by Lily Zante
Time stopped, and he ceased to blink, to breathe, to function. Pictures of Melissa in various stages of undress turned his mouth dry and his heart plummeted to his feet. She looked scared, and sad—he was careful to focus only on her face, not the rest of her. He could almost taste her fear—feel it, for her. He raced through the images, made all the more uncomfortable because Melissa’s discomfort was so evident in them. With relief he made it to the end.
But then he saw a movie file and his breathing slowed right down. He almost knew what this could be. With trepidation, he clicked on it, even though he knew it would only bring bad news. His face dropped, when he saw Melissa. And Matt. She was crying. And she was naked. And he was moving over her with no regard for her pain.
On the bottom was a date. It was the date he’d seen Melissa the first time at the apartment. He’d accused her of sleeping with Matt, of cheating on him, of leading him on, and all this time she’d listened to his accusations and not told him what had actually taken place. She had only told him what she thought he could handle.
He forced himself to watch the movie all the way through. Even though it broke his heart to see the girl he was starting to feel something for, crumble before his eyes.
Noah wiped his hands over his face, his jaw tight, his hands fisted. He was tempted to bring his fist down on the laptop, smashing it to pieces.
But he could do something better.
He could wipe it clean.
He thought about it calmly and knew what he would do. He would create a virus, and he would unleash it on Matt’s unsuspecting computer. A virus that would completely corrupt all of his images and multi-media files. He’d code it such that it would unleash late at night, once Matt had gone to bed, in this way diverting the chances of any suspicion of him or Paul.
And he would do the same for all the other devices connected to the box. It would take a while to set it all up—but he had time.
When he’d done that, he would go and see Melissa. He needed to know that she was all right.
Chapter 43
“If you want, as part of a normal work related procedure, I can ask HR to look into this. Get his PC looked at, for other possible images. It might be a way to deal with this matter and with him.” This had been Nadine’s suggestion and Melissa had to admit, it seemed to be the best way of dealing with the situation.
Nadine had left it to Melissa to think about what she wanted to do and how or if she wanted to proceed. What Melissa didn’t want was her shame becoming public knowledge. It had been bad enough that Nadine had seen any of the footage. She would die if anyone else ever saw it.
Nadine seemed more than eager to help her—not only because she was like a friend almost, though there was, and always would be, that boundary between them with her being so high up. But there was something else. Nadine had said she knew what it felt like to be a victim. Melissa hadn’t thought about it at the time, but now it occurred to her that even someone as high up as Nadine, in a position of power, confident and strong, could still have suffered some sort of harassment in her past.
The thought both alarmed her, and yet made her see that it could happen to anyone. That she wasn’t weak because she’d allowed it to happen. That she hadn’t really let it happen at all. Matt had made it seem that the choice had been hers. He’d let the guilt eat at her, and paralyze her. He’d made her think she was too dumb to figure it out.
She’d been a victim. And being a victim was sometimes harder to see when the abuse came from someone who claimed to love you.
Nadine had gone to her meeting in the afternoon, and Melissa did what Nadine had suggested: taken the rest of the day off. She spent the rest of the afternoon curled up in bed.
The dim beat of her cell ringing on her table disturbed her thoughts. She ignored it, trying to use this time to think of all that had happened. When the ringing stopped and then started up again, she ignored it a second time. When followed by a beep signifying that a message had been left, curiosity got the better of her.
Noah. Her insides fluttered.
Two missed calls.
It was only four o’clock. He’d still be at work, she guessed. What did he want? She opened his text message:
Hope ur ok
R u?
Disappointment curled over her. She’d thought that he might be arranging to meet her, maybe later, after work. She put her hand on her heart. At least he’d called to see if she was okay. That meant something. If he didn’t care, he wouldn’t have bothered. He’d called her twice.
Ruminating about his motivations, she called him back, not even stopping to think it through.
“Hey. Sorry I missed your call.”
“How are you?”
“I’m…okay.”
“Good. That’s good. It’s good that you’re okay.” His voice rang with a touch of uncertainty. As though he wanted to say more, but was deliberately holding back.
She sat down on her bed, one arm folded across her stomach, as she listened for the hidden words he kept to himself. “You sound a little…I don’t know—different.” She told him.
The silence boomed between them.
“Noah?”
“Melissa, do you want to meet up today?” She heard the tightness in his voice. He was going to tell her that he didn’t want to see her again. She frantically thought back to their earlier conversation. How had she left it? She hadn’t asked for an ultimatum. Or hinted that she wanted more. What, she wondered, had prompted this? He sounded strange.
“Uh—sure.” It would mean traipsing back towards work again, assuming he wanted to meet her at the coffee shop again. But it would be worth it. To see him again.
“We could meet at mine—no, we can’t,” he said almost as suddenly.
“No, we can’t” she agreed.
“Sorry, I wasn’t thinking. I thought it might make a change to meet someplace else other than the coffee shop.”
“You could always come over to mine.”
A split second pause and then, “Sure.”
He was coming over. The prospects for the remainder of the day had suddenly improved—until he got her thinking.
“Is everything okay?” she asked, panicked by the idea of what and why he might want to come over.
“I wanted to see you. To talk. That’s all. What time do you get back? I could meet you somewhere after work.”
“I’m at home already,” she confessed.
“Why? What happened?” She noted the concern in his voice.
“We can talk when you get here,” she said, deciding in that moment, to own up to everything and come clean. She gave him her address and then freshened up. Not because she expected anything to happen between them, but because she looked as if she’d been hit by a trolley.
Chapter 44
She had been right. It was so close to downtown—the location was ideal. In fact, making his way from his apartment to hers had taken longer. Noah surveyed the outside of the whitewashed front façade of the condo Melissa lived in with admiration.
He rang the doorbell and wondered how much this gorgeous little place set them back in monthly rent. His recent move paled in comparison. Living with Matt was going to cause huge problems, and working with Matt—could never happen.
“Hi!” Melissa greeted him with a smile and tired eyes. “Come on in.” She led him through the wide-open hallway and into the living room. “You found it okay?” she asked him, as she walked.
“Yeah,” he replied and took a good look all around him as he entered the open plan living area. “Nice place,” he said admiringly. “So close to work and so central.” He put down his backpack and walked over to sit on the sofa next to the one where she had sat.
“We were lucky with this. Our landlord is always away, and it feels as though it’s just me and Heather here. Most of the time.” He noticed she was wearing casual clothes. A tee and lounge pants. Images lashed in front of him—images of her in one of her most vulnerable and darkest moments. H
e felt like a voyeur and tried to replace those sordid images with her now.
Despite her cheery exterior, he knew she was hurting. It killed him that he couldn’t make her feel better without admitting that he knew something she did not want him to know.
“How are you feeling?” he asked, drinking in her features, examining her as if this was the first time he’d ever clapped eyes on her. He assumed she’d been under the weather, her reason for staying at home today.
“I could be better.”
He leaned forward, sitting on the edge of the couch, not feeling totally at ease. The thing he needed to say stuck in his throat like a thorn from a rosebush. “What’s up, Melissa?”
She hitched her legs up on the couch, curling them to the side and looked at her hands, unwilling to meet his gaze. “I don’t know what to tell you,” she said slowly. “I feel I owe you the truth, but there are some things…” She shook her head and paused.
She seemed more open now, but he wasn’t sure if this was because they were meeting away from the coffee shop and imaginary barriers had lifted—or whether she was all battered and bruised from recent events. He debated about telling her what he’d seen. Perhaps for now it would be better to keep it to himself. She needed time, to get whatever it was that was buried inside her to the fore.
“I returned the CDs,” he said.
“Already?” she asked, surprised. “I only gave them to you this morning?”
“I went home early,” he confessed. “He was looking for them yesterday, the CDs. I didn’t want to risk putting them back this evening while he was around.”
“Thank you,” she said, quietly.
“And I had work which I needed to do at home.” It wasn’t technically true, though breaking into Matt’s computer and corrupting his files counted as necessary work in his eyes. He wasn’t looking forward to dealing with the aftershocks of hearing about it when he got home.
Melissa arched an eyebrow at him. “That’s pretty cool—working from home. I don’t think Nadine would allow it.” Her face lifted as she smiled and the awkwardness lifted a little.
“How come you’re home?” He was curious to know.
She looked at him then, as if she were considering a major decision. “I saw him earlier—as I got into work after we met. He caught me in the elevator.”
Noah felt his body start to sweat. “What did he say?”
“Nothing, for the longest time. He stared at me and then before he left he said ‘I’ll be watching you, Melissa.’”
“’I’ll be watching you?’” Noah repeated her words. “What does he mean by that?” he wondered out loud. Then, not wanting to worry her further he said, “The guy’s an idiot. I wouldn’t worry about it.” But he did worry about it. He worried about her most of all. She wasn’t done yet though. “That day, when I came to your place, after our night together.” She paused, as if remembering that night. “Uh—” She let out a long sigh, as though the words caught. “I don’t know how to tell you.” Her words were a whisper and he was torn between sitting beside her, and staying put. He wanted to comfort her, run his hands through her hair, to hold her. He got up and sat beside her.
“You said you had something to tell me,” he said softly, taking her hand, he stared at her downcast eyes, saw her face turn ashen. “I won’t judge you, Melissa. I kind of already have an idea what that guy’s about.”
“You asked me last time if I slept with him that day, when you first saw me in your apartment. I did.” She closed her eyes and said the rest. “He told me he’d give me back all my photos, he’d delete them all, for one final…”
Leaning over, he rubbed his thumbs over her closed eyes, soaking up the wet tears that coated her eyelashes.
“One last time with him.” The words choked high in her throat, as she struggled to say them.
When she opened her eyes, his thumbs had slid to either side of her mouth, his palms cupping her cheeks. He stared at her, looking deep inside her, touching her face gently. “It wasn’t your fault.”
“I didn’t want to. But I stupidly believed him. And so I let him.”
“It wasn’t your fault. He blackmailed you.”
“I had no idea he would tape it…”
Noah kept his voice steady and looked her straight in the eyes. “He’s a bastard. And I can’t believe I live with him.”
“That day when I broke into his room and found the photos, the ones he’d told me he’d deleted, I took them all and copied them to my memory stick. I wasn’t thinking straight; I kind of figured I needed to have them maybe as proof of what he’d done if it ever came to it. But I gave that memory stick to my boss by accident.”
Surprise jerked his whole body. “Your boss saw it?”
Melissa hung her head in shame. When she looked up, her lower lip trembled.
“What happened?”
“She said we couldn’t let him get away with it. But she didn’t want me to have to show my images as proof of what he did.”
He nodded in agreement. Her boss seemed to have Melissa’s best interests at heart.
“He doesn’t even know yet, that Nadine knows,” said Melissa.
He doesn’t yet know what I’ve done to his files, thought Noah. Soon enough Matt Elliott was going to get back exactly what he deserved. Noah looked forward to that moment with glee. He blew out a soft breath, stroked her cheek with his thumb. “That’s why your boss sent you home early?”
Melissa nodded.
“I’m sorry for what he did to you. I wish I could make it better for you. I wish I could have walked through that door before he made you do it.”
“None of that can be changed now.”
“Can’t it?” he asked.
She looked at him puzzled.
He sat back, taking his hands away, putting a little distance between them. “I wrote some code that will mess up his multi-media files,” he confessed proudly.
The frown on her face deepened. “You did what?”
“I created a program that will infect all of his images and movies—tonight, while he’s sleeping. I would have already done it but I figured it was best to do it while he slept, you know, as a way of reducing suspicion.”
“When did you do that?” she asked, her voice quiet.
“Earlier this afternoon.”
“Why would you do that?” He could see her connecting the dots slowly, her suspicions already aroused. “Why would you delete his movie files?”
She knew.
Noah looked away. “Because I saw the footage.”
She gasped, her hand on her chest. “You saw that?”
He shifted his gaze to her and nodded. She stared down at her hands, and that was when he leaned over and put his arms around her. The fresh smell of her hair, and the lemony smell of her, so soft, and pliant, and warm, made him want to stay like this.
She pulled away first, clearly not wanting to talk about it. “He’ll go crazy when he finds out.”
“He won’t.”
They still held hands, even as she knelt back to sit on her heels. “He’s not stupid.”
“Neither am I,” Noah told her.
“I wish I could erase that footage from your mind,” she said quietly.
“Shhhh.” He put a finger to her lips. “I wish I could rewind time so that he never did that to you.”
They sat a while in silence, before he said, “It can’t be easy. Both of you working at the same place.”
“About as awkward as it must be for you to live with him.”
“There’s other places I could rent.” The idea had been fast forming in his head. He didn’t want to see that guy 24/7. Living and working with him was going to be the worst. But it would be better than having the guy at the Zimmerman Group—if he offered him a job at Black Diamond. If he did it for Melissa. Not for Matt.
“In the spirit of full disclosure,” he said, turning to his side and leaning back into the couch, “I have another confession.”
She looked at him, alarmed. Apprehension flooding her features.
“He’s applied for a position at the place I work.”
Melissa was speechless. “How? Why? Does he know about us—is that why he—”
He could see the alarm on her face and rushed to soothe her. “No. No. It was from before. He heard about the place I work from Paul. He’s looking to move. He knows the place I’m working is currently hiring.”
“You don’t have to take him on.”
“He’s good. On paper. At least my boss thinks so.”
She looked away, then back at him. Her brows coming together. “What do you think?”
“I think I’m going to take him to hell.”
Chapter 45
“They found images on his work PC,” Nadine said scornfully. “He obviously thought he was too smart for everyone. He thought he could get away with it.”
“Does he know of my involvement in this?” Melissa asked.
Nadine shook her head. “No. Neither do the people in HR. Let’s say the IT manager owes me a few favors. I let him know that we had suspicions of some activity, but that we couldn’t prove it without the evidence. I merely asked him to take a look discreetly. He checked a couple of PCs, not only Mr. Elliott’s. Apparently, they found nothing personal on his machine, no images of you or anyone else. Some porn, some of it hardcore.”
“What happens next?”
“He’s been suspended temporarily. With immediate effect.”
“And then?”
“I guess a suspension should be enough of a warning. He’ll be off work for two weeks without pay. That should hit him where it hurts.”
Melissa breathed a sigh of relief. It still didn’t stop the guy from bumping into her on the way in and out of work though. And he knew where she lived. She felt uneasy.
“Are you alright with this?” Nadine asked gently.
Melissa nodded. She’d have to be. She’d gone through worse.
“I’m here for you. My door is always open, if you need to talk or anything. I don’t suppose this is over completely,” she added, trying to make the situation sound better than it was. “I’ve requested that he not deal with any support calls on this floor.”
