Despite Toria's reservations, Reyona had already made up her mind.
She was done hiding.
She was done being a coward.
She was going to take what belonged to her from that bastard and then drag his ass through the court and back.
"If it really comes to that," she muttered to herself as she dressed up carefully that morning.
Of course, she had vowed to herself to be more assertive but then a tiny part of her still wished things didn't go this way.
Changed personality or not, hanging her dirty linen in the open for all to speculate and discuss was not her game plan.
She was dressed in an electric-blue power suit and trousers.
The suit had one pearl button in the middle, perfectly displaying the orange silk shirt she had underneath.
Paired with minimal jewellery of pearl earrings, a necklace, and a watch, the powerful CEO look was well complimented with passion diamond stilettos and a matching Channel bag.
She left Toria a note, tucked the discarded sheets around her and left in a high spirit.
She raised her eyes towards the sky as she got outside and vowed silently that that day was going to be Reyona's Day.
She was going to kick ass and she would enjoy it.
She looked in the direction of Jordan's home and wondered if they were back home yet.
"Not your business," she said to herself firmly when she found herself thinking of checking on them.
Then, of course, a certain fellow rudely intruded on her thoughts.
That helped to quickly discourage her from that idea.
As she entered the car, she switched on her phone.
She and Toria had made a pact to switch off their phones the night before.
It had been Toria's idea.
While the latter was trying to list the many ways it would be a bad idea for Reyona to go back to the scene of confrontation that fast without having the definite verdict of divorce between them first, Toria's phone started buzzing, and she had excitedly turned her phone towards Reyona.
Then, before Reyona could fully grasp what was on the screen, Toria snatched the phone away again while saying, "I am sorry. I am sorry. We are not doing this. I am going to switch this off now. I need you to…" She looked around and ran to pick Reyona's phone off the table. "There, I am switching our phones off. That is it. It is just you and me and whatever caught our fancy tonight. No pokey-nose world getting in here."
"I run a company; I shouldn't switch off my phone," Reyona said without much assertiveness.
"Not tonight. Tonight you are just Reyona, a woman who kicked ass and would celebrate all night with her adorable sister."
"By adorable, I guess you mean you?" Reyona asked with an innocent expression on her face.
"Ha ha. She thinks she is funny," Toria said before she went off to hide the phones in the bedroom.
She handed Reyona's phone to her that night just before they went to sleep but Reyona had not bothered to put it on anyway.
Her phone had been off for hours and the world survived, right?
What could a few more hours hurt?
As she put on "Wildcat" by Aria and moved her body to it enjoyably on the way to work, she listened as notification after notification sounded on her phone.
The beeping sound stopped just as she was looking at her company from afar.
She could see her company, just as she could see the reporters waiting there for her too.
"You started this, girl. You better finish it," she muttered to herself as she shored up her resolve and planted the passive look she had mastered for negotiation.
She could see her security men doing their best to keep the reporters back.
"I really need to give them a raise," she thought to herself.
All she could think of was vultures roving around a carcass.
She parked some distance from the company.
A reporter saw her and he asked another to be sure if that was her car or not.
The others heard and those who knew for sure started running towards her.
Like a stampede, they ran towards her car, giving the security men a break.
It was a momentary relief because they saw that they were going after Reyona and then they had to run after the reporters to save their boss from the mob.
Reyona had already rolled up her noise-filtering window glasses, though.
Her car had been modified after she got it.
It could switch panes from tinted to regular to noise-filtering.
So, as the reporters beat on the car's body and window, Reyona watched their mouths open and close in what she supposed were variants of statements regarding their oh-so-important need for an interview.
Her eyes widened a bit as she reached for her phone and saw fifteen calls that had gone straight to voicemail, eleven messages, and an email.
She decided to check those later.
She opened her call log and dialled the last number she called.
"Are you ready to go?"
"Waiting for your call," the person on the other end responded.
"Do it now."
"Right away"
Reyona disconnected and sat with a serene smile on her face as some of the reporters decided to make do with her car-barricaded pictures first.
Reyona mentally counted.
One…two…three…f…
Her security men didn't have to stress themselves this time around because the reporters started pulling out their phones one after the other as if they all got notifications at the same time.
Some of them looked back at Reyona in the car, like she had just taken their baby from them.
Some of them quickly ran back to their vans and drove off, while others stepped aside as they quickly requested a live session from their stations.
Then they quickly face their photographers and put a spin on what they just read and saw.
Soon enough, there was enough room in front of Reyona's car for her to drive through.
Still, some tenacious reporters stuck close to her car to get their own version.
She honked loudly and drove without a show of hesitation.