Her smile froze on her face and slid off a moment later. “I am curious,” she continued as if I had said nothing. “With what kind of a person you’ve managed to offend to make them want to kill you. And in such a manner too! Straight to the morgue. That’s pretty cold if you know what I mean.”
I shrugged. “Yes, I stay up all night thinking about it too,” I replied nonchalantly. “What did you manage to uncover, Ms. Larson?”
Rebecca was visibly irritated at not being able to upset me thus far, but she obliged me nonetheless. “I did not discover much, or it could be that Ash had been looking in the wrong direction. After you were brought out of the lift, the person who brought you into the morgue was not the same person who drugged you. That person may not even be a man.”
I frowned at her words. “I’m curious, Ms. Larson. Where did you get this piece of information from?”
“That doesn’t matter,” she said coldly. “What matters is that you shouldn’t let Ash get into trouble again for you.”
“What do you know?” I asked sternly.
Rebecca seemed to have lost her cool demeanor from earlier. I leaned closer. “Rebecca, if you meant what you said about doing all of this for Ashton, you owe it to him to tell me everything you know.”
Her plan of making things difficult for me had gone awry and she looked sour about it.
“Scarlett, you’re pretty selfish, you know,” she reprimanded. “You’re constantly letting Ash place himself in danger for you. Don’t you love him? You’ve left him twice, and both times did you fail to find a man who’s more willing to spend his money on you than he is. At the end of the day, you go back to him. Don’t you feel ashamed?”
I was deeply offended. What the hell did she mean by not being able to find a man who wants to spend on me?
“Putting himself in danger for me?” I said, losing all pretense. “Rebecca, do you know why he chose me despite the greater compatibility he shares with you?”
I took a deep breath. “Because you are a despicable creature. How many times have you placed his life in danger? And always in a car too! Do you want to harm him because you can’t get him? And speaking of him spending his money on me: I’ve always thought that you would at least have some semblance of decency, but it appears that you are severely lacking in that department. You’re always somebody who buys what you want without ever working for it. Who is the one to pay for your branded goods? Your house and car? Isn’t it all from Ashton? You’ve used your brother’s death to guilt him into paying for all your expenses, not to mention instigating Cameron to harm her own child and nearly destroying his marriage. Don’t you think that you are taking his kindness for granted? Do you think that your brother would be ashamed of how his sister is behaving? Rebecca, if you had some dignity, you wouldn’t harass him shamelessly like you’re doing now. I feel pity for you, hence my tolerance for his generosity towards you. Don’t think that you are entitled to inherit everything with the Fuller name on it. Even if your name is Ms. Fuller, it’s high time that you start earning your own living instead of being the parasite that you are.”
At the mention of “parasite”, Rebecca slammed her fist down on the table. “Scarlett!”
She was livid. Her pretty eyes flashed viciously as if she would like to devour me. “You think I have no shame, don’t you?” she asked through gritted teeth.
I looked her in the eyes and nodded. “That’s right.”
I’ve never enjoyed quarreling with others, and I certainly did not feel comfortable putting them in their place. But Rebecca had gone too far today.
In retrospect, she probably regretted telling me what she knew about that night. But that didn’t matter to me even if she didn’t. She was a woman who wouldn’t concern herself with these things. The things that she did know probably came from Joe anyway.
I figured that I’d better corroborate what she’d said with Ashton. I grabbed my purse and prepared to leave.
My tirade did not sit well with Rebecca. The shame and anger she must have felt was released at the sight of my departing back. “Scarlett, as high as you think of yourself, just know that Ashton is merely infatuated with you temporarily. Don’t forget that the Moore family is aware of your dirty past and will expose you at any given time.”
I laughed derisively and did not bother to wait for her to finish.
When I stepped out of the café, I breathed a long sigh of relief from having finally left the toxicity behind. Suddenly, my eye fell on a signboard not far away. It was a restaurant for hairy crabs. At the sight of that unpleasant trigger, my heart began to thump wildly again.
Ashton called me but I did not feel particularly eager to pick up. After a slight hesitation, I hung up on him. To return now would only make me feel worse.
It was at that notion that I’d decided to wander aimlessly on the crowded streets.
I had lost track of time. It was a foggy night, with thunder rumbling ominously overhead. Before I registered the fact that it had begun to rain, my clothes were already soaked.
