Wife's Bitter Revenge Against Neglectful CEO Husband-Chapter 154: Planning Pay Back

"What is going on here?" Jake asked. "Why is King persona non grata now?"

I ignored his question. "I want you to check out this person." I handed him Wyla’s card. "If she checks out, I’d like you to hire her as my personal assistant and train her to your level or as close to your level as she is capable."

"Why? Are my services not good enough?"

"Your services are more than fine, but sometimes, a girl needs a break from being surrounded by men. Besides, I think she has what it takes, provided she’s not someone else’s lackey already."

"Alright, but you didn’t answer me about King. What gives? I thought he was one of the good guys. Obsessed with you, sure, but who hasn’t been at one time or another? Still, he’s worked with us in the past."

"Don’t worry about why. Just keep King off my ass while I do what I’ve got to do. And, Jake, have your men keep an eye out for people from detectives and trackers and the like. I’m being followed. I have been followed for months now, and not one of you professionals has caught it."

"We thought you knew," Jake said as he sat back in his chair and crossed his arms."

"Really? I thought you knew me better than that. Min said it was common knowledge. I didn’t see the point."

"Well, here is the point. King has been using these guys to invade my privacy. He has been using select photos and partial truths to harass Alec.

"Now Alec isn’t sure I’ve not been having affairs with pretty much every man I know, including you."

"Shit."

"Exactly."

"So I need a safe space. If Wyla checks out, she will be that safe space. In the meantime, call Min and get his ass in here. No, wait. What does it matter now? Focus on Wyla."

"Will do. And I’ll clear out the lookie-loos. I’ll also scan the office and your apartment for bugs, just in case.

"Not yet. Focus on Wyla. Ask Stiff to help."

It was too early to wake Ben, but I texted him to call me. Then I locked my office door and left word that I wasn’t to be disturbed.

No one was scanning my office for bugs but me, and fancy that, I had state-of-the-art equipment. Crazy Code specialized in government contracts. One such contract was to integrate this equipment with agency software that helped identify the source of the enemy’s equipment and signals.

I did a complete sweep and found nothing, but that didn’t mean King’s men weren’t using long-distance listening equipment. I routed the music from my phone through Bluetooth speakers and cranked the volume up. It is what I would be listening to via earbuds anyway. Now I’d share the beats and pray the asshole listening in hated techno music.

Now, to give King a taste of his own medicine.

For a little while, before King realized who I was, Night Shadows was in charge of Heavenly Enterprises’ cybersecurity. When King fired me, we left a backdoor into his network. The backdoor was still there, and the new cybersecurity team wasn’t much better than the one I replaced.

I planted a couple of presents in the infrastructure with timer delays. When King’s world exploded, it would set off a chain reaction that would be felt in every corner of his life. First, I wanted to know who was watching me and to what degree.

I found what I needed in the estate’s household account. The biggest chunk of the household account went to Dynamic Investigations. After further research, I discovered that King’s point of contact was with Bob Jones.

Bob Jones was a retired police officer and a partner in Dynamic. His brother was a business partner to King. There’s nothing like keeping it in the good ol’ boys’ club.

Bob and I would be having a chat. But first, I left him a couple of timed gifts, too. Geez, I could kind of understand a food industry company being lax in security but not Dynamic. They should do better. I copied their client list. Someone should teach these people to choose more wisely. That would be a nice little project for Estelle later.

People really shouldn’t fuck with me.

Now to dish out a little of what’s good for the goose is good for the hander. With Min at his side, I knew better than to hire people to follow him around. Min would spot them in no time, but then again, I didn’t need to. Cameras were everywhere, and I could access them all. What I needed help with was adding eyes and ears in the Heavenly home and King’s corporate executive office.

It was dark outside by the time I locked everything down. My security protocols were a lot better than anything I’d seen today, but they weren’t foolproof. Nothing ever was, but no one would find evidence on this computer, and I never saved hack projects to the company server. I’d never implicate Crazy Code.

When I cut the music, the silence was deafening. I was looking forward to returning to the hotel. I texted Wyla for a ride and stayed busy answering text messages.

Alec: Are you coming home tonight?

Teela: Not yet. Soon though.

Alec: Will you at least make training at The Red Dragon tomorrow?

I thought about it. I wanted it, but I promised myself I’d finish King first.

Teela: No. Not yet. Be patient.

And if he wasn’t patient? If he gave up on me or chose to believe King, what then? Then I would move back to the cabin, fall apart, and stay until I recovered, no matter how long it took, but I would recover. No man—good or bad—had the right to take control of my life. I’d come too close to letting King and his family destroy me once. I’d never let anyone do that to me again.

King: Forgive me. I was wrong.

I didn’t answer him. Not yet.

Ben: You rang?

Teela: We need to talk. Can we meet?

Ben: Min said you had a run-in with King. Is it about King?

Teela: Yes.

To the best of my knowledge, Ben had done me no harm, and yet I was about to ask him to be my accomplice in taking down the only family member who had protected him.

Ben: How can I help?

I arranged to meet him for breakfast at a diner near The Well Water. I’d have to slip out if I wanted to meet in private.

Wyla texted me that she was waiting. She wasn’t the only one waiting. Alec had my suitcase with him.

"Alec."

"You’ll need clothes if you’re going to be gone for a while. Call me if I missed anything or go by the apartment and take what you want. You know my work schedule if you don’t want to see me right now."

"Thank you."

"I miss you."

The best I could do was nod without crying because I missed Alec also.

Wyla took my suitcase from me while Alec held the car door open for me. He leaned in for his final words. "Stay safe, Teela. Call me when you’re ready."

I was exhausted. It had been a long day followed by a long day, but it wasn’t the length of the days that wore me down. It was the emotional upheaval that exhausted me.

"Are you okay?" Wyla asked as she side-eyed me in the rearview mirror.

"Nothing I won’t recover from."

"Anything I can do?"

"Just get me back to the hotel safe."

"Will do."

Talking Ben into meeting me had been the easy part of the next stage of my plan. The hard part was leaving the hotel without my team of babysitters following me. It took some creative bathroom breaks and disguises and bus transfers before I found a happy place. If someone followed me through all of that, they would have to be at Min’s standard of skill, and I had faith no one was better than Min.

Worst case, someone told King Ben was helping me and I had to move on from Plan A to Plan B. It wasn’t impossible, but it was more expensive.

At the diner, Ben was waiting for me with a surprised expression and a cup of coffee at the ready.

"That’s a new look for you," Ben said. 𝐟𝕣𝗲𝕖𝕨𝗲𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝗲𝚕.𝗰𝚘𝐦

"Really? You don’t like cleaning woman chic?"

"No, no. On you it works. I just wasn’t expecting it."

"I’m incognito for a reason, bro."

I spent the next ten minutes explaining what had happened and how it made me feel. Just the retelling was enough to upset me all over again.

"Of course I’ll help. That was an asshole move," Ben said.

"Thanks. I want to give him a little payback. I want to impress on him how important respecting someone’s privacy is. I need someone to place some cameras and listening devices in his private office and his home."

"This is just to teach him a lesson, right? No corporate espionage or criminal charges, right?"

"Cross my heart. I’m not implicating you in anything that serious."