Wife's Bitter Revenge Against Neglectful CEO Husband-Chapter 159: Pump the Brakes

Now it was time to fuck with King’s life again, starting with showing him what it is like to live under a microscope. 𝒻𝑟ℯℯ𝑤𝑒𝑏𝑛𝘰𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝒸𝑜𝘮

I used my resources to snap shots of King for the next four hours. Everything from photos of him on the verge of tears to jumping down the throat of a maid for her failure to line up his shower products in the correct order. I captured shots of him picking out a tie and going to the toilet with his laptop draped across his lap.

He yelled at his private secretary when she failed to replace Min adequately. Apparently, Min quit. I couldn’t wait to hear the story behind that. And I watched as he downed a fist full of pills from bottles that he had stored in his office drawer.

Since when did King take drugs like that? I was lucky if he would take pain relievers when he was sick.

I wanted to know what he was taking and why. Was this related to the self-harm he had initiated when he realized just how severe Lettie’s crimes were? Or did the new therapist add drugs to his treatment plan?

If Min was still on King’s payroll, he could give me photos of the pill bottles. I could research the medication. But maybe I didn’t need to go that far. Min may already know. He would have signed a non-disclosure agreement when he was hired. He might be reluctant to tell me.

It was always like that with Min. He was a good friend, but he had given King a lifetime of loyalty. I hated it when he had to choose between his loyalty to King and me.

I had big plans for King with the pictures I took. I planned to use them to illustrate a book of distorted truths about King. I intended to leave stacks of books on a street corner near King’s office for anyone interested in reading. I was confident his employees would grab them, and the office gossip mill would do the rest for me.

But if he was really ill and under treatment, I didn’t feel comfortable attacking him. I needed to know why he was taking medication and what medication he was taking. While illness, whether that is physical or mental, is no free pass to making me miserable, it is a factor in how I would manage the situation.

I called Min.

"I heard you’ve cut ties with King?"

"Yes," Min said.

"I’m sorry. I know he is important to you."

"Ben is more important."

"As it should be."

"Why are you calling, Teela?"

"King is on meds now? Do you know why and what the medications are?"

"Yes. I don’t know the specifics. He came back from the therapist with the bottles several weeks ago."

"Do you know how to find out? Maybe his private secretary could tell us? Who refills the prescriptions for him?"

"I don’t know. I’ve never seen any refills. I don’t know if the doctor gave him a large quantity or if the therapist is refilling the script for him."

If the therapist was involved, then it was a good bet that the drugs were meant for behavior modification. If that was the case, the meds could be the cause of King spiraling now. And he was for sure spiraling. His behavior was not consistent with that of the King I knew.

"Have you noticed behavior changes since King started taking the medication?"

"I don’t know, Teela. When I’m with King, he’s usually focused on work. I suppose he’s changed, at least when it comes to you. He spends a lot more time pacing and looking at photos on his phone. He gets angry more."

"Did that have anything to do with why you left him?"

"No. I left for Ben."

"Is Ben there? Can I talk to him?"

"Ben is sleeping."

"Can you have him call me when he wakes up?"

"Yes."

The call ended. I would have been offended that Min hung up on me if I didn’t know him so well. Things like greetings were not part of his routine. Jake was the same way much of the time.

Jake tapped on the door before walking in.

"You called?"

I filled him in on the morning happenings.

"That doesn’t sound like something King would do."

"My thoughts exactly. Jake, King could be in trouble. All of this acting out may be a subconscious cry for help."

"Maybe, but it isn’t your place to help him. He’s an ex-husband for a reason."

"Agreed. I’m waiting for Ben to call me back, but in the meantime, can you and your men please keep King off company property? I’ve had Estelle apply for a restraining order. Stiff is worried these events will affect the employees."

"I can. Do you want a private detail to follow you around? If King can’t get to you here, he will look for you elsewhere."

"For now, protect the company. On a slightly different topic, how is Wyla’s background check going?"

"It’s done. There wasn’t much to see. She’s a hard worker. She keeps her head down. There are no shady characters in her adult background."

"That leads me to presume her childhood is different."

"Yeah, about that. Has Wyla told you she was orphaned as a child?"

"She did."

"Did she tell you her dad was an associate of Eugene Crest?"

"My eyes flew up from scanning my monitor to Jake’s face."

"Jake, Wyla said she was adopted when she was a kid. Did she also undergo a name change?"

"She did."

My heart skipped a beat. Had I chanced into resolving Eugene’s love list project just by booking a ride?

"Was her name Hillary Blanchard?"

"Tee, if you’re going to do your computer voodoo to do a background check, why did you waste my time?"

"I didn’t. I know the name from a private love list project. I didn’t know my project was related to Wyla until right now."

I filled Jake in on Morrison Blanchard and Eugene Crest’s relationship.

"From our interviews with the people in Wyla’s life, I’m not sure how well she’ll handle this information. Wyla is as straight as a ruler. She has a strong sense of right and wrong. I’m not even sure she’d be willing to work for you if she knew about your relationship with the mob boss, let alone finding out she was inheriting a lot of money that was earned through illegal means."

"You make a good point, but don’t you think she should at least know? Let her decide what to do."

"Do you want me to talk to her?" Jake asked.

"No. I will. Are you good with me offering her a job if she wants it? Are you willing to train her?"

"I am."

"Thanks, Jake. Once again, you’ve been an invaluable addition to my life. I’m not sure how I survived before I met you."

Jake grinned. "You’d manage, Teela. You are one of the most capable women I’ve ever met."

"Just women?"

Jake chuckled. "No, I guess not, but in my world, it is more impressive because you are a woman. I see a lot more capable men than women."

"What does Mitzy think about your quantifying comments by gender?"

"I don’t know. It’s never come up."

"Are you dating her?"

"Not yet."

"I saw the way you were looking at each other during the party. Are you sure Mitzy knows you’re not dating yet?"

"Teela," Jake growled. "Spend more time worrying about what is going on between you and Alec and less about me and Mitzy."

I threw up my hands. "I can take a hint. She seems like a good woman. Kind. She obviously cares about the boys. And you. I hope it works out."

"Thanks. I’ll let you know how it goes, but right now, I’m still married. I’ll take it slow and see how it goes."

Jake left to take care of business while I sat at my desk spying on King. He was rubbing his forehead. He reached into the drawer for more pills. It hadn’t been that long since the last dose. Didn’t most medication dosages fall into the four, six, or twelve-hour range? What was he taking that he’d need more so frequently.

I could find out for myself. I still had the therapist’s contact information. I used it as the starting point for hacking into the patient records and scanning until I found King’s folder. Me, the queen of nosy, was reluctant to break into these confidential records. King had an expectation of privacy. Yes, I saw the irony of taking photos of him on the toilet and now preaching that he expected privacy, which I was hesitant to break. If I broke that, and he found out, King would likely give up on getting help with all the issues Lettie caused with every member of the Heavenly family. He really needed that help.

The best I could do was ignore the crux of therapy notes as I scanned for information about the medication. I didn’t see any notations about prescriptions.

I went through the information again, trying hard to ignore the massive number of times my name was mentioned. Try as hard as I could, it was almost impossible to ignore my name. It was as if the notes were calling me, begging me to read word-for-word the entire history of what King thought about me.