Time To Heal [COMPLETED]

CHAPTER ONE: HER DOUBLE LIFE

FIVE YEARS LATER...

A frigid cold smile plastered on her face, Anastasia stared at the culprit standing in her line of vision with undisguised disdain. Consideration or pity were not part of her dictionary, so she could not be bothered that the poor man stood completely humiliated in front of her, his head bent in resigned shame. In fact, it gave her a sense of perverse satisfaction to know that she had the power to make that man cower like a worm. She was an unfeeling bitch, she knew – in general models were supposed to have a mean side.

Anyway, she was after all Anastasia Forrester– the queen bee of the contemporary NY fashion world which gave her enough leeway to do anything she wanted. Humility was not her thing. Had been in the past but now she felt better being the proud princess she was. It was life, after all, which had molded her into who she was now, who she was meant to be.

"So, what will it be Mr. Patterson? You have two options. Either you accept that you have stolen the sample from the store room and resign or I hand you over to the cops?" she proposed in an uncompromising voice, bestowing him with a glacial look that could freeze hell over.

In a completely melodramatic setting, the entire office was holding its breath, waiting for the offender's reaction, and Ana had the bitter notion that most of them were probably enjoying the show. What a bunch of losers, she mentally sneered. Regrettably enough, she had turned into a great cynic, believing people to be superlatively selfish; everybody was only bothered about his own loss or profit. This was unfortunately the stark truth. If someone was at a top of a building ready to jump, people would gather like a voyeuristic crowd just to watch while pretending to care.

In a manner to peremptorily intimidate, she drummed her nails impatiently on the table, knowing that the staccato beat would dismantle his feigned regret. Truly enough, the poor guy was actually looking nervous, ready to puke his lunch and she smirked inwardly with sadistic satisfaction. It was not her fault that she endorsed no room for concessions. Life was good to some and bad to the rest. Besides, the hardest way was the best way, wasn't that what they said? She could teach the hard way alright.

What delighted her was the fact that her whole staff was gawking at her in an awe-struck way, not daring to oppose her even if they believed that fifty years old employee was innocent. It was unfortunate that she needed a scapegoat and Mr. Patterson was regrettably handy at the moment. Frankly, she didn't care if he was being victimized; her only focus was to resolve her problem as soon as possible. The only way to stop the frequent robberies which had been happening in the warehouse was to designate a victim at random to scare the hell out of everyone.

Still standing with his head bent without a word in his own defense, Mr. Patterson was seriously starting to piss her off with his demureness. She sighed, and mentally rolled her eyes with piqued impatience. Considering the amount of backload which had amassed, she had no time for that kind of prolonged drama. Uncrossing her legs, she got off her chair and sauntered with ease in the direction of the open space, making sure that she was standing in a strategic position before dropping the bombshell.

"As most of you are probably already aware, the theft rate has become alarming following which I had a hidden camera installed there." There was an audible gasp from her audience and she arched her eyebrows cockily, knowing that it showed confidence. "There's not only one thief but several of my beloved employees who have had the audacity to take samples from the store room without my permission. Like I had already mentioned the last time, I prefer sincerity to fraud. This time, there will be no commiseration from the management level. So, it's up to you to decide whether you want to resign or you will wait for me to take actions after the security hands me over the surveillance video."