I Married a Billionaire: Lost and Found(21)

"Yeah, okay, sure. I'll make sure to do that." I turned and stormed out of the room, retreating to my studio and slamming the door. I didn't know what the hell he expected me to do. I had no idea how to handle any of this, and it was all being dumped in my lap at once, and quite frankly, I still thought I'd handled the situation with that journalist pretty well.

I wasn't about to start playing nice with these people - for what? So they could just turn around and write more lies to suit whatever they wanted their headline to be? I couldn’t believe that Daniel still thought there was a way to reason with them - after everything they’d said about him, how could he?

I found myself alone again that night, cracking open a bottle of wine and sitting a silent kitchen with my thoughts. Not the most ideal situation, but Lindsey had found a way to work in an important business meeting into her trip, and Daniel was meeting with his broker again to go over what the technical team had found.

I couldn’t stop thinking about the magazine article. The more I drank, the more I stewed. Right about the time I realized I ought to stop, I decided to open another bottle instead and rummaged a pen and paper out of one of the drawers.

Handle them with kid gloves. Fuck that. I was going to offer them a piece of my mind instead. Specifically, Tim Calamazzo, the writer credited for "Daniel in the Lion’s Den."

My lip curled into an involuntary snarl just thinking about it.





Dear Mr. Calamazzo,





It’s quite likely that you don’t know me. Or perhaps you do. Either way, I doubt you gave me any sort of consideration when you wrote your "article" entitled "Daniel in the Lion’s Den," featured in the most recent edition of the magazine. I have to give credit where credit is due - your article was compelling enough to suck me in, initially, which is more than it ought to have done. You can give yourself a pat on the back for that one.

The headline caught my eye first. I’m sure you were quite pleased with yourself when you came up with it, although it does imply a certain level of sympathy that neither you, nor most of your colleagues in the press, seem to feel for the article’s subject. After all, in the Biblical story, we’re not meant to identify with the lions. Perhaps you intended it to be ironic?

After a promising beginning, I was deeply disappointed to open the article and find that it was another cheap shot at a man who has reached heights of success that you yourself, Mr. Calamezzo, will almost certainly never see.





I hesitated here, but only for a moment. I was on a roll. I scribbled feverishly, my pen moving across the page at an almost frightening speed. The words were coming into my head faster than I could get them down.





At this point it might be worth mentioning that Daniel Thorne in my husband. I am almost certain that this fact will cause you to completely ignore my letter, as I’m clearly too close to the subject to have any kind of objectivity on the matter. Which is all that matters to people like you, isn’t it? Making sure that you don’t accidentally treat your subjects as human beings. God forbid. But even if objectivity is your only goal, even you should be able to realize that the current tone being taken in the media - by yourself as well, Mr. Calamezzo - is borne of jealousy, greed, and petty anger that you’ve decided to direct at an innocent man.

Daniel Thorne will almost certainly be acquitted of these ridiculous charges (though if he isn’t, I imagine he’ll have people like you to thank for it). But regardless of the outcome of his trial, he will always be remembered as the man who cheated, who took unfair advantage of a system that is set up to favor people like him. Everyone who reads an article like yours is going to assume his guilt, because they know that if they were in his shoes, they would have done it. This is their sole criterion for judging him. Their own greed, and their own guilt.

I hope you are happy with your hand in this. I hope you sleep well at night, Mr. Calamezzo. I truly, truly do.





Yours Sincerely,

Mrs. Madeline Thorne





When I let the pen drop on the counter, I realized my hands were shaking. My hands, my arms, my whole body - the hysteria that I’d been stifling and stuffing down bubbled to the surface, and suddenly I was crying. The tears were big and hot as I sat there on the kitchen stool, rocking back and forth, hugging myself tightly. Now that I’d opened the floodgates, there was no closing them again. I sobbed and sobbed. Droplets fell, mercifully blurring the words I had just written. I already hated myself for writing them.

I stood up suddenly, picking up the paper and crunching it into a tiny ball. I shoved it down into the kitchen compactor as far as it would go, pushing it harder than I needed to, slamming it down with my hand again and again and again. I felt a sharp pain and recoiled, seeing a few drops of blood land on the trash before I realized I must have cut myself on something buried in there. I kicked the cabinet shut and ran my hands under hot water, scrubbing with anti-bacterial dish soap and strangely relishing the harsh sting in my open wound.




I shut off the tap and dried off, taking a look at the cut before I wrapped it in a paper towel. It was rough and jagged. Ugly. And a result of my own stupidity and foolish, drunken anger.

I sank to the floor, holding the towel tightly against my hand, and cried until I had nothing left.