My Brother’s Girlfriend Bullied Me, They Regretted It

"Ma'am, you're holding up the line." Yvonne glanced at the customers waiting behind me, voice pitched loud on purpose. "Four hundred grand. Are you paying or not?"

A few of them were openly staring now.

I called Christopher.

Busy signal. Again. And again.

It was a weekday. What was he even doing?

Chris had a temper, sure. He liked to play around. But there was one thing about him. He was scared of me. Whatever mess he got himself into, one call from me and he straightened right up. So the fact that I couldn't get through, something about it felt off.

I put the phone away and looked her dead in the eye.

"My name is Eleanor Whitfield. Christopher is my brother. Pull up the investor file in the back office. Every store has my emergency contact on it."

I figured that was the end of it.

But the second she heard my name, the smug look on her face cracked apart, and then she burst out laughing. Loud, ugly, head-thrown-back laughing. Every eye in the store swung toward us.

She leaned in suddenly, dropping her voice so only I could hear it.

"Cut the act. I've already seen your face in Christopher's phone."

"Chris told me there was some woman who kept coming in here mooching off the place. I thought he was joking."

"Turns out you're the shameless little bitch who's been throwing herself at my man."

"And now you've got the nerve to walk in here and spend his money on top of it. Bold."

It took me half a second.

The name on the tag. Yvonne. The girlfriend Christopher had been so weirdly secretive about for six months, the one whose name he wouldn't even tell me. So this was her.

His taste was that bad?

Then it clicked. The bill wasn't a mistake. It was waiting for me. But the rest of it, the mooching, the throwing-myself-at-her-man story, where the hell was that coming from?

Before I could finish piecing it together, she lifted a hand.

"Since the lady's not paying, let's hold her here. Someone call the cops."

Two security guards were on me from behind before I could move. One clamped a hand over my mouth. The other wrenched my arms back like he was wringing out a towel. I fought it, but I didn't have the strength. Everything I did just looked pathetic.

The customers stood there, frozen.

In the corner, an older saleswoman went pale. She took half a step forward, lips parting. Yvonne shot her a look, and she stepped back.

They half-dragged, half-carried me to the VIP fitting room at the back of the store. Full-length mirrors, racks of clothes, soft lighting. Just like that, the rest of the world was cut off.

They threw me onto the leather couch. I heard the lock click outside. Yvonne had used her staff card to lock the door from the other side.