Chapter 10 - Denied Entry
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By four o'clock in the afternoon, Adrian arrived unannounced at my office building.
He did not make it past the front security desk.
I watched the live feed from the lobby security cameras on the boardroom monitor. Adrian stood near the elevators, his hair disheveled, his expensive tie crooked, the usual, arrogant ease completely gone from his posture.
He loudly demanded to see me. When the guard refused, he began to beg. When begging failed, he threatened the receptionist with legal action for denying him "marital access," a phrase so legally absurd that Marisol, sitting beside me, actually lowered her glasses and stared at the screen in disbelief.
Adrian eventually gave up on the guards and called my private office line.
I answered and put him on speakerphone.
“Tell them to let me upstairs, Isla,” he demanded, his voice tight with panic.
“No.”
“I am your husband.”
“For now.”
A heavy, breathless silence filled the line.
“You’re blowing this wildly out of proportion,” he said, desperately trying to recover his old, patronizing tone. “You walked out of my sister’s wedding because of a simple seating misunderstanding.”
“Was the seating misunderstanding before or after you paid your mistress with money actively stolen from my company?” I asked calmly.
His breathing hitched audibly over the phone.
Marisol wrote a quick note on her legal pad, tapping her pen.
Adrian lowered his voice, attempting a conspiratorial whisper. “Isla, please listen to me. Bianca’s agency did provide legitimate services for the firm.”
“Did sleeping with you in Burlington count as billable hours, Adrian?”
May you like
He made a sharp, wounded sound in the back of his throat. “That is beneath you, Isla.”
“No, Adrian,” I replied, my voice turning to ice. “What was truly beneath me was constantly apologizing to your mother for noticing my own money quietly disappearing.”
