Seducing my Ex-husband back (Claire) novel Chapter 4

4
THE TRANSFORMATION

~CLAIRE’S POV~

Three days.

Three days of wedding videos and photo albums scattered across my bedroom floor like broken dreams.

Three days of Richard’s cologne still clinging to his abandoned shirts, three days of drowning in wine and self-pity.

My phone buzzed on the nightstand. Thirty-seven messages. All from me to Richard.

“Why did you do this to me?”

“Did you ever love me?”

“Please, just talk to me.”

The latter ones were different. Ugly words I had never imagined saying, curses that tasted like poison on my tongue.

All unanswered. All pathetic.

Eleanor’s name flashed on the screen. I let it go to voicemail like all the others.

On the fifth day, I woke up squeezing Richard’s shirt to my chest, the fabric damp with tears. I stared at it for a long moment before hurling it across the room.

‘Enough.’

I stumbled to the bathroom, catching my reflection in the mirror. Hollow cheeks. Dead eyes. Broken woman.

I was about to cry again when something inside me snapped.

“No,” I whispered to my reflection. “No more.”

Crying wouldn’t bring back my life. Wouldn’t bring back Richard. And as much as I hated him for destroying me, I missed him so desperately it felt like dying.

That’s when I understood. He had known exactly how much I loved him. And he had used that love as a weapon.

I hated him. I wanted him to suffer exactly as much as I was suffering.

But how?

The answer came to me like divine inspiration.

First, I would make him fall in love with me again. Because revenge was sweetest when it came from the hands of someone who’d been worshipped.

I was going to make Richard Blackwood worship me.

Right before I brought him to his knees.

I grabbed scissors from the drawer, my hands shaking as I brought them to my hair. One cut.

Then another. Long chestnut locks fell to the floor until I was left with a sharp bob that made my eyes look bigger, more mysterious.

I stepped into the shower and washed away five days of grief.

When I appeared, I barely recognized myself. The broken woman was gone. In her place stood someone harder.

Someone dangerous.

I spent the next hour cleaning up the destruction I had caused, throwing away the gifts Richard and Monica had given me over the years.

Each item that hit the trash felt like shedding old skin.

**********************

My parents’ small apartment felt suffocating after the penthouse I had shared with Richard. I sat at their dining table, eating in silence while they stared at me from across the room.

“Have you been eating at all?” my mother asked, her voice sharp with criticism. “You look like a skeleton.”

I kept chewing, ignoring her words. I wouldn’t let her affect me. I needed a clear head to plan my revenge.

“Slow down,” my father said gently. “Nobody’s going to take your food away.”

Two hours later, I stood to leave.

“You should visit more often,” my father said at the door.

“Fix your appearance next time,” my mother added. “You’re not the first woman to get divorced.”

I scoffed. “You never fail to remind me what a shitty mother you are.”

“At least I could keep a man!” she yelled as I walked away.

I got into my car, hands shaking with rage, when my phone buzzed. Richard’s lawyer. Something about finalizing the divorce and alimony.

I agreed to meet him tomorrow.

Time to face the man who had destroyed me.

*********************

I stood outside Blackwood Industries, staring up at the glass tower that had once felt like home. My hands clenched around my purse as I forced myself through the revolving doors.