She Left Me Breathless (2 page)

Anne’s brow furrowed into a frown. “What?” she asked.

“Come on, it’s not a hard question. How much is your yearly salary?”

The color of Meredith’s cheeks was nearly the same flaming red color of her hair. “Sydney, what the hell are you doing?” she asked.

Sydney turned and looked at Meredith. “I don’t think I was talking to you and if you have any sense whatsoever, you will sit there and keep your mouth shut.”

“Around $250,000.00,” Anne said, pulling her car keys from her purse.    

“If memory serves me correctly, I think your bonus last year was somewhere around a hundred grand.” Sydney smiled at Anne. “I guess what I really want to know is, was she worth it? Was fucking my girlfriend’s ears off worth more than a quarter million dollars a year?”

Meredith slid off the bed and wrapped the sheet tightly around her body. “Come on, babe, don’t do this,” she said, coming around the side of the bed to stand next to Sydney. She laid her hand on Sydney’s arm.

“Don’t touch me!” Sydney said, emphasizing each word as she shrugged Meredith’s hand away. She looked at Anne. “As for you, you’re fired! Don’t bother going to work tomorrow. I will have Maureen pack your stuff and send it by courier. Now get the hell out of my house!”

Without a backward glance, Anne quietly left the room.

Meredith was livid. She stomped her foot on the floor. “You can’t do this, Sydney!” she yelled.

Sydney whirled around to face Meredith. Her light brown eyes were almost black as she glared at the woman who had shared a bed with her for the last ten years. Meredith, seeing just how angry Sydney was, took a nervous step back.

Sydney jabbed her finger at Meredith’s face. “Now it’s your turn, you, you cold, calculating, ungrateful bitch! You’re fired and I want you out of my house, out of my sight, and out of my life.”

Meredith began to sob. “Where am I supposed to go?” she asked, her voice cracking with emotion.

Sydney wasn’t buying it. “I don’t give a shit where you go and you can knock off the fake tears. You forget that I know you better than you know yourself. You have one hour to get your shit packed and get out.”

Meredith’s whole demeanor changed. Not a single tear ran down her cheek. She looked at Sydney with pure contempt. “I need at least three weeks to find another job. Can you at least give me that?”

“You have one week, Meredith, and that’s final.”

“Can I stay here tonight? I promise to make other arrangements tomorrow?”

“I want you out of my house today. There are plenty of hotels you can choose from or better yet, have one of your gal pals put you up for the night.” 

“Fine,” Meredith said, grabbing a pair of slacks from the closet. “Would you mind giving me a little privacy?” she asked sarcastically.

“Why? It’s not like you have anything I haven’t seen before.”

“If you paid more attention to me, I wouldn’t have to spread my legs for other women.”

Sydney couldn’t help but laugh. “How stupid do you think I am? Do you think that I don’t know you’ve been spreading your legs for every Tom, Dick, and Harriet that comes along? I know exactly whom you’ve been sleeping with. I also know when you slept with them and how many times. I didn’t get to where I am by sticking my head up my ass.”

“If you knew, why didn’t you say or do anything about it?”

Sydney shrugged. “Because you just weren’t worth the hassle and as long as someone else was servicing you, I no longer had to.”

“I can’t believe you just said that,” Meredith said, shaking her head.

“Do you know what the difference between a whore and a prostitute is, Meredith?” When Meredith didn’t answer, Sydney said, “A prostitute is at least smart enough to charge for a piece of ass. Just think about it, if you charged, you’d be a millionaire by now.”

“You are one heartless bitch,” Meredith said through clenched teeth.

Sydney laughed. “Maybe I am but I’m not your bitch anymore.” She stopped in the doorway and turned to look at Meredith. “You have one hour to get your things packed. I want you gone as soon as possible and if you think I’m joking, try me. I won’t hesitate to call the police and have you physically removed.”

Meredith snorted. “I’m surprised you don’t have your goons do it for you.”

“That’s something you don’t need to worry your pretty little head about. What I do or don’t do is no longer any of your concern,” Sydney said, slamming the door shut so hard that the chandelier hanging in the foyer rocked back and forth. 

Sydney stood outside the door for several minutes while she gained some semblance of control over her frayed nerves. She was relieved that it was finally over between her and Meredith and she was grateful to Anne for giving her an excuse to do what she had wanted to do for a long, long time, what she should have done years ago.

Her thoughts turned to Frankie, Maureen, and Caitlyn. They were the only ones who knew she would be coming home a day early. She also knew Frankie well enough to know that the big bear of a woman had intentionally left the snow on the two cars for Sydney to see.

Sydney took the steps two at a time in an almost giddy sort of manner. She practically floated over the family room floor. She went behind the wet bar, grabbed a beer from the fridge, and then retrieved the stack of mail from the foyer table. A glance at her watch told her it was almost 9:00 A.M. and Jackie wouldn’t be there for another hour. Sydney hoped that Meredith would be gone by the time she arrived. She was eager to see what new information Jackie had for her and whatever it was, it had to be good, otherwise Jackie would have waited until their usual appointment on Friday to come over.       

She dropped into an oversized recliner and kicked the footrest up. She tossed the stack of mail on the coffee table, took a long swig from the bottle, and glanced up at the ceiling. The sound of slamming drawers and stomping feet made her smile. Meredith was thoroughly pissed and Sydney couldn’t be happier.

Meredith glanced at her reflection in the mirror.
I’m an attractive woman. I have a fantastic body for a woman in her forties
, she thought as she tucked several, long strands of red hair behind her ears. Her green eyes flashed with anger. “Who the hell does she think she is?” she asked herself. She grabbed a handful of clothes and slung them into the suitcase sitting on the edge of the bed. It took everything inside of her to fight back the tears that threatened to spill onto her cheeks. She would not give Sydney the satisfaction by shedding one tear.

“No one dumps me and gets away with it,” she muttered under her breath. She stomped over to the closet and yanked several suits from their hangers. She looked around the room. Sydney was crazy if she thought she could take everything she owned right now. She would have to send someone to fetch the rest of her things and Sydney would just have to deal with it. There was just no way to pack ten years worth of stuff in less than an hour.

I can’t believe she’s doing this to me
, she thought as she flung several pairs of panties and a handful of silk bras into the case. So what if she had a fling or two or three or fifty over the course of their relationship. Personally, she thought it helped to keep things fresh, at least on her part and if Sydney had tried to spruce things up a little more, maybe she would not have been so apt to look at anything wearing a skirt.
Ah, who the hell am I kidding
, she laughed at her own thoughts. Of all the relationships she had been in, not one single woman had been able to keep her eyes and most importantly, her hands from wandering.

Meredith tossed the smaller of two jewelry boxes into the suitcase and zipped the lid shut. She grabbed the luggage handle and turned toward the door. She caught a glimpse of her reflection in the mirror and smiled. If Sydney thought she could just kick her to the curb with no repercussions, she had another think coming. No one dumps Meredith Lansing and gets away with it. Not even the great, Sydney Welsh.

Sydney looked up at the sound of the door opening. She watched Meredith come down the stairs.

Meredith sat the suitcase on the floor next to the couch. “Are you sure about this, Sydney?” she asked. “Once I walk out of here, I’m not coming back.” 

“Yes, Meredith, I’m sure. You and I have known for awhile that this was coming.”

“How can you just end it like this? Do all the years we spent together mean nothing to you?”

“You have got to be kidding me. I just caught you in bed with one of my executives and you have the nerve to turn this around on me,” Sidney said calmly.

“Well, I’m not giving up that easily. If you think you can just toss me out like yesterday’s garbage I’ve got news for you and—”

“That’s why I’m giving you this,” Sydney interrupted. She reached down and picked her checkbook up off the coffee table. “I want you out of my life for good, Meredith. No more games.” She ripped off the check and shoved it in Meredith’s hand.

Meredith looked at the check and frowned. “$500,000.00? What in the hell am I supposed to do with this? How can you expect me to live on such a measly amount?” she asked sarcastically. 

“If you don’t want it, I’ll take it back,” Sydney said, reaching for the check.

Meredith pulled it back and crammed it in her pocket. “I guess I’ll just have to make do. I wouldn’t want to put you out or anything.”

Sydney resisted the urge to shoot another dinger at Meredith regarding who’s doing all the putting out. She felt her temper flare again. “You’re lucky I’m giving you that much. If you remember correctly, the good citizens of Ohio voted down the gay marriage proposal, so by law, I don’t have to give you a penny and—” Sydney stopped in mid-sentence and stood up from the chair. She threw her hands up in the air. “You know what, Meredith? I am so over this. I just want you gone.”

“Come on, Sydney. Please don’t do this,” Meredith practically begged as she followed Sydney into the foyer.

Sydney jerked the front door open and stood off to the side.

Meredith, dragging her luggage behind her, stomped unceremoniously through the doorway. She turned to look at Sydney, her eyes full of contempt. “I meant what I said. If you think I’m just going to go away quietly without a fight, you’re sadly mistaken, Sydney.”

“Goodbye, Meredith.”

“I’ll send someone over tomorrow to collect the rest of my things,” Meredith yelled over her shoulder just before Sydney slammed the door shut in her face.

Sydney closed her eyes and fell back against the door. Feeling the coolness of the wood permeate through her blouse, she took a deep breath, and forced herself to relax. After a few minutes, she opened her eyes. She glanced at her watch.
Jackie would be
...

The doorbell rang before she had a chance to finish her thought. “Damn it, Meredith,” she swore as she jerked the door open.

Jackie Christopher, a behemoth of a woman with short sandy brown hair, smiled sheepishly. “Sorry, Syd, it’s just me.”

“I’m sorry, Jackie, please come in,” Sydney said, stepping back to allow her through the doorway.

Jackie walked into the family room and took a seat on the couch. She took off her sunglasses and laid them on the coffee table next to the file folder she had brought with her. She was silent as she watched Sydney go over to the wet bar.

“Kinda early to be hitting the sauce, huh?” Jackie asked, her eyebrow rising slightly as she looked at Sydney.

“You know what they say, it’s five o’clock somewhere. Care to join me?”

“Oh what the hell, you only live once, right?” Jackie laughed.

“So they say,” Sydney said, grabbing two bottles of beer from the fridge.

Jackie took the beer Sydney offered and twisted off the cap. She took a long swig from the bottle. “So, you wanna tell me what’s going on or do you want me to guess?” she asked.

“Meredith and I broke up,” Sydney sighed.

Jackie snorted. “There’s a real shocker.”

“You aren’t the least bit surprised?” Sydney asked, cocking her head to look at Jackie.

“As far as I’m concerned the two of you should have split a long time ago,” Jackie answered, shaking her head.

“You aren’t the first person in my life to point that out,” Sydney laughed.