Forty-EightChloeNights in New York City were either really pretty or just really bad. It simply depended on where you were at the time. If you were in a club or an observatory in the empire state building. I was in the observatory. I had always wanted to come here ever since I stepped foot in New York. It was marveling how huge the damn building was. Thousands of offices littered the 102 floors of the skyscraper. It was so high up that I had to cover Adele's face so she wouldn't get sick and puke her guts. She was terribly afraid of heights. But looking down from the eightieth floor, I could see the many many lights that flooded the city. They looked like tiny stars far away in the darkness. A galaxy of neon lights burning fervently in a distance. "Oh Adele, I wish you could see this," I mumbled to the girl sitting on my arm. "I don't wanna," she whined shaking her head. Her eyes were closed tight and her hands were trembling. "Fiiine," I drawled. "You don't have to. I'll take
Forty-NineChloeWhen we got home, it was way past ten. Adele had fallen asleep in the restaurant. We had only stayed a few more minutes because Addison didn't want to leave until she had dessert. It seemed something must have happened in the Maldives. She had come home quite sour, moaning and crying in her bed like she was sick or something. I hoped that she wasn't. I couldn't lose Addy, she was all I and Adele had as a family. After tucking Adele in bed, I went back to the living room and saw Addison take out fresh beer bottles from the freezer. She'd drunk a whole bottle of chardonnay at the damn restaurant! And now she wanted to chug down beer?! Was she trying to cook her fucking liver?! "Okay, that's it!" I yelled. She froze, staring innocently at me. "What's it?" I stomped towards her, my face schooled into a severe expression. "What is going on?" Addison looked around her as if there could be anyone else I was referring to. For a woman so fucking smart, she could be dumb
FiftyNathanThings were falling apart so fucking fast, it felt like a dream. I was watching my family crumble before my eyes. "Dammit!" I roared, tossing all the articles on my desk to the ground. "Sir!" Marcus yelped, scooting to the ground to pick up the fallen articles. I didn't give a flying fuck. My face was all over the freaking tabloids. The headlines read, 'The cast out son of the Benjamins!" Cast out? I was betrayed. Stabbed in the back by my family and these people dared to make a joke out of it! That was all I was anyway to everyone in South Carolina. A joke! A fucking pathetic joke. Oh, would you look at that? Benjamin's little boy has been tossed off the side. How fucking hilarious- I could imagine those thoughts running through their heads as they read the papers or glanced through their phones. I had tried over the past few days. So damn hard. Dad's mansion was so heavily fortified, you'd think the president lived there. There were guards in every fucking corner.
Fifty-OneChloe"Maybe egging your boss' car wasn't a good idea," I whispered to Addie as we tip-toed away from the results of our hard work. We had snuck into the upper side of town and located her crazy boss' home or weirdo boss like she liked to call him. I couldn't figure out which I found amusing. Was it the way she called her boss a weirdo or the fact that she had slept with the weirdo anyway? My face pulled into a sour frown at the thought. "I'd say it is," she whispered in reply, stopping abruptly. She turned around to look at her boss' car which we had just pelted with eggs and laughed. "Do you know how pissed he would be tomorrow?! His car is going to reek for days!" If I didn't find it funny, I didn't show it. This was supposed to be a vindication trip for Addy. Her boss had lied to her and tricked her into sleeping with him despite having a wife and daughter. Addison was going to feel awful forever especially since she would remember it for most of her life. I understoo
Fifty-TwoChloe"Good morning," I mumbled to the kitchen staff, my head lowered to the ground. I felt so tired and despite my bravado the night before, I had stayed up through half the night worried about Addison and calling her several times. She ignored all of my calls! All of them. How could she be so childish and run off like that... like a freaking child?! It was plain silly! I understood that I may have been harsh. In my defense, I wasn't trying to be. Besides I thought I did my best to sound as quiet and as gentle as possible. What more did she want?! Did she want me to pretend all was fine? Like she hadn't made a grave mistake?! "Whoa," Arthur exclaimed, staring at me in shock.My face flamed up red at the shock on his face. I knew what I looked like. My eyes had dark circles under them and were rimmed red. My hair was tied up in the roughest bun I could manage and I was dressed in black pants and a white shirt. I wasn't looking my best and honestly, I wasn't feeling it ei
Fifty-ThreeNathan "Chloe," I couldn't believe my eyes. Chloe stood in front of my apartment, smiling widely at me. Her soft blue eyes looked the same. A warm deep blue that made me shudder as she watched me approach."Chloe.. are you... Is that you?" I mumbled, taking shaky, unsure steps toward her. God if this was a dream, then it was cruel. A cruel cruel dream. "What do you think? I'm some kind of ghost? Open the door will ya?" She said snarkily and my heart leaped. I dragged her into my arms, burying my face in her shoulder. "Chloe, oh my God...Oh my God," I muttered, holding her tightly against me."I'm back," she whispered, stroking my chest. I stroked her hair softly. Soft blonde waves that I had missed tangling my fingers in. "Never do that to me again! Never leave me again! Do you hear me?" I asked pulling away from her. She simply smiled at me and somehow, we were in our bathroom. I glanced down to find my clothes were gone and when I looked back up, Chloe was getting
Fifty FourChloeI bit into my sandwich, chewing as I calculated how much stock we had left. We would have to make a grocery order soon and I wanted to be sure I got every item we needed. I had forgotten to order an extra tin of tomato sauce last week and Liu had ranted my ear off. He could be nice and all, but whenever something threatened his business, be it a person or a thing, he was bound to get his haunches up and rant on and on until someone begged him to stop. I was in the middle of checking how many eggs we had when Jenny came barging into the store, causing the crates of eggs to wobble slightly. "Dammit! Jenny be fucking careful!" I yelled, reaching out to steady the crates. We couldn't afford to lose any eggs. Liu was going to hack off my head! When I was sure the eggs were stable I turned around to glare at her. "Sorry," she mumbled timidly, wiping her hands on her black pants. I sighed and picked my account book which had fallen to the floor. "What do you want?" "The
Fifty FiveNathan"What did you find out?" I muttered into the device stuck in my ear as I got dressed for work. "Benjamin Industries is falling apart. Their rival, the El Salvatore group of companies are rising through the ranks. It's quite remarkable how much investors they've been able to garner within a short period of time. The owner, Mr Eduardo is a business man who has struggled to hold his company up for several years. For some reason, he suddenly gained a lot of investors and now his business is on the fly. The only thing standing in his way..." I sighed, straightening my suit and adjusting the rumples in my collar. "My family's company," "Yes," Cameron, the private investigator I had hired, replied. "Nathan Industries isn't on his radar because we deal in a different niche than he does. You run a tech company and the last thing Eduardo wants to be interested in is tech. I think another reason why he isn't interested though is because you keep your accounts and company dea