115

DARLENE

It hadn’t been easy, finding this death trap of a place that looked more like a graveyard mausoleum than it did a safe house.

I had sprinted out of the grand manor like a bat out of hell, damn near fishtailing the sleek white Porsche into a tree as I spun out of the lot onto the highway.

“Shit,” I grunted, letting loose a string of expletives as I risked a glance at my phone, snapping my eyes back to the stretch of asphalt lit only by the fluorescent white of my headlamps and blinking away the bright white spots that remained in my eyes.

My phone had been ringing off the hook ever since the news of the affair had spread.

“I should talk to Fredrick, make him see a reason to drop the issue,” I whispered more to myself than to the smiling penguin decor that swung lightly from its hang on the rear mirror.

I felt the tightening in my throat thicken as I staved off a fresh bout of tears, deciding I would just have to call my mother later.

The beeping noise from my car meter had me