“Why is that any of your concern?”
I sighed. “Listen, Lea, I don't have time for whatever mind game you’re playing. If you need to know anything about the child, you can ask me or contact your best friend, Jeremy.”
“Ah, someone is still sour about me inviting him over, huh?” she asked with clear laughter in her voice.
“No, I genuinely don’t care.” Liar! “Listen, the child should be your only concern and I’ll tell you everything about him that you want to know.”
“What are you afraid of, Deano?”
Everything. I sighed. “Listen, Lea, I was in the middle of something important and I'm not keen on being disturbed for a pointless psychological debate. Just email me next time, okay?”
“Dean, I just -”
“Bye, Lea.” I hung up. That was probably the first time in my life that I’d hung up on my sister, but her constant meddling in my life these days was getting on my nerves.
“Phil?” I called loudly.
When the door didn’t open, I frowned. I went to open it; the corridor was empty.
Leaving the door open, I walked back to my desk and pulled up the security cameras, including the secret ones that no one knew about.
I frowned at the one showing Opal’s room. Double-clicking on it, I made it bigger and turned on the sound.
I’d looked at this camera more often than was necessary recently, telling myself I was trying to find the evidence I desperately needed to get rid of her, except…I wasn’t sure it was true anymore.
She was back against the wall, her hands clutching her torn shirt. She looked positively fearful. Phil was crowding her space menacingly.
“Are you so fucking stupid, you can’t see a good offer when it’s right in front of you?” Grabbing her face, he licked her cheek. A growl built deep inside my chest. “Just a couple of fucks a week and you’ll have no worries. Fuck, I’ll even help you keep your kid.”
He wouldn’t do that. Phil would never go against me, but he was the best liar there was.
“No, please,” she begged, her voice quivering with fear. “I don't want that. I don't do that.”
Phil snorted, pushing her harder against the wall. “Please. Who are you trying to kid here? Dean told me you were the kind of cheap whore that got fucked in the ass behind the dumpsters at Arby’s.”
She turned her head as he tried to kiss her, giving me a prime look at the pain and horror on her face at my lawyer’s lies.
“Maybe so, but not anymore. Let me go or-”
He slammed her against the wall. “Or what? What are you going to do? Go cry to Dean? Who do you think he will believe? The prostitute he loathes or the upstanding lawyer who has been by his side for years? Please, you don’t stand a chance. Just for that I should just take you right now and tell him I paid you for it.”
Fight. Goddamnit woman, fight him off! I growled with fury looking at the monitor. Why was I this angry, this offended on her behalf? I should not care and yet...
Phil sighed. “I’ll help you keep the little bastard. Let me satisfy my filthy desires with you, which I'm sure isn’t anything you haven’t done before. I’ll shove it in your cunt, ass, mouth…Take you to swinger parties. Use you like the broken doll you are. Make you my fucking cum bucket.”
“Never!” she spat, pushing him away.
That’s my girl! Your girl? I thought horrified, but I couldn't dwell on that as he’d slapped her so hard, she fell.
“Enough!” I barked, barging out of my office and toward her room. That had gone too far, much too far.
I forced my way in through the connecting door of the nursery, for once glad that the child was sick and his aromatherapy machine made it too loud for him to hear the commotion.
“What’s happening here?” I barked.
Opal was trying to get up, her ripped shirt showing her cherry-covered cotton bra.
“This bitch was trying to get me into bed,” Phil sneered, looking at Opal in disgust. “I almost had to fight her off - She is a fucking nympho.”
I turned to Opal, who looked down, her cheeks already a deep red. There was even some blood on the corner of her lovely plump mouth. I suspected that blow had opened the inside of her cheek.
“Miss Collins?” I tried, but she kept her eyes on the floor. I took a step toward her, which she mirrored with a step back. “Opal?” I tried again as gently as I could.
She sniffled. “It doesn't matter. I need to shower,” she added quickly before disappearing into her small ensuite.
I looked at the door she’d just closed, murder on my mind. It wasn’t her I wanted to kill; it was Phil. Phil, my most trusted colleague. I turned to him, his disgusting erection was still so evident in his pants.
“Lets go,” I ordered, walking through the nursery again and straight to my office. “Take your jacket. You’re leaving.”
“What?” he chuckled, thinking I was joking.
“Take your jacket; you’re leaving,” I replied even colder now.
“What?” He frowned. “Come on, Dean. She’s just a whore who -”
I punched him, hard enough to bruise my knuckles. “We do not abuse women. We do not rape women. Not in my home, not in my presence, not in my company.”
“You’ve fucked her?” Phil asked from his spot on the floor. Reaching into his pocket, he got out a handkerchief and cleaned the blood off his split lip. “Does she have a magic pussy? First your brother, now you?” He shook his head. “You're lost, boy.”
“I did not fuck her. I have no desire to.” Don’t you? “But she’s still helpless. She is still a woman and what -” I shook my head. “You have to leave. Now! Before I do something I regret.”
“After twenty-five years of me saving this company’s ass, you’re choosing her side over mine?” he asked with incredulity as he stood up and grabbed his jacket. “You better think about where your loyalty lies because -” He stopped talking.
“Because what?” I crossed my arms on my chest. “Are you threatening me, Phil? Don’t think I’ll go down alone. I’ve learned from the best.” I pointed at the door. “I’ll repeat it only once more. Leave now.”
Phil grumbled something under his breath before exiting the office. I watched him on the cameras to ensure he left.
Sighing, I picked up my phone, irritated at the woman who was costing me my best employee. Then keep him if you want to. You’ve always known what he was like, but you’d never cared...until now. Why is that? Lea taunted in my head. Fuck, I could hear her stupid witch-doctor nonsense when she wasn’t even here.
“Now’s the time to prove you’re worth the massive retainer I pay you every month,” I announced as soon as Elise, the owner of Hired! a head-hunting company I used from time to time, answered the phone.
“Mr. Beaumont?”
“Yes. I need you to discreetly get feelers out. I need a new corporate lawyer to head my legal department. I need the best of the best; experienced, calculating. Salary opened to negotiation. I need candidates tomorrow by the end of play. All that in complete anonymity.”
“Tomorrow? Sir, that’s -”