harrison goes next door to the Rogue Tower to get in a workout. He claims the little workout room he had put in for me doesn’t have manly enough equipment. I set about doing some online shopping for things we will need to take to Montreal with us. I have lots of Christmas shopping to do, but no way am I going to head out to the malls. Harrison wouldn’t hear of it anyway.

I set myself up in the great room on the white leather sofa. It is
a dismal day, but it still seems cheery in this room. While my laptop is firing up, I head out to the kitchen to make myself some tea. I walk in and must have startled Alicia, as she jumped when I said hello. She quickly tucked something into her apron pocket, mumbled a hello, grabbed her rag, and left the kitchen out the other doorway. I notice something on the floor where she had been standing. I bend over to pick it up. It’s a piece of off-white torn paper. The longer I look at it, the more familiar it is. It finally occurs to that it is the same paper as the envelope Bradley’s letter was in. How peculiar.

I put the piece into my pocket and go in search of Alicia. She is in the powder room
, cleaning. “Ah, there you are. I was hoping I could send you on a couple quick errands?”

She seems to jump every time I speak to her
. She stammers, “Uh, sure. I guess so. What do you need?”

“I have a craving for a few things
, so I was thinking you could run up to Zupans in John’s Landing area.”

“Okay, let me just change real quick and I will go, just make me a list.”

“Great.” I head back into the kitchen, make a quick list of things, and grab some cash from my purse. I wait for her in the elevator foyer. I am perched on the edge of the water feature ledge when she walks in. She is dressed in typical college student garb, a hoodie sweatshirt, jeans and sneakers. As I look her up and down, I have not a clue why I am so threatened by her. She is the last thing that would make Harrison hot.

I hand her the list and money and ask her to pick up the dry cleaning as well. That will get her out of the house for at least an hour. I have some investigative work to do. Once I hear the elevator descend the shaft
, I go in search of Albert. I need to enlist his help. As I suspected, Albert is parked in the media room watching his morning talk show circuit.

“Albert?”

“Hmm, oh
oui Madame
?” He stands up.

“I need you to keep an ear out for the elevator for the next thirty minutes or so.”

He tilts his head looking confused.

“I know don’t ask, just work with me
, okay?”

“
Oui Madame
, whatever you want.”

I head back to my bedroom and into the master closet. I remember seeing a ring of keys in one of Harrison
’s drawers. I grab the key ring and head back down the hallway. I get to Alicia’s door and try it. Sure enough, it is locked. I pull out the ring and begin trying the different keys. I am on my fourth try, when I hear someone walking up behind me. I quickly turn around to find Albert standing behind me. “Here, I have a master.” He swiftly unlocks the door, and I give a smile of thanks. He continues to stand outside the door, as I nervously look around. I would just die if I were to be caught. I walk over to the closet and open the door. On the floor of the closet, is the apron she was wearing earlier. I pick it up and put my hand in the pocket only to come up empty handed. I drop the apron back to the floor and shut the closet door.

The nightstand drawer is slightly open. I open it far enough for me to see in
, and sure enough, there are the pieces of the ripped envelope and letter. My hands are now shaking. Why would she have kept this and when was she in our room that she would have collected the pieces? I am not sure what I should do now. I reach into my own tracksuit jacket and pull out my phone. I start to call Harrison, but something else catches my attention. Under the ripped pieces of paper is what appears to be a journal. I open it up and skim over the pages. At first, it seems to be the notes of a nurse, but then the handwriting changes. I go back to the beginning again and actually read what is written. Once I start focusing on the words, I realize this is a written diary of my recovery from the attack. It was written during the time that I was recovering here at the penthouse. I can see that this was written by Glenda. I read on. It describes how I was doing. How many times Harrison came into the room with me. It describes conversations she overheard. It even describes what Harrison was wearing and how long we were alone, without Glenda in the room.

My palms are getting sweaty and my heart is beating faster with each turn of the page. Why in the hell would Glenda keep those kinds of notes
? I can understand making brief observations for the doctors, but this is creepy. These are not the normal nurse-type of notes. I skip forward to where the handwriting changes. I can tell that the voice of the writer changes dramatically. As I read into the second paragraph, I realize this is the writing of Alicia. It describes how hot she finds Harrison and how she wishes she was me, with all of my money and opportunity. I skip a couple pages and the most terrifying thing pops off the pages at me. It says she will begin tainting my food now that she has gained the trust of the rest of the staff. A little farther down the page it says that she is gaining the eye of Harrison, and she feels it won’t be long before she is able to seduce him. After that, there is a page of doodles like one does while talking on the phone. I skip ahead to the last entry.

‘Tonight, I finally got somewhere. He is all mine now. The bitchy wife might be on to me
, so I have to be careful. Wasn’t able to do anything with food today. Big news though. The moron is re-marrying her on New Years in his hometown. Not if we can stop it.’

My stomach does a complete flip
-flop. I feel sick now from having read the musings of an immature nut job who is living under the same roof as me.

I begin to walk out of the room
, when I realize that I still have her book in my hand. I am not sure what to do with it. The contents are incriminating, but the ramifications are overwhelming. What does this mean? Are the writings for herself or for someone else? Why would Glenda have been making notes about my recovery and then Alicia making notes about our life here. I couldn’t read the part about her standing outside our bedroom door listening to us having sex. Dear God, I don’t even want to know what she wrote. She is sick and she is leaving. Today.

I peer out to the hallway
, and Albert is still standing there, leaning against the wall with his ear bud in his ear. I wonder what show has him so engrossed this time. No matter, I have more pressing issues. “Albert!”

“
Oui
?”

“Can you get a box out of the storage closet by the elevator? I am packing up Alicia’s things.

“
Madame
?”

He steps aside
, and there is Alicia standing behind him with the bag of groceries from Zupans in one hand and the dry cleaning in the other.

“Guess I got back just in time.” She says far too smugly.

I am still standing in her room with her journal in my hand and the pieces of paper in the drawer. Now is as good as any time to confront her. “Care to explain this?”

She drops her parcels to the floor and breezes into the room.
She tries to snatch the book from my hand, but I am taller and hold the book up in the air. “Will you let me explain?”

“Yes, while you pack your things. Albert?”

“
Oui Madame
, I will get the box.”

Alicia t
akes his absence as an opportunity to attempt to seize the book again. I am holding her off with my free arm, while I shout “Albert! Albert!” I hear his feet pounding on the tiles as he returns to the room.

“Sure, call your body guard to protect you against the poor little housekeeper.”

“I read what you wrote in here. You need to pack your things and get the hell out before I have you thrown out!” I am shouting at the top of my lungs. “I am no longer putting up with your insubordinate husband-lusting ass.”

“Danielle?”

I whirl around to see my husband standing there, taking in the whole scene.

“Just what is going on here?” He demands.