Chapter 41: CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

CHERYL's POV

No way in hell those two were now best buddies. I felt like throwing things, definitely things that would break. I hated the gut of that bitch and the fact that she thought she could steal my girl Rhona just like that.

Today when I saw them at the shopping mall, I almost ran mad with anger because I was not going to let that little bitch steal my way into the Lionel family away.

I was so happy that I bought clothes that filled a whole rack. Shopping was my major form of therapy and I had given in to every intrusive thought that went through my head that day.

I had since decided that Rhona and I needed a small tete-a-tete. I was wondering when it would be best to call and ask that we hang out. I was at the house yesterday and my mother was home when I stormed in. At first, she was really baffled that I had been out all night when I had only said I wanted to pick up a couple of dresses for my personal beach shoot.

"Cheryl? Why do you have all that?" she asked baffled.

"Hello Mom," I replied stonily and walked right past her like she didn't just ask me a question.

When I got to my room, I just wanted to lie down and sleep because I was so angry. I mean how could Rhona be so disloyal to the point of being best buddies with my enemy?

I was lost in thought when my mom knocked and entered my room without waiting for me to give up permission.

"Mom, you didn't wait for my permission to enter," I nagged. I knew she wouldn't apologize or anything but still, I wanted to nag because I was angry so I just went ahead.

"I'm sorry," she surprised me by saying. "I was worried about you. I know you stress shop so I know someone must have really triggered you to cause you to buy so much," She continued.

I was trying to figure out if to tell her or not when she sat on the bed and held my hand.

"I heard the award show is airing this evening. Did you by chance bump into Kim shopping?" She asked intuitively.

One thing about my mom was she always had an idea if not the whole picture. I almost started crying as I gave her the details.

"I met Rhona at the mall. She was with Kim. That's not the whole story mama. They were giggling and holding hands. Apparently, I was being delusional for thinking she was my friend and loyal at that. That Kim girl really just thinks she can steal my man and then my friend," I lamented.

It wasn't the loss of a friend that bothered me, it was the fact that if Kim got Rhona on her side then it was clearly over for my ambition to be a part of her brother's life, but my mom didn't have to know that.

"Oh my dear girl, you know that's her brother's wife now so the chances that they were eventually going to bond and become friends are quite high."

Mom had a point but I didn't care, as far as I was concerned Rhona was my friend and owed her loyalties to me.

"Yeah Mom, I do understand that. I just felt betrayed that Rhona would even consider being friends with someone who took my man," I wanted to keep complaining but I knew my mom was not the one to applaud the kind of plans I had so instead, I decided another conversation was just fine at the point.

I needed to set things right with Rhona. She had to understand how close we were supposed to be. Her behavior was unacceptable and we had to address that. I picked up my phone and dialed her number.

"Hello Rhons, how was your shoot?" I was at a loss for how to begin. " I was wondering when... uhm if... I mean would you be free to hang on Friday?!"

I had never stumbled over my words talking to her before. It was so embarrassing. To add to that, she didn't jump to my rescue as she usually did. I felt deflated anyway but I continued.

"Yeah, Friday is good. I have a shoot break on Friday. Where do you have in mind?" She was asking.

"Pierre lounge is good. Let's see at five in the evening then."

"Ok, I'll be there," she promised and got off the call.

For a moment I wondered why she went off the call so fast but then again she was probably in the middle of work when I called. We had a lot to talk through on Friday but for now, I had more pressing matters to attend to.

Nicholas had left me a message a couple of hours ago. He felt we were being too slow to action.

Don't you think we're taking forever to come up with a plan? The more time we spend trying to decide what to do, the smaller our chances of taking back what belongs to us becomes, we need to act fast.

One thing Nicholas would do was be straight to the point. I was recently investing a lot of energy stalking the Lionel's that I was beginning to lose sight of the initial goal.

I had to call Nicholas as fast as I could. When I got back to my room from getting water in the kitchen, I almost went mad with shock when I saw Nicholas sitting on the only sofa in my bedroom.

"Nick? Nicholas... what is going on?" I hated myself so much for stuttering at a time like this but I realized that I was quite scared.

He was just sitting there smiling. For a moment I almost questioned his sanity making me even more worried.

"I figured you needed some sort of push to get you off your ass since you promised to get back to me but didn't the last time we spoke."

I gave him an icy stare that spoke in volumes that he wasn't answering the pressing question at hand.

"That's not my concern at this point Nicholas, how did you get access to my bedroom?"I queried.

He smiled mischievously and said, "Do you want to hear an interesting story?"

"No, Nicholas. I don't," I sneered.

"Oh, I'm still gonna tell you regardless." He was beginning to sound creepy but I wanted to further give him the benefit of the doubt.

"Ok, go ahead and tell me the story then."

"So I called earlier and my call went straight to the answering machine. I figured you were either not available to pick it up or you just didn't want to engage and since I really needed to sort things through, I decided to come instead. The rest is just your mom trying to play Cupid and distract you from Craig I guess."

The laughter that followed also had me laughing and almost rolling on the floor.

Now that was cleared, we did indeed need to talk about the plan to act on.

"So what do you have in mind exactly? Like how do we proceed, and who should get what?" I asked Nicholas. I was usually the mastermind but right now I had a lot going on in my head.

"I think the easiest route will still involve getting Kim as far away from Craig as much as possible. The only way to do that is by kidnapping her. Now the plan has to be so flawless that no one will be able to trace any of it back to us. Right after Kim goes missing, you're going to become an angel of mercy who brings Craig all the strength and support he could need. Now that's an excellent plan in my opinion."

I was nodding my head at how good it was even though we didn't have the details worked out yet.

"You know that the security around them is plain and pure brittles. How exactly do you suggest we work through that?"

"The security will be more intense at the house. I have my eyes on Kim and I have noted the level of security she moves with. In my estimation, she doesn't go around with her bodyguard a lot. I bet she considers the level of threat to her life very low at this point. As long as she catches no wind about our plans then our plans would be executed flawlessly." There was an evil light in his eyes as he finished.

He had a point though. If we gave them no inkling what we had planned then the chances that they would be caught off guard were quite high.

I was hoping for that. I didn't want any police involvement after all. My mother would literally collapse if she knew the sort of conversation happening at her house at the moment.