Layla
It’s not until the cab drops us off outside our grandparents’ house that the enormity of my discovery
starts to settle in my mind.
Leif is the developer bullying my grandparents into selling their house. Leif isn’t the haven of safety
and security I thought he was. He’s cold-blooded, money- hungry, despicable, capitalist scum. I can’t
believe I woke up in his bed all those mornings, feeling like I was protected from the world. The biggest
villain in the city was housing me the whole time. Sle eping next to me when he could. I cuddled with him.
I let him stroke my hair and kiss my temple, and I felt safe.
I sucked his cock on many occasions. I let him inside me. I let him put his lips on me, his tongue. I
gave him my body and my heart and now, now...
Bewilderment. That’s what I feel. Like a tornado just tore through my life and whipped me up into the
air. I don’t know which way is up or down. I can’t make sense of any of it. All I know is at some point
soon, I’m going to come crashing back down to earth.
And it’s going to hurt. What kind of man tries to force an elderly couple out of their home for the sake
of a tower of luxury condos? Am I
really so stupid as to not see what he was like? Was I so blinded by the new boots and new jacket and
fucking penthouse apartment not to see what was right in front of me?
How did I not notice it was his company that was mentioned in all those legal documents?
The answer is clear in my mind: because he refused to talk about his business. He gave me some
bullshit excuse about leaving work at the office and I cheerily tied a blindfold over my eyes and complied.
I am a fool. An idiot. A complete and utter nitwit. A pregnant nitwit. My grandmother opens the door
and ushers us inside while the blood pounds in my ears.
Finally, after an entire day of denial, I let the truth ring in my mind loud and clear on r epeat, like some
twisted, awful recording.
I know I’m pregnant. It wasn’t a false positive. I’m having a baby, and the father is the bully who’s
trying to make my grandparents homeless.
He’s rich and powerful and well-known and he’ll kick my grandparents out, and then he’ll take my
baby. Horror yawns open inside me as I think of the implications—all that could go wrong.
He told me Isla’s mother left, but do I know if that’s true? Can I take his word for it? What if he did
the same to her? He could have bullied her and taken her child. He could be truly, awfully evil.
Isn’t it only evil people that make elderly couples homeless?
“What’s this all about?” Grandma takes my jacket and hangs it up in the foyer closet. It’s the old
jacket that I saved. I couldn’t bear to put on my stupid Balenciaga designer puffer jacket when we left
Leif’s apartment, letting Emma stuff it into her suitcase alongside the white one.
My grandmother turns back to me. “Why the cloak and dagger? What happened to the nice apartment
in the city?”
“It’s Leif,” I say, my voice a croak. “Leif owns the company that’s trying to push you out of this
house.”
Grandma stares at me, her wrinkled face blank. She blinks once, twice, three times, opens her mouth
then closes it again. “He... Are you sure?”
“I heard him.” I clap a hand over my mouth to push back the sob mounting inside me. Once I can
speak again, I meet my grandmother’s eyes. “I heard him speaking to his father. He said he does this all
the time. He’ll start demolishing all the other buildings they’ve already bought, he’ll tighten the screws
and pressure you until you buckle. He sounded so... cruel. Calculating.”
“That bastard.” My grandfather’s voice is a low rumble at the mouth of the living room, his eyes a
dark flame. “I shared a meal with him, and the whole time...”
“I know.” I close my eyes for a moment. “I know.” “But did he know?” Emma looks at the three of
us. “Did Leif know whose house he was trying to purchase?”
“How could he not?” I answer, my voice faraway. “He’s the owner and CEO of the company. He built
it from the ground up. His life is his company and his daughter—how could he not realize who we were?
Who Grandma and Grandpa were? He had his driver take them home one night!”
I look down at myself, at the same old clothes I’ve always worn. The same person I was before I met
him. Clinging onto stability with my fingernails, trying to carve out an existence from the pummeling
blows life dealt me.
“Why else would he be interested in me?” I ask, my voice sounding as small as I feel.
Screeching tires outside make me turn my head. Looking through the half-moon window at the top of
the front door, I see a familiar silver Rolls-Royce double-parked on the street.
He followed me. He fucking followed me. That stupid car. Who needs a car like that? Why does he
need to drive around in a car that’s worth as much as my grandparents’ house?
It’s pretentious and flashy and I can’t fucking believe I was so attracted to someone so outrageously
conceited. He marched into the restaurant when I was on a date with another man—and made the other
guy leave! And then I sl ept with him!
What the hell is wrong with me? A thick, bloody spear of anger rips through me, and I grip it with
both hands. A pretentious, conceited, egotistical, Rolls-Royce-driving asshole is trying to ruin my fucking
life and I will not allow it.
I grab my old jacket off the coat hanger again, throw it on, and rip the front door open.
If Leif Sorensen thinks he’s going to bully my family—if he thinks he can buy me off with a fancy
apartment and an overpriced jacket, pull the wool over my eyes with all the money he’s pillaged from his
victims—he has another thing coming.
No one fucks with my family and gets away with it. Especially not Leif fucking Sorensen.