Chapter 127 The Art of Psychological Warfare
Catherine: POV
Over the next two weeks, I refined my approach.
Call number seven came while she was at lunch with potential investors. I watched from across the street through a coffee shop window—just another unremarkable woman in oversized sunglasses, my face partially hidden behind a magazine.
Her phone buzzed. She glanced at the screen, saw the unknown number, and her face went pale. She excused herself from the table, stepping outside to answer.
"What do you want?" Her voice was strained, exhausted.
"I want you to suffer," I said simply, using the voice modulator I'd purchased online. "The way my family suffered. The way Elena suffered when you orchestrated that attack on her baby."
"I don't know what you're talking about—"
"Liar." The word came out sharp as a blade. "I have proof, Victoria. Recordings. Financial transactions. Everything that links you to what happened to the Vanderbilts. Everything that proves you manipulated me into hurting Elena."
Silence on the other end.
"You thought you were so clever," I continued. "Using me as your weapon. Making me believe I was protecting Julian when really I was just clearing the path for your own schemes. But you made one critical mistake."
"What?" Her voice was barely a whisper.
"You underestimated how far I'd go for revenge."
I hung up and immediately switched to the next phone. This one I'd programmed with a text message, set to send from a number that would appear to originate from inside her own building.
The message was simple: [Second table from the left. Woman in the red dress. She's been staring at you for five minutes.]
Through the coffee shop window, I watched her stumble back into the restaurant, her face ashen. She looked around frantically, her paranoia exactly where I wanted it.
Call number twelve came three days later, at 4 AM.
"Please," she sobbed into the phone. "Please just tell me what you want. Money? I can pay you—"
"I don't want your money, Victoria. Money can't bring back my father. It can't undo the heart attack your financial schemes caused. It can't erase my mother finding his body and deciding she couldn't live without him."
"Catherine—if this really is you—"
"Oh, it's me. Or maybe it's my ghost. Does it matter?" I laughed, a sound devoid of humor. "You killed Catherine Vanderbilt just as surely as if you'd pulled the trigger yourself. What's calling you now is just what's left. The part that wants to watch you suffer."
"I'm going to the police—"
"And tell them what? That you're being harassed by a dead woman? That you're hearing voices? They'll think you're having a breakdown, Victoria. Stress-related psychosis. Guilt-induced hallucinations." I paused. "Maybe they'll even institutionalize you. Wouldn't that be ironic?"
She was crying now, full-on sobs that she couldn't control.
"You destroyed everything I loved," I said quietly. "My family. My future. My name. And now I'm going to destroy your peace of mind. Every phone call. Every unknown number. Every shadow in your peripheral vision. You'll never know if it's really me or just your guilty conscience finally catching up."
"Stop—"
"I'll stop when you're as broken as you left me. When you know what it feels like to lose everything. When you're so paranoid and terrified that you can't sleep, can't eat, can't function."
My voice dropped to barely a whisper.
"I'll stop when you're destroyed, Victoria. Not before."
I ended the call and immediately powered down the phone, pulling out the SIM card and snapping it in half. That particular number was burned now—I'd never use it again.
But I had six more phones. Six more identities. Six more ways to make her life a living hell.
---
By week three, Victoria had hired private security. I watched from my various surveillance points as bodyguards escorted her everywhere, as she had her locks changed, as she stopped going out after dark.
She'd lost weight. The stress was eating her alive from the inside out, exactly as I'd planned.
The beauty of my approach was its sustainability. I didn't need to physically confront her. Didn't need to risk arrest or exposure. I just needed to be a persistent nightmare, a voice in the dark that she could never quite escape.
Call number eighteen was my masterpiece.
I'd done my research, learned her schedule, knew she had a therapy appointment every Thursday at 4 PM. Dr. Melissa Reyes, psychiatrist specializing in anxiety disorders.
The call came as she was leaving her session.
"How was therapy, Victoria?" I asked pleasantly. "Did you tell Dr. Reyes about the dead girl who keeps calling you? Or did you lie to her too?"
I could hear her breathing quicken, could practically feel her panic through the phone.
"I know you just left Dr. Reyes' office," I continued. "I know you're wearing that blue Chanel suit. I know your bodyguard Malica is checking his phone instead of watching the street."
She spun around, scanning the crowded sidewalk frantically.
"You can't see me," I said. "You'll never see me. But I'm always watching, Victoria. Always waiting. And one day, when you least expect it, I'm going to make you pay for everything you've done."
"LEAVE ME ALONE!" she screamed into the phone.
People on the street turned to stare at her. Her bodyguard grabbed her arm, trying to calm her down. She looked hysterical, unhinged.
Perfect.
"Never," I whispered. "I will never leave you alone. This is your life now, Victoria. Looking over your shoulder. Jumping at shadows. Wondering when the dead girl is going to call again."
I hung up and watched from my position across the street as she collapsed against Malica, sobbing uncontrollably.
Victory tasted sweet.
---
That night, I sat in my motel room and planned my next phase. The psychological warfare was working beautifully, but I needed to escalate. Push her closer to the edge.
My laptop screen glowed in the darkness, showing Victoria's social media feeds, her email accounts—everything I'd hacked into over the past month. She'd been sloppy with her digital security, arrogant in her assumption that she was untouchable.
I began composing anonymous messages to her business partners, her investors, her social circle. Nothing overtly accusatory—just subtle hints about her mental stability, her questionable business practices, her role in the Vanderbilt family's destruction.
Seeds of doubt. That's all I needed to plant.
By morning, Victoria Astor's carefully constructed world would start crumbling around her, and she'd have no idea who to blame.
I picked up the next disposable phone and typed out a final text message for the night:
[Sleep well, Victoria. If you can.]
Then I leaned back against the headboard and smiled at the ceiling.
"Victoria," I said aloud to the empty room, "I'm not going to let you have a moment's peace. Not ever again."
The war had just begun.