The irony isn’t lost on me. But I’ll deal with my guilt later. For now, I’m focused on him. Sniveling. Little. Fucktard.
“I have fuck you money. Specifically”-I kick my foot out, swiping it under his shin and he goes toppling the floor, his head grazing the corner of the coffee table and screams out in pain-“I have fuck with Patrick Linzer money. And when I pay someone off, they stay quiet. Or even better, I pay them to talk about you.”
I lean in, whispering against his ear. “And guess who I paid to talk, Patrick?”
“Ginnifer Pope, Brenda Notting. Wow, Brenda was actually happy to talk for free. But I couldn’t have that. So, I paid her what you should have. Should I go on, Patrick?” I stomp on his legs, it gives way under my foot, not breaking, but he still screams.
He screams like a little bitch. “Please. No.”
“No?” I grab his shoulder and shove him onto his back. “But I’m just getting started.” I step on his arm so he can’t move it and dangle the paperweight over his face. “You know what, Patrick? You’re actually not that bad looking. Could use a spray tan, maybe, and a haircut. But I hate to think what will happen to your prospects of finding a wife if you have a giant scar on your face. Now I don’t give a shit about a scar, but you can’t really rely on your personality, can you?”
I pretend to drop the paperweight, catching it a few inches from his face, so close my knuckles brush against his nose.
“God! No!” he whimpers. “What do you want?”
“Me? Aw, I don’t want anything. I have ‘fuck you money,’ remember?” I pull my keychain out of my pocket. “I’m just havin’ a little fun with you. I mean, that’s what you tell them, don’t you? Just a little fun.” I bend at the knee and drive the stem of a car key right into his shoulder socket. Until it breaks skin and his scream fades into a whimper. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to break any bones or anything. Just seeing how much you can take until you break. Shouldn’t take too much.”
“Please,” he pants, “what do you want?”
Oh, the thing I want, I can’t have. I want him cremated alive. But I’m not the person he hurt. They’re the one who should get to decide what happens to him.
So I play with him instead. “Well, I don’t know. What do you have, Patrick?” I look around the room. “I mean, I was going to send a file with all of your transgressions to the media, but I’m willing to listen to see what you might want to trade me for it. We don’t really have the same taste in art. I mean that Degas”-I point to a painting on the wall-“I own the original. So, what else have you got?”
I stand, one leg on either of his head, and he sweats, looking up at me. “I… I can drop my charges.” I pull him up so he’s kneeling again, blood staining his left shoulder.
“Well, that’s not really how it works. I mean, you can tell them you’re not going to pursue them, but I could still get prosecuted. And for what? Making sure you didn’t do to Clarissa what I did to you? I mean, I don’t really think it’s going to trial. And why is that?”
I grip a handful of his hair and yank his head back with a crack of his neck. “B-B-Because you hhave f-f-fuck you money.”
“Very good! Look at you learning. So… tell me again, what are you going to give me if I take it easy on you?”
“I… I’m not going to press charges and… and… whatever you want. Please.”
I whisper into his head. ” And you’re not to hurt another woman again. Because I’m telling you now. I’ll find them. I’ll find every single one of them. And I will have what you did to them done to you, but so much worse. So, so much worse, Pat. Do we have a deal?”
He nods like a bobble head. “Yes. Okay.”
“Good. And you’re going to release a statement that you’re going to donate $500, 000 to a women’s shelter.”
He tries to shake his head, but I’m still holding it. His pupils narrow instead. “That’s… too much.
Please. I don’t have much left…”
I smile a smile that doesn’t reach further than the corner of my lips. “Make it $600, 000. Keep talking. I can count all the way to fifteen million.”
“Okay! Okay….”
I let go of his hair. “See how easy this was? We’re almost done, Patrick. We have had a lot of fun here, haven’t we?”
I sink into the sofa while he kneels there, drooling, dripping down one side of his face as his lip swells, a look of both fear and loathing in his eyes.
“Just one more thing.” I put my phone on the table before sitting back, arms folded. “I want to know everything that Gerry said to you. Every single fucking word.”
When I leave an hour later, Patrick is no worse for wear. Maybe his thighs are a little tired and his finger a little sore. That can happen if someone drops a paperweight on it. I liked that thing. I took it with me.
My head aches from all the things he told me about Gerry, his plans, his renewed motivation to make sure that Kingsley never takes his rightful place as CEO of Baxter Enterprises. He tells me things that turn my stomach. And those are just the things that Gerry would tell a slug like Patrick. What else he has planned, is going to come out of nowhere…
I hand Dmitrik the envelope with the pictures and testimonies of the women who agreed that it was okay to release their stories.
“Wait until he releases the statement and then send those out.” He nods.
I change my mind. “Actually, you know what? Send those out now. Fuck him if he still wants to come after me after that.”
Dmitrik nods and tucks the envelope into his jacket. “You okay? It got serious in there.”
We stop under a street light, waiting for Kevin to return. “Has someone ever hurt someone you loved?”
His eyes darken.
“Then you know. There’s not such a thing as too serious.”