He Broke My Heart, My Family Broke His Empire Chapter 08

He Broke My Heart, My Family Broke His Empire Chapter 08

Julian Ashworth, you really were trying to kill me.

I could barely feel my feet, but I kept walking, not daring to stop. If I did, I might never get up again.

Eventually, I found a corner beneath a bridge over the Charles River. It was piled with stinking cardboard and old blankets. A figure was curled up deep inside, motionless. I couldn’t tell if they were asleep or dead.

I huddled on the other side, not daring to close my eyes all night.

When I was thirsty, I grabbed handfuls of dirty snow and stuffed them in my mouth. When hunger cramped my stomach, I could only press down on it and curl into a tighter ball.

I stayed like that for two days. My hair became a tangled mess, and my expensive evening gown was caked in mud. I was indistinguishable from any other homeless person on the street.

On Thanksgiving Eve, the hunger became unbearable. I crawled out from under the bridge and went to an alley behind a row of restaurants, hoping to find pizza crusts in a dumpster.

The giant screen in Copley Square was playing the evening news.

At the Boston Children’s Hospital annual charity gala, Julian, as a major donor, stood beaming on stage. He had just won a Van Cleef & Arpels diamond necklace at auction and was fastening it around Felicity’s neck. On camera, Felicity smiled, shy and sweet.

Beneath the screen, I accepted a box of cold macaroni from a kind chef at a restaurant’s back door. I wolfed it down, thanking him over and over.

But before I could finish, the restaurant manager spotted me and shooed me away like a stray cat.

“Get out! Go on, get out of here!”

That night, the blizzard hit.

The warmth drained from my body bit by bit until I was as cold as a block of ice. I curled up on a street corner, watching snowflakes settle on me, my mind filled with images of the scorching sun on my family’s ranch in Texas.

The snow fell heavier and heavier.

Just as I was about to lose consciousness, a black Cadillac Escalade stopped silently in front of me.

The license plate was from Texas.