Luxury on the Company Dime: A Girlfriend's Bill and a Boss' Wrath

"Let me break it down for everyone. The clothes Dianne wore in these photos are from Burberry. The retail price for these is over 30 thousand dollars.

"This bag over here is from Louis Vuitton. You won't be able to get that without at least 100 thousand dollars. Coupled with her shoes, sunglasses, and hair accessories, everything on her would add up to roughly 300 thousand dollars," Lizzie wrote in the company group chat.

Then, she sent another photo. "I'm sure everyone knows what brand this car is. Need I say more? Does everyone really think a finance officer would be this wealthy?" she questioned.

The group chat that'd been quiet just moments ago instantly blew up. With Julius' earlier remarks backing Lizzie up, several of them began fawning all over her.

In fact, some of them even started to make up rumors about me out of thin air.

"I think I saw her getting into someone's car last week. He looked pretty old…" one of them said.

"I always knew she was bad news. We'd still be in the dark if it weren't for Lizzie," another replied.

Lizzie only became more brazen with everyone fueling her ego.

"The reason I'm exposing this is because I want everyone to be the judge of this incident. Dianne would often message Julius behind my back. In fact, she even asked him to go to her place late at night."

Lizzie sent another screenshot after that.

The contents in it were exactly as she'd said. I'd messaged Julius at 1:00 am.

"Come to my place. Now," I wrote.

But that was because Dad found a problem in the contract late at night. I'd only asked him to come over to verify it.

Everyone turned their backs on me at this so-called evidence.

"Doesn't she know that Mr. Sanford and Lizzie are married?"

"I know Dianne's tricks all too well. I used to be a whore like her, and I liked seducing men who'd already been taken…"

Bianca nervously took the phone away from me. "This is all fake, right?" she asked.

I nodded gratefully in response. "Yes, it is. But it's not something I can explain to you in a few words. Thank you for telling me all this."

I'd already noticed earlier that this was a separate group chat they'd created on WhatsApp. Everyone else was in it except for me.

Bianca visibly relaxed at my words. "I'll take your word for it. That really puts me at ease."

I pointed at her phone and asked, "Is it okay if I take a photo of that?"

"You… want to take a photo?"

I smiled in response before replying, "Yes, that's right. I'm going to report this to the police. This is a clear act of defamation."

Bianca handed her phone to me without the slightest hesitation at my words. "You're doing the right thing, Dianne!"

After sorting out the evidence, I sent a copy to my lawyer back home, Lawrence Duncan.

"Don't worry. I'm not the kind of person they say I am," I reassured Bianca.

Confusion, grievance, and fury swarmed inside me when I first saw the messages. I even felt the urge to storm over and tear Lizzie apart on the spot.

But once I'd calmed down and thought things through, I realized that it would do more harm than good. Throwing a tantrum wasn't going to clear my name.

It didn't take long for me to receive a reply from Lawrence. "This constitutes defamation, Ms. Hayden. Should I draft the lawsuit now?"

"Yes, and send it to me once you're done. We can submit all the documents once I've called the police."

I'd just sent the message over when the door was pushed open. Lizzie swept her gaze over the room with her hands on her hips. Then, she pulled out a chair and took a seat across from me.

"It looks like our finance officer has a lot of free time on your hands, don't you?" she mocked.

I remained silent. All I offered was a brief glance in response.

Lizzie didn't get the slightest bit angry. Instead, she played a voice message from Julius.

"You can go shopping if you feel like it. Grab someone to carry your things if you can't manage them all, or just have Dianne do it. She's not busy with work anyway," he said.

Her amused gaze lingered on me as she tried to gauge my reaction when the recording ended.

I kept a smile on my face. Then, I tidied up my desk and stood up nonchalantly. "Let's go then. I'll make sure you shop to your heart's content while I keep you company."