The Stray Cat I Fed Warned Me About My Two Faced Best Friend Chapter 06

The Stray Cat I Fed Warned Me About My Two Faced Best Friend Chapter 06

The dining room erupted into panic.

Only seconds earlier, everyone had been demanding to see the footage. Now no one knew where to look or what to do.

Derek froze for two seconds before throwing himself down beside Vanessa and pulling her into his arms.

“Vanessa! Wake up! You can’t die on me. I already lost my son. What am I supposed to do if I lose my wife too?”

His sobs echoed through the restaurant, raw, theatrical, and almost convincing.

Had I not known that he was buried in gambling debt and regularly terrorized Vanessa at home, I might have believed him.

My thumb hovered over the play button.

One tap. That was all it would take.

But Vanessa had collapsed at the perfect moment.

She lay in a widening pool of blood, her skin gray and her breathing shallow. Whatever the truth might be, no one wanted to watch a video while a pregnant woman who had just miscarried lay unconscious in front of them.

The ambulance sirens grew louder, and a police cruiser pulled up outside.

Two uniformed officers pushed through the crowd.

“Who called 911? What happened here?”

The restaurant owner hurried toward them, sweat running down his face.

“Officer, something happened in my restaurant. This woman started bleeding and claims our food caused it, but those wings were brought in from outside. We don’t even allow outside food.”

One officer glanced at the open takeout box on the table, then at the phone in my hand.

“Who’s directly involved?”

“I am.” I locked my screen. “My name is Natalie Parker.”

“So am I!”

Derek rose with red-rimmed eyes and pointed at me.

“She brought my pregnant wife here and ordered the hottest food on the menu. Then she fed her poisoned chicken wings from her parents’ restaurant. She killed my son. You need to arrest her.”

The officer frowned.

“We’ll sort out exactly what happened after the paramedics stabilize her. Nobody leaves until we’ve taken names and statements.”

Two paramedics entered with a stretcher and moved Vanessa onto it as carefully as they could. Derek followed them toward the ambulance.

Before climbing in, he looked back at me with open hatred.

“This isn’t over, Natalie. You’ll pay for what you did.”

I stood beneath the restaurant lights and watched the ambulance disappear into the rain, my fingers locked around my phone.

I had been one second away from exposing Vanessa.

But social media wasn’t going to wait for evidence.

By the time the officers took me to the precinct to give a formal statement, the story had already exploded online.

Three hashtags had taken over the city’s local trending feed.

[#BestFriendPoisonsPregnantWoman]

[#RestaurantOwnerDaughterKillsBaby]

[#ShutDownParkersSeafoodBoil]

They occupied the first, third, and fifth spots.

I tapped the first one and found the clipped livestream posted by the man in the plaid shirt.

The headline was designed to provoke instant outrage.

[EXCLUSIVE: HORROR AT LOCAL SEAFOOD RESTAURANT. PREGNANT WOMAN MISCARRIES AFTER POSSIBLE POISONING BY BEST FRIEND.]

The video already had tens of thousands of views.

Comments poured in faster than I could read them.

[She looks so normal. How could anyone do something that sick?]

[What’s the name of her parents’ restaurant? I never want my family eating there.]

[Found it. Parker’s Seafood Boil in the Southside Market District. Everyone needs to stay away from that place.]

[Forget staying away. Someone should shut it down for good.]

A chill spread through me.

My parents were still at the restaurant.

I called Mom immediately. She answered after the second ring.

“Mom, you need to…”

“Natalie,” she interrupted, her voice exhausted and confused. “Something’s happening at the restaurant. People are smashing everything.”

Glass shattered on the other end of the call.

Then I heard Dad shouting.

“What the hell are you doing? Get out! Someone call the police!”

“Mom, get into the kitchen and lock the door. Don’t come back out.”

My grip tightened around the phone until my nails dug into my palm.

“I’m coming right now.”

By the time I got a rideshare back to my parents’ restaurant, it had been torn apart.

The glass front doors had been shattered. Red paint covered the sign, and tables and chairs had been overturned across the dining room.

Metal seafood trays lay scattered across the floor, surrounded by shrimp, crab legs, corn, and potatoes smeared in pools of dark Cajun butter sauce.

More than a dozen young people stood outside with their phones raised, livestreaming the destruction. Someone hurled another egg against the front window.

“Get out of our neighborhood!”

“Shut down this filthy restaurant!”