The Personal Assistant

by Kimberly Belle

“Emotions were high that day, Detective, and my wife was angry, but she’s not a violent person. So she said some unkind things. They’re just words.” “Kind of like the trolls’ words?”

I am. Loving mother, supportive wife, charismatic businesswoman. One with an enviable, Instagrammable life.

These days, Anna Claire had a much better idea of what this business entailed. He wasn’t just moving money, he was moving drugs. A whole shit ton of them. Managing a web of mules spread out over three states, trading pills for cash that they left for her to collect at the Starlux.

Except I meant every word. I told her I wasn’t giving her a motherfucking cent. That if she didn’t stop messing with me and my family, I’d dump her body someplace no one would ever find it. I stare down the detective and wonder what else she’s holding back. If the lip reader picked up on the other stuff.

This body is beautiful, yes, but it isn’t anywhere near as perfect as my wife’s.

For the life of me, I can’t square these past ten days with the man I know. The stepfather and the husband. The provider. The sweet stranger who fronted the valet

“Not everything is about you, you self-centered bitch. Who

I hate her. Unapologetically Alex sucking up all the air in every room, turning every subject back to her, hijacking every conversation. This woman and her Insta-perfect life, treating every moment like it’s a colorful little window into her vacuous life. Even more than Patrick, I fucking hate her so much.

Patrick Hutchinson isn’t a self-made man, not even close. He got a head start with two million dollars of stolen money. He’s a thief and murderer and a fraud.”

I find it a little strange that this is the part she’s fixated on, not the part where I killed a man without even blinking, not the part where I took a woman’s baby and a bag stuffed with cash—Nina

“Owen says you never mailed the key. He says he never saw you do it, and who becomes a self-made millionaire at twenty-two? Not without some kind of a head start.” “Again. Owen is lying. He’s a self-serving prick who will say anything to save his own ass.”

God, Mister Fluffles was right. Unapologetically Alex was full of shit.”

Even from prison, Doug has plenty of henchmen doing his business, all of whom would be eager to prove their loyalty by going after the man who killed his brother and stole two million dollars of his money.

Owen Chamberlain is an arrogant ass who burns through money without a single thought as to where it came from. Country club dues, private school tuition, big house on one of the swankiest streets in Buckhead. There’s no way he can pay for all that on a judge’s salary and it can’t all be family money.

For Patrick, for the stepfather they loved and lost, for yet another fatherless future. There’s no way to spin that, no positive affirmation that can change that hard truth. The only thing I can do is let them sob.

I don’t defend my online persona, or try to explain once again that she is only a role, that I am not Unapologetically Alex, because that would be making this moment about me when it’s not.

That’s just the kind of man he was, one who’d let a soaked woman skip the line at the valet stand, who dished financial advice to help people grow their bank accounts.

What happens when people tire of my story, when Unapologetically Alex grows old and stale all over again, or people migrate to a new social media platform? Can I stay in demand, keep all those new followers engaged? Will I ever stop feeling so angry?