19. Alyssa

While I still had some time before my family arrived, I decided to start putting the final nail in Helen's coffin. Now see, Helen hasn't worked in years, but she still keeps in touch with her old work buddies because they're the only people she can lord it over since her skeezy ass married up.

Also, she and Dad are members of the country club set, and she loves her Saturday Brunch and afternoon teas, in short, all the things Mom was a part of before she decided to crawl into her skin to take over her life. Her reputation is very important to her, and her standing in the community is like the air she breathes.

Since I'm not ready to show my hand just yet, that's where Rhoda comes into play. I started my campaign with hints and innuendo. ‘Which bed-hopping harlot who stole a whole ass married man from his family had to threaten his job when he wanted to go back to his wife fifteen years ago?'

I dropped that in the community forum and hit send. Knowing the older generation in my community, tongues were going to get to wagging before noon. It's Sunday, so the church crowd would have something to chew over after service because no one gossips more than church-going grandmas.

If they don't get it by nightfall, I'll be sure to drop a hint or two just to get them headed in the right direction. Now, I have information on Helen and her daughter that I have been collecting for years, but the folders hubby gave me as part of my wedding gift had even more.

There were some things I always suspected, like the fact that once a cheat, always a cheat, and yes, she'd cheated on my idiot Dad more than once in the last fifteen years, but I didn't feel bad for him, in fact, that made me very happy. I relish the idea of rubbing it in his face, but not just yet. I'll wait until he is at his lowest, then strike.

I abhor him almost as much as I do her and her kid, and the only thing saving him is the fact that we share blood. I never discussed the divorce and what it did to me. I stopped somewhere around the age of twelve, a good four years after everything was turned upside down.

That was about the time I realized that my Dad was a piece of shit. Whether he had decided to lay in the bed he'd made and screw everything else, I don't know. But I know when he allowed Helen and her daughter to bully me when he would cancel my events at her behest, that I started to despise him.

That was the year Trey went away to college. He was the last of my brothers to leave, and the others were still away at school, either in the master's program or PhD. Since I no longer had my protectors there as often, Helen let her mask slip. When the boys were still around, they made sure Dad and I had time alone with each other.

That all stopped that year. Helen insisted that Mitzie, who lived with and saw my Dad every day, had to be a part of everything we did. If I said anything, I was yelled at, and to keep the peace, Dad always made me take low.

He had no idea that my anger turned to rage and slowly simmered into loathing. I saw the once loving, strong man, who I had once held above everyone else, become a despicable cliché.

I always knew I was going to make them pay. Though I never spoke of my inner feelings with anyone. Not even Sherry, my closest friend. I used to keep journals until I realized the dangers of someone else finding them, so I burned them all. But everything was already imprinted on my brain, some things you just never forget.

I will never forget him paying more attention to someone else's daughter while neglecting his own. Never forgive him for standing by while Helen talked down to me and ripped my mother apart out of her petty jealousy.

Something else I made sure to do was to excel in school. I knew that meant a lot to Dad, and because Helen loved making comparisons, I knew it would stick in her craw that I was better than her kid in every way. What she didn't know was about the things her kid was getting up to when she was supposed to be at school.

When I graduated, she did some shady shit to get her diploma, and I know all the details. I've been covering my tracks over the years, and no one, not even my brothers, knew about any of this. About the fact that I have been collecting incriminating and reputation-killing evidence for the past ten years.

It suddenly hit me that Garrett knew my darkest secrets and didn't seem the least bit fazed, which makes me wonder just how crazy he is. I knew why I was doing it; my moral core wouldn't let me do anything different, but what the hell was his excuse?

"Why are you helping me?"

"Why wouldn't I help my wife?"

"It can't be that simple."

"But it is. If what you were doing would put you in any danger, I'd find ways around it, but I've already told you I only have one bottom line that must never be crossed. Everything else is fair game. Besides, they fucked with my woman, that's not allowed."

"But you didn't even know me then."

"Doesn't matter. It means enough to you after all these years, so it must be important. If it's important to you, it's important to me."

"Are you trying to make me like you or something?" He choked on his orange juice and looked at me.

"You really don't hold back, do you?"

"Did you want me to?"

"No, I like this straightforward, no shits given approach. I'll always know where I stand."

"If it gets to be too much, let me know."

"No, don't change who you are, not even for me, baby." He's so freaking smooth. I can't stand him.

HELEN

What the hell is going on? Why does it seem like everything that can go wrong has in the last few months? If I didn't know better, I'd think someone had it out for me, but I have no enemies with that kind of power. In fact, for the last fifteen years or so, I have been the one with the power.

Once I left my shiftless husband and married up, my and my daughter's lives have been on easy street. I know what some people say behind my back, but none of them would dare say it to my face because of my husband's standing in the community.

I was able to hold my head up even after breaking up a marriage, which most people seem to have forgotten with time. My ex-husband came from nothing, and though we loved each other for a time, love doesn't pay the bills after all.

I had a child to raise and I wanted better for her. What's so wrong with that? Once I realized that I had a way with men and didn't have to just settle for the boy I met in high school, I decided to set my sights higher. I didn't want to kill myself working for the rest of my life after all, and with my looks, why shouldn't I shoot for the stars?

Corbin had been easy. I knew once I got him to open up about his home life, especially the fact that his wife wasn't putting out because of her depression, that it would be child's play getting him in my bed, and from there, I would do the rest.

The only fly in my ointment had been his kids, especially his bitch daughter who wanted to be Daddy's girl, while leaving my kid out in the cold. It had been a long, hard fight, but I eventually won there too. But the little bitch had lost her mind, and since then, everything has gone to shit.

I knew I should've called the cops that night. She broke in here and attacked us. Things would be so different now if I had, I'm sure. But the truth is, I felt him slipping away long before that. It started when she didn't invite him to her graduation when he had to hear about her valedictorian speech from others.

Or maybe it started long before that and I just never realized. I was too busy enjoying my new status to care about him sulking. After his attack of conscience when I threatened to sue him and the company all those years ago, I sensed a shift even then, but as long as I got what I wanted, I didn't care about anything else.

I was Corbin's wife, and my kid was enrolled in one of the best schools in the area, where she got to meet the sons and daughters of the wealthier citizens. She got to wear better clothes, and so did I. It didn't matter that I had to force him; I didn't care as long as I got to live the life I always dreamed of.

I'd wasted my youth on my high school sweetheart, who was arguably the love of my life; he was just too poor, is all. It's not my fault that Gigi was too stupid to hold onto her man. That bitch refused to remarry or even date as the years went by, and I knew that my husband felt a way about that.

His family and mine had turned their backs on me. I was able to buy my way back into my family's good graces. I guess bills needing to be paid trumped their moralistic high ground, but I was never able to get his side of the family to accept me and my child, no matter how hard I tried.

I never understood how they could treat a child like that. Corbin's children were spoiled right in our faces, always going on trips overseas with their grandparents, having shopping sprees every season, especially the little bitch.

It wasn't fair. She had her mother's family to spoil her; she didn't need my husband's as well. I'd argued time and again with Corbin about that, but he never seemed to care too much. His answer was always that I got what I wanted, and he wasn't going to fight his family for me.

The first few years of our marriage, I had to put up with his kids in my house, taking time away from Mitzie and me, but once the last boy went away, I was finally able to breathe, and things started looking up again.

I was never able to knock the shit out of Alyssa the way I always wanted to, but at least I was able to drive a wedge between her and her father. It's not my fault that her Dad chose my kid over her; he had the choice. I know I had worn him down, not to mention the threats I'd made against Gigi when things didn't go my way.

But now that the kids were all grown I'm starting to see the cracks in my plan. It felt as if I had been losing ground for a while, but so much time had gone by that I didn't think there was any danger to myself.

And then the wedding came up. I wasn't invited, of course, and neither was Mitzie. I threatened Corbin about what would happen if he went without us, but this time, he didn't seem too worried. I'd still insisted on going anyway, and he'd agreed once I threatened to show up anyway and make a scene at his precious daughter's wedding.

It didn't matter how I got my way. The outside world didn't have to know that my marriage was a sham and had been from the beginning. I didn't care about any of that. He had to keep up appearances after all, so he couldn't mistreat us, but now that the kids were all grown, he didn't seem to care as much.

I knew it was all about her, Alyssa. She was always the one he cared most about. That's why I hate her the most. I could never kill his love for her entirely, not even when she cut him out of her life. In fact, once she did that, he seemed to try even harder, though she never seemed to care.

My poor daughter had tried her best to get him to love her the same way. I'd even cut off contact between her and her biological father as a way to make Corbin step up, and he had for a while, but now everything seems to be going haywire.

Turning up at the airport to find that my ticket had been canceled was the first blow, and then Mitzie being arrested because her name was on some list only confounded the whole situation. I still don't know what that list was or why her name was there. They tried explaining that it was something to do with traffic tickets but what sense does that make?

I tried buying another ticket, but there was no money on my card, no money in the bank account, nothing and I had no access to Corbin's. That's when real panic started to kick in. That, and when my calls kept going directly to voicemail, is what really made me start to panic.

Things that I hadn't paid attention to or given thought to in years were suddenly at the forefront of my mind. All the things I had done and should have done to secure my future were suddenly weighing heavy on me.

There was no change at home. Everything was still the same, as far as I could tell. Corbin hadn't taken his clothes or any of his important stuff, so I knew he hadn't run off. But the thought of him on that island playing happy family with Gigi and her kids was more than I could take.

If that wasn't enough, now I have these fucking fleas all over my house. I've never seen this many fleas in one place before, and my whole body is now covered in bites from my face to my ass. I can't even go to the pharmacy for itch cream because my card is empty, and since it's the weekend, I have to wait until tomorrow to get to the bank and fix this.

If his kids were still here, I'd swear they were the ones responsible for all this, but there's no way they could've done any of this. So, who was it? I thought of my lovers, any one of whose wife could be behind this, but if that was the case there was nothing I could do. If Corbin ever found out about my affairs, my prenup would be void, and I would get nothing.

I felt panic rise up as my head wanted to explode. I can't even get my kid out of jail or hire a lawyer, and there's no way to get in touch with Corbin. I don't have any of his kids' numbers. Not one of them had ever given me the time of day and had always treated me less than the dirt they walk on. Even when they used to stay in touch with their father, they never acknowledged me, and that all stopped once Alyssa went off to college.

That's when I realized that he didn't really care about Mitzie. What Alyssa did had broken him, and he'd spent the last five years trying to win her and her brothers back to no avail. I hadn't cared then, but maybe I should've paid more attention.

I can see now that I had grown too comfortable. But how was I to know that his kids' reaction to the divorce and the fact that his ex-wife never remarried or dated anyone would make him turn out this way? I should've made him share my bed and should've forced the issue when he claimed to be suffering from erectile dysfunction due to the stress of the divorce and subsequent fallout.

Maybe that had been a lie as well. Maybe he'd just been biding his time. I had no answers and no way of getting any now that he was out of the country and not answering his phone. I thought at first that it was because of his location that my calls weren't going through, but now I'm not so sure.

I sat on the couch feeling stressed the hell out and jumped right back up when the fleas descended on me en masse. I opened my mouth to scream and scare them away and ended up with my third mouthful of the disgusting things.