Page 119 of Return Billionaire to Sender

I thought she saw somebody worth sticking around for.

Now I want to burn down the world.

“Go,” I say.

“Malcolm,” she says, wringing her hands.

The longer she stays and pretends to care, the more it hurts. It never was true or real—I just very badly wanted it to be.

“You might want to hurry,” I add. “The eviction and demolition timetable seems to have been sped up. The building comes down in three weeks.”

“What?” the blood drains from her face. “I thought we had nine or ten…”

“Not anymore,” I announce with a calm that I don’t feel. I’m raging inside. I’d tear down that building with my bare hands, brick by brick, if I could.

“Please, you can’t—”

“Can’t what?” I ask. “Oh, dear. Am I displaying a lack of empathy?”

“I get it, you’re angry, but we’ll all be on the street! This isn’t you.”

“That’s where you’re wrong—it’s exactly me.” Again, I point at the door. “Should we make it two weeks? Or are you going to get out?”

“No, please—” She backs toward the door, begging me with her eyes. She lets herself out. And I’m alone with our crumpled dreams in my fist.

* * *

News flash:When something’s too good to be true, it probably is. This is a lesson I learned early on, but not well enough, apparently.

I’d planned to stay in town a couple more days, working with my legal team and Gerrold’s team, but I have to get out. I have to get away from this place.

Not an hour later I’m on my jet, heading back east, just me and the flight crew. They’ll have to double back to get everyone else.

So be it.

I gaze out the window as we rise above the cloud line, relieved to put distance between me and the coast.

All I feel is empty, now.

And coldness.

And a little bit of hate.

I hate the rush of excitement I felt whenever she’d walk into a room. I hate the wonder I felt when she turned down a million bucks. I hate that I ever found her refreshing.

I don’t hate that I hit my father on her behalf, because any excuse to hit my father is a good one, but I hate myself for how deeply I absorbed her tenderness afterwards. Thinking it was about me.

Like a fool. I hate feeling the fool.

I hate that it’s not even a good building. Could it not at least be a grand building? She fucked me for it, after all.

I hate that I’d started to look for hedgehog things, that I even began to like hedgehogs, just because she liked them.

So that’s one silver lining—I can go back to hating hedgehogs. They really are unpleasant, stupid creatures, what with their ridiculous fur, not that you could even call it fur. What was it she said that she loves about them? Their optimism? They havequills, for fuck’s sake, always at the ready, prepared at any moment to prick people. Not exactly a sign of optimism.

I hate that John and Maisey might have been in on it. I find that I very much hate that idea. Was any of it even real? John’s flowers in those coffee cans, were those just props? Their stupid bike rack meetings? The bullshit with the dryer-lint bandit?

I hate that I had my architects redesign the building and the whole complex in a completely substandard way, and that when it was finished, instead of being disgusted with myself, I felt happy about it, imagining those ridiculous people being happy about it.

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