She Came Back to Burn Them All

02

Dirk didn't say a word to me the whole drive back to the villa.

The second the car stopped, he slapped his keys down hard on the entry cabinet.

"Sara. Don't you move."

I bent down to change my shoes.

"Are you going to lecture me again?"

He jabbed a finger at my face.

"Look at how you acted tonight!"

"I'm the chairman of the company, not your personal chauffeur!"

"An employee's in trouble, stuck in the pouring rain with no way home, and I give her a lift. What's wrong with that?"

I dropped my bag on the couch.

"What's wrong is that you have no sense of boundaries."

His face darkened.

"Boundaries?"

"I think all that garbage online has gotten into your head!"

"Everybody at the company knows the kind of man I've been all these years."

I looked at him and didn't spare him a shred of dignity.

"I know."

"You love your reputation, love playing the good guy, especially in front of young, pretty women."

"Last year Diane in procurement complained her husband wouldn't give her money for the house, and you loaned her twenty grand out of your own pocket."

"And how did that turn out? Her husband stormed into the company, pointed at your face, and accused you of keeping another man's wife."

His face flushed red.

"Sara, that was just good intentions gone unrewarded."

"And besides, your dad really doesn't have a bad bone in his body."

I nodded.

I knew he didn't.

In my last life, right up until the millions of people online drove him to jump into the sea, he was still on the phone with me, trying to explain.

"Sara, sweetheart, your dad never touched her."

"I was just afraid she'd catch cold in the rain, so I gave her a ride. That's all."

I believed him.

But the public didn't.

Seeing that I wasn't saying anything, his tone softened.

"Dad's not blaming you."

"Your mom passed early, and I raised you on my own, playing both father and mother."

"I know you look out for me at the company, that you're afraid people will take advantage of me."

"But you can't go through life this cold. Always leave a little room."

"That girl was crying her heart out in the rain. Even if you weren't going to let her in the car, you could've at least said something kind."

I looked at that naive face of his and nodded.

"Fine."

"Then I'll be the cold one."

"My problem is only with her. Whatever happens, next time she cries, the farther you stay from her, the better."

He waved me off impatiently and turned to head upstairs.

"All right, all right. Don't talk about one intern like she's some kind of monster. Get some sleep."

Watching his back, I pulled out my phone at once and called Lawyer Matthews in the legal department.

Boris Matthews was an old friend of our family, and Henson Group's chief legal counsel.

I told him to dig deep into Wanda. After all, there's no love or hate in this world without a reason.

Outside the window, the wind and rain rattled on.

The pain from my last life came rushing back.

The frenzied fans shoved me down a flight of stairs, more than a dozen steps.

Countless feet stamped on my back, on my hands.

It hurt so much I couldn't even scream.

A girl held her phone right up to my bloodied face and filmed.

"Everyone, look. This is the rich man's daughter who covered for a rapist!"

"She's finally getting what she deserves!"

"Stomp her to death!"

I drew a deep breath and clenched my fists.

This time, we'll see who stomps whom.

The next two weeks, the company was strangely quiet.

Wanda went out of her way to avoid me.

In meetings she shrank into the corner, like a startled little bird.

Until one morning after the rain.

I'd just walked into my office, hadn't even had a sip of water.

The work chat suddenly blew up.

【Oh my God! Huge scandal on Mr. Henson!】

【Number one trending topic! Go look right now!】

【Someone's publicly accused the chairman of assaulting a female intern on a rainy night!】

My head buzzed, and I opened the link at once.

The familiar headline stabbed at my eyes.

《Creepy CEO Dragged Me Into His Car on a Rainy Night, and I Almost Never Made It Home》

The article was written to inflame, every word dripping with staged grief.

The photos left even more to the imagination.

Wanda's collarbone was mottled red and purple, two buttons on her blouse torn off, her hair plastered messily against her cheeks.

She wept prettily into the camera, a diagnosis of mild depression clutched in her hand.

"I'm just an intern, fresh out of school."

"I didn't dare fight back."

"He's the boss. One word from him and my whole life is ruined."

"I don't know what I did wrong. Is being pretty a sin?"

The comment section below had already gone completely insane.

【Animal! The old bastard should drop dead!】

【All rich men deserve to die. Drag him out and shoot him!】

【He has a daughter of his own. How could he do this to someone else's daughter! Dig up his daughter's social media too!】

【I heard his daughter was in the car that night. She's definitely an accomplice! A family of perverts!】

My palms went cold. Not from fear, from pure disgust.

I shoved my chair back and pushed open the door to the chairman's office.