Chapter 67

ZARAH’S POV

I threw my phone on the bed in a huff. "How did he meet that bitch Mannie?" I muttered under my breath while pacing the room.

My palms were hot. My breath quickened. I pressed my heel into the soft carpet and shoved my hands into my pockets. My phone buzzed once more on the bedside table, but I ignored it. Each ring was a little rope tightening around my neck.

The morning had been ruined. The plan I had wrapped so smoothly the night before suddenly felt loose, like a thread pulled from a dress. I had built the idea of taking that day for myself — nails, coffee, a neat message to Dominic about a charity event he would enjoy and make him fall for me.

“Who exactly is Michael’s uncle?” I asked the empty room. My voice sounded small despite the heat in it. The question nagged at me. If Mannie had caught the attention of the family, if she had wormed her way into that world—then everything I had worked for could unravel.

I felt the old sting of being watched, measured, and replaced. I would not be replaced. She had a way of surviving that gave her a quiet strength. That scared me. It made my pulse spike.

I flung myself down on the bed and let my head thump against the pillow. My mind ran in circles.

I stood and went to the window. The street below was slow, the city almost polite in the morning light. Cars crawled, vendors set up their small shops, and a bus pulled away with a squeal. From this height everything looked small and manageable. From here, I could pretend I could control the world.

This was the house I had snatched from Butler Wu. Here I can see the world, even though it was a bit smaller compared to the mansion.

I paced again. I wanted to show Mannie that she had to step off the line she was crossing. I wanted to wipe her out of the picture before she could plant roots.

The door knocked once. Then again. The sound was sharp.

Knock!

Knock! Knock!

I smoothed my skirt and opened the door in one motion. My face was composed; my voice was cold. “What?!” I barked.

On the other side stood the maid, knees bent, hands clutched to her chest. Her eyes were wide with fright. I tasted that fear like sugar.

“Madam,” she said, voice shaking. “Butler Wu… he had an asthma attack. They… they took him to the hospital.”

The words floated in the air. For a breath, I felt nothing. Then a smile curled at the corner of my mouth. Panic sharpened the maid’s features in a way that pleased me. I always liked being the center of motion in a room. When people fluttered around, I felt alive.

“Why did he have an attack?” I asked, stepping past her. My heels made a soft but loud sound on the stair. The servants shifted as I moved — their bodies angled away, eyes down. They knew my footfall. They knew the taste of my temper.

“Ma’am, he—” the maid began, but I cut her off with a wave.

I walked down the marble steps in a rhythm that felt like control. I let the servants watch me. They cleared a path. The butler’s phone lay on a small table near the foyer, screen bright and unlocked. My eyes found it and held like a hook in water.

One of the older women — the one who always tried to tell me what to do — looked up at me as I neared. Her hands were quick, trying to tuck the phone into the folds of her skirt. Her face painted a lie of innocence. I liked to watch when people tried to hide things. It made them small.

“Stop,” I said, voice low and sharp. Her head snapped up.

My steps shortened. I leaned down and took the phone from her spotted hands before she could pull it away. Her fingers twitched.

The phone was unlocked. A message was open, a name and a photo visible in the preview. My pulse thumped hard against my ribs.

I knew the person in the image and I recognized it, because I was thenone who had taken the picture for Mannie.

A pyramid scheme I had been involved in and planned to use her as the scapegoat, but then they had fell like a pack of crumbling cards before I could get the money.

I read the message, my heart drumming. The message was from someone written Master, whom i guessed was Dominic. "The house I asked you to give her — was it given to the person that looks like this?"

That bitter spark turned into a flare. I felt fury like a physical thing rising in my chest. It tasted metallic.

“She’s taking everything from me,” I hissed, my hand tightening over the phone. The older woman looked ready to curl into herself.

My mind clicked. If Dominic had asked his man to give her a house, it meant she had a direct route into his life. A deed in her name would wrap her into his world. Or did he think I was her, since I haven't exactly met him before.

I threw the phone to the couch in anger, "How dare she?" I wanted to crush her... crush the threat while it still hung small and brittle.

I thought of the camera at Mannie’s apartment — the cheap dome that pointed at her door. I had noticed it once when I passed. It was basic, but it recorded. If I could make a scene and have a recording of her “promiscuity,” it would stain her. People remembered the image; they never asked for the truth beyond it. I could plant a false story and let it grow.

I opened the voice recorder on my phone. I set it to record before I left. The red dot blinked. I felt like a hunter. My hands were steady now. I smoothed my coat and let the ride down the driveway fill me with a cold eagerness.

I ordered the driver to bring me to her block. I walked like I owned the street. My shoes were loud on the pavement. It was morning, the rush hour.

The poor building looked more tired up close. The paint peeled like old scabs. Children shouted by a leaking pipe. A stray dog wagged a tail, then wandered off. The smell of cooking and damp seeped into me like a memory I could not wash away.

I saw the door to her unit ajar. I did not knock. The handle gave under my fingers and the door opened. The hallway was narrow, and the light in it hummed. I could hear her children's voices.

Good.

They would be my audience. The more eyes saw her tear and rage, the stronger the lie would be.

I walked inside with a slow, fake anger I had practiced in my head the whole drive. “You bitch,” I spat, the words designed to burn like acid. “Can’t you keep your promiscuous claws off my man?”

My voice was loudly angry. I wanted neighbors to hear. I wanted people walking past to peek in through windows. I wanted the security camera to see a spectacle.

She stood across the room like a small island, the life around her swirling. Her hair was a loose knot. Her skin showed the lines of sleepless nights.

“Which man?” she asked. The word came sharp. She straightened, fiddling with the dishcloth as she cleaned her hand.

"And why the hell would you enter my house that way? You are trespassing? I could report you for that, do you know?"

My chest tightened. I had meant to humiliate her with the question, but she was not folding. That was a problem. I needed her to break, to be smaller.

"Would you say Micheal didn't meet you?" I questioned.

“You are dating Michael?” she said, voice thin with the shock of betrayal. She slanted a look at me as if daring me to prove the fantasy.

My lips tightened. “What does that have to do with my question? Michael said you were going out with his uncle, yet you can’t seem to keep your claws off other men. How promiscuous can you be?” I baited.

She grabbed the nearest object and threw it. Time slowed. A sharp thing flew straight toward me. I saw it was a knife. The metal flashed like a promise and my lungs shrank.

I ducked, heart punching at my ribs. The knife sliced the air and landed with a dull thunk on the wall behind me.

My pulse thudded in my ears.

“Bitch!!!” I screamed, the practiced fury now real. My voice echoed off the walls. The recording on my phone glowed red, catching the words, the hit, the scene. I loved the grain of hurt in her look when she realized how close she had come to hurting me.

“How dare you?” I roared, stepping in as if I had been knocked back by the throw. I wanted neighbors to take my side only if i had known that the neighborhoodwas a bit empty today. I wanted them to feel the injustice. I wanted them to think I was the victim. People loved victims. They posted their pity like a flag. I would ride that pity.

“Get out of my house!” she thundered, her voice shaking but growing in strength. The kids shuffled near the doorway. One small face — Lily’s — peeped from behind the curtain. I hated that small face in that moment because it complicated the story. It made me feel shame for a second, and then anger conquered the shame. I would use it. I needed to show everyone that she was a danger, that she flew from man to man. The children would be collateral in my story.

I stepped back, but my throat was raw and my hands trembled. I had wanted her to crumble. Yet she stood like a small, furious cliff. Her voice filled the room.

I could see the security camera over the doorway. My plan had almost been perfect. I had staged the scene well. The camera would catch me screaming and the object flying. I had the recording of my own voice now, too. With a cut, I could claim I had been attacked. I could claim she was a woman of loose morals, violent and unstable. People would believe the first thing that fit the simplest story.

I felt triumph sear through my bones. I smiled like a cut. “Just you wait.” I threatened and turned to leave.?