Chapter 16
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Elena finally looked up from her documents. Her dark eyes were completely unreadable, devoid of both anger and sympathy. She looked at the weeping, broken woman in front of her and felt absolutely nothing.
"I am not destroying your life, Cassandra," Elena said calmly. "Your actions destroyed your life. My husband and I are simply providing the consequences you have evaded your entire existence."
"I slapped you because I thought you were a maid!" Cassandra cried out, immediately realizing how terrible it sounded. She desperately tried to backtrack. "I was drunk! I was stressed! I made a mistake, and I am so, so sorry! I will get on my hands and knees and apologize to you right now!"
"You don't understand, do you?" Elena said, leaning back in her chair. "You think you are apologizing because you feel remorse. You aren't. You are apologizing because you lost your money. If I had actually been a maid, you would have gone home that night, slept perfectly well, and never thought about my bleeding lip ever again."
Cassandra sobbed, burying her face in her hands. "Please... I have nowhere to go. I don't know how to survive without my money."
"You will learn," Elena replied coldly. "Just like the thousands of working-class people you have abused, underpaid, and humiliated over the years. You will learn how to check the price of bread. You will learn how to take the bus. You will learn what it feels like to be invisible."
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"Elena, please have mercy!" Cassandra shrieked, sliding out of the chair and falling to her knees on the plush carpet.
"You demanded that a bleeding waitress get on her hands and knees to clean up broken glass in front of an entire ballroom," Elena reminded her, her voice dropping to a harsh whisper. "Mercer is a luxury reserved for those who show it to others. You have exactly one minute left in my office. I suggest you use it to walk to the elevator."
