Friday, July 29, 2016
Tech Geniuses
The way Valerie looked pleadingly at him made him feel sorry for her—not enough to make him stop what he was about to do, but still. His father, Andrew, looked surprised with a brow raised, wondering what his wife had been up to.
"We'll continue with my ex-girlfriend, Nicolysse Park," Trey said, hands on his hips as he paced the front. Andrew's head whipped to him, his eyes narrowing in displeasure. He obviously wanted Valerie to be dealt with first so he could know what was going on. He didn't like not knowing something.
Trey opened his mouth but didn't get a word in as the door burst open, revealing a very angry Alexandra. All that went through Trey's head in that moment was the fact that she was not supposed to be out of bed, and the thought pushed him towards her. "What are you doing here? You're not supposed to be on your feet."
"Some trust you have in me and my abilities to do this behind me," she began sarcastically, waving a hand to encompass the room. "Aren't we supposed to tell each other everything?"
Melissa appeared behind her, slightly out of breath. "I'm sorry," she huffed. "I tried to slow her down and talk some sense into her, but she closed the elevator in my face!" She leveled a glare on Alexandra.
"I wasn't trying to stop you, but at least try to understand what is going on. You do realize that if your doctor thinks this isn't working and that you're on your feet, she will definitely lock you up in the hospital?"
Exasperated and extremely tired, she walked past them to the back where Gale was to seat herself in the spare seat available at the back, snatching an unopened water bottle off the table. Gale stood to get another out of the mini fridge for his boss' wife.
Trey's eyes were on Lexi the whole time, trying to gauge her emotions. It hurt him to see unshed tears in her eyes, and pocketing the remote, he went closer till he could wrap his arms around her. "I'm sorry," he whispered, kissing the top of her head.
Her hands went around his waist, burying her face in his chest. "I'm not mad," she mumbled, sniffling. "I'm just hurt that I was not included; everyone at the house knew except me, your partner. Do you know how that feels?"
He didn't, so all he did was hold her closer to him, apologizing over and over again till she got herself under control. "Did you really think I'd try to stop you?" She pulled away and he cupped her cheeks, wiping her tears with his thumbs.
"I did," he admitted quietly, "but mostly, I was afraid it would make your condition worse if you stressed over whether it was a good idea or not, and I didn't want that for you. I'm sorry."
"It's okay," she replied with a small smile. "You had good intentions."
He returned the smile and reached behind her to close the door, nodding at the man who stood guard there. "You're already here, so you might as well sit."
She nodded, trying to hide her face with his body when she remembered there were still a lot of people in the room. Trey pulled away with a chuckle and her ears turned pink when it hit her that everyone had witnessed her melt down—those in the room and everyone tuned in.
She ought to start thinking twice and stop being impulsive.
"Hi," she greeted timidly, while Trey pulled out his seat at the head of the table for her. She received an influx of hellos and congratulations. She answered as many as she could, then headed towards the end of the table where Trey was standing. "I can't sit in front of everyone," she whispered, sniffling. "I want to see what happens on the screen."
Trey wheeled his chair to the right side, seating her. "I won't beat about the bush in any of these things I'm about to say or reveal. If at any point you think you can't take it, let me know and you'll be escorted outside, okay?"
She nodded though she had no intention of walking out. He hesitated, then leaned in to press a brief kiss to her lips. "We'll be okay." Gale set the water down and she thanked him, uncapping it to take a sip.
Trey stepped back, resuming his position at the head of the table as Gale resumed his behind the computer. "Sorry about that," he apologized. "Back to you Nicolysse." She looked away from Lexi to scowl at Trey.
"As you probably know by now, I'm not interested in getting back with you," he stated bluntly. "I needed to be next to you to give the idea that I was over Alexandra. But during this time of pretense, I came across some dirty secrets. Would you like to know?"
She became stoic, no expression painted on her face. "You're going say something anyway regardless of my answer, so go ahead. Let's see if you've really found 'secrets' like you claim you do," she said, dropping the hand she used for the airy quotes.
Trey smirked with a nod. "You're right, I would." He walked leisurely around the room again. "You always wore an aphrodisiac around Mitchell to get him to fall in love with you, to make me jealous, and to trick me into believing my friend was against us being together only because he loved you himself."
Nicolysse rolled her eyes. "It's in the past. Get over it."
Trey nodded slowly, the hand that wasn't holding the remote sliding into his pocket. "Again, you're right. It is in the past and it wouldn't have mattered if you weren't really into Mitchell yet leading me on for my money. You know how I know that?"
Trey pulled up a slightly grainy video, pressing a few buttons to clear the video's resolution, then Nicolysse was on full display—a slightly young version, but definitely her.
She slid a man a picture of young Samantha and leaned back. 'I'm going to have one of her roommates take her to the club and drug her. A server will spill drinks on her and direct her to a room to change.
'All you have to do is use her, mentally scar her as much as possible so that she wouldn't dare show face next to Mitchell again. He's mine. Understood?' The man opposite her nodded, rising as he tucked the picture in his pocket.
As the man walked away, the camera caught his face and Trey paused the video, turning to Nicolysse. "Of all the people available, you had to hire the campus' alleged rapist to physically hurt someone because they were getting the attention of someone you liked?" Trey shook his head.
"Well, a little bird alerted Mitch to what was going to happen and by the time we all got there, Cameron had his hand up her skirt. Then we smelt the heavy aphrodisiac in the room. Jason and I pulled Cameron off and left the room while Mitchell took care of her."
"What point are you making?" Nicolysse cut in, a perfect brow raised in question.
"You'll know soon." He pulled up another video of Nicolysse talking to a guy they hadn't found yet. "You remember him and what you made him do right?" In the video, Nicolysse wrote something on a paper for the man and as she gave it to him, it came on display. Trey paused, zooming in. "Lexi, do you recognize that?"
Alexandra squinted, trying to make sense of the scrambled letters and numbers. "It looks like a number plate," she murmured. Trey didn't say a word as he waited for her to figure it out, and when she did, her jaw dropped. "That was my mother's car—the one in which they died!"
He nodded, because if the pain on her face said anything, it was that she'd figured it out. Nevertheless, he played the next video showing the man going around the parking garage as he tried to find the car with the number plate he'd been given.
When he found it, he looked around then whipped out a universal key, unlocking the door. "Whatever he did wasn't picked up by the garage's cameras considering he went inside the car."
Trey moved on to the next video—via traffic cams—of Lexi's parents driving on a highway circling a mountain. A truck came out of nowhere, switching onto their lane then crashed into the car, throwing them off the road.
Alexandra's eyes were wide, but she wasn't crying yet. Trey hit pause and zoomed in on the truck driver, pressing a button to clear out the noise of the picture. "The driver of that truck that killed my wife's parents was my own ex."
Murmurs erupted around the room as some wondered if it was safe to have a killer amongst them, especially since the one she'd tried to hurt was sitting right in there too. Nicolysse looked murderous, and Trey was glad Lexi was quite far from her in case she tried anything.
"That's not all," Trey continued, the room going silent as they awaited his next words. "She had planned to come to the house after the news broke to 'offer condolences' so she could poison my then new wife into losing our first child.
"Except," he made eye contact with Alexandra, "my wife, in shock, fell down the flight of stairs, losing the baby. It worked out for Nicolysse, so she stayed away, and no one ever suspected her. We only found out from the report that the brakes had been tampered with."
Trey looked away from his wife. "And this would've stayed buried if you hadn't taken me to your house and if I hadn't seen your journal." Nicolysse's eyes went comically wide as she shook with barely restrained rage.
"I know it's wrong to read another person's journal, but it was wide open, and when I glanced at it, a line saying 'the way I killed her parents' caught my attention. So, I took a quick photo and turned to the entry you made about killing Alexandra's parents to make her push me away, then you could swoop in.
"They're all here," he added, bringing up pictures of pages in the journal, leaving his employees and wife in shock. "The reason for tampering with the brakes hadn't been for it to fail them, but so that the cause of the accident would be ruled as a brake failure, and that the damaged car would be because they fell down the mountain."
To her credit, Alexandra remained silent, and he admired her restraint. He rubbed her shoulder, receiving a shaky smile in return. "All that wasn't enough for you." He pulled up another footage from a hospital and Alexandra recognized it as Highgate.
"This happened during our second pregnancy. You knew when we were going to have our next checkup, so," he played the video, "you had the doctor lie."
Nicolysse entered the room casually, playing with a gun. Alarmed, the doctor stood, only to receive a stern 'sit down'. He did, watching as she advanced. 'This doesn't have to be hard. I just need a favor.'
'What favor?' he asked, his voice shaky.
'Well,' she strode further into the room, 'I need you to tell Mr. and Mrs. Robinson when they arrive for their checkup that she has caught an infection, and therefore, it'd be wise to abort the baby or risk the chance of dying together with the baby.'
'I can't do that,' he said, shaking his head frantically.
'You will if you know what's good for you.' She pulled out her phone showing him a video, saying, 'Is this what a certified doctor should be doing? Screwing his patients? If you don't want this to leak, you do as I say. Otherwise, your wife and children will have to live with ridicule for the rest of their lives. Do you understand that?' He nodded. 'So, you'll do it?' Another nod—hesitantly this time. 'Good boy,' Nicolysse murmured, patting his head like a dog.
'And one more thing. If you fail, I'll blow this off and send it to your wife,' she said pointing the gun to his privates. 'Understood?' He nodded again, shaking. She stepped back, tucking the gun into the hem of her jeans. 'See you around.'
"And he did," Trey said in a grim voice. "He chose to help destroy a life, and I regret not listening to my wife when she told me she wanted to keep the baby regardless. That doctor told me the infection was life threatening, and I decided I'd rather not lose both of them.
"So, I let him abort the baby, and for that, my wife didn't speak to me for a long time." He let out a painful chuckle. "You've caused nothing but pain throughout the time I've known you, and I wish you'd stopped at that. But you pulled something else a few weeks ago and very nearly succeeded."
He played the video tape from the beach house, standing behind Alexandra. He kept an eye on Nicolysse the whole time so he could tell if she tried pulling something.
"Are you sure you have it under control?" Valerie asked, her face creased - whether with worry or whether she was just having second thoughts.
"Yes," Nicolysse answered. Nicolysse tripped over a sweeping brush, then stepped on it, snapping it in two. Her mouth moved as she—no doubt—cursed under her breath.
"But he gave you his attention today, and I think he's already interested," Valerie muttered. "All you have to do now is woo him."
"Not with her in the way," Nicolysse said bitterly. "He'd always go crawling back to her like a lovesick puppy." Nicolysse reached into her bra, pulling out two small vials. "I'm ready to take action."
"What are those?" Valerie looked uncomfortable, shifting her weight from one foot to the other.
"Just two little things. I need Trey to want me and her out of the picture."
"That is what I want to know," Valerie said. "What do you mean by taking her out of the picture?"
Nicolysse chuckled a bit. "You can't back out after I've told you." She looked Valerie in the eye, smirking. "It's a slow poison—" Valerie dropped the glass jug she was holding.
"Are you crazy?!" Valerie hissed. "She's pregnant. If you kill her, you kill three, and I'm not letting you."
"Relax," she muttered, rolling her eyes. "It's slow, so just a warning of sorts. I'm sure it'll be flushed out of her system before it does any damage—don't worry about it." A pause. "All you have to do is serve them for me, and please remember the drinks correctly before you put my love at risk."
"What if I don't want to? Alexandra's drink I mean," she clarified, her voice taking a shaky note as she looked at Nicolysse's hands. "It's dangerous."
"Then I'll gut you," came the quick response. "I'll kill you then finish the job myself, probably with something that will eliminate her instantly. I'm using a slow poison for your peace of mind, so deal with it."
"Why?" Valerie asked, sounding as terrified as she looked.
"She didn't heed my warning, and you told me to do something about it. So, here I am, doing something about it."
"It could've been anything else—"
"Shh," Nicolysse muttered. "You don't want anyone to find this out, do you?" Nicolysse smiled when Valerie remained silent. "Use your words, Valerie."
"N-no," Valerie replied.
"Good." Nicolysse poured the contents of the first vial in one drink, the second in the other, mixing them quickly. "Give Trey this," she pointed to the first one, "—it has an aphrodisiac - and give this to her. He'd probably be in bed with me when it kicks in, and when she realizes he doesn't care enough to be with her, I'm sure she'll make the right decision."
Trey stopped the video, crossing his arms over his chest. "And you know what that made me realize? It's that every time someone you're interested in starts to give their attention to another that isn't you, you try to get rid of them. First with Samantha, and now my wife. You got away with it the first time, but not this time."
He had gotten next to Alexandra when Nicolysse stood. Instinctively, he stepped in front of Alexandra in time to see Nicolysse hold out a gun. "Step away from her Trey." She sounded so calm, like she wasn't pointing a gun at someone; like it was a normal thing for her.
Trey saw Melissa rise out of her seat somewhere behind her. He almost told her to get back, but she pressed a finger to her lips and signaled him to keep going. "Don't do this," Trey told Nicolysse.
She let out a dry laugh. "You know, I'm realizing Ethan and I have a lot in common."
"You mean being crazy?" Trey asked, projecting innocence.
"No," she responded sharply, the hand holding the gun shaking. "Besides being both your exes, you stole from each of us. She stole you from me and you did the same with her. And I'm not going down without a fight."
"Do you know what happens on Valentine's Day?" Trey asked randomly, relieved when Billy understood and responded with a 'roger that'.
Thrown off, Nicolysse's hand wavered. "What has that got to do with anything?"
Melissa tapped her on the shoulder, and when she spun around pointing the gun to her, Trey's heart dropped into his stomach. Except, Melissa grabbed the hand holding the gun with her right while pushing on Nicolysse' forearm with her left, prying it out of her hand. Then she pointed it to her.
Nicolysse laughed, her head tipping backwards. "What does a bratty kid like you know about a gun?"
Melissa smirked. "Well for starters, I know safety was on." Melissa cocked the gun, pointing it back at Nicolysse. "Safety off." Nicolysse paled slightly. She staggered backwards, tripped on air and fell. "Get up or I'll shoot."
"You can't. You're a—"
Bang.
Nicolysse screamed, covering her ears as the bullet made a hole in the wall. "You were saying?" Melissa mocked, tilting her head to the side. "Get up, and don't make me repeat myself."
Just then, his security team led by William filed in. William took the gun from Melissa putting the safety back on, while his men hauled Nicolysse off the ground. She looked pissed, but when she met Alexandra's eyes, she smiled wickedly. "I'll see you soon," she said calmly, winking at her.
Alexandra looked away, forcing down the fear that was rising to the surface. With a nod at Trey, Billy left the room. "Are you feeling, okay?" Trey asked, brushing her cheek. She gave a quick nod, smiling a little.
Trey didn't believe her, but he straightened nevertheless. There was one more person to deal with, then he would give her his full attention.
"Valerie, it's your turn now," he called out, then paused, blinking. "Where's she?" Two of his managers pointed downwards to the floor, and that was when Andrew also realized his wife had passed out. "Can someone revive her so we can get on with this? We don't have all day."