Scorned

Chapter Eight

Chapter 8

Shawn Carter stood in the door frame of his conference room as Beyoncé planted herself at the end of the long table. Her attention had been on all the different screens, each showcasing a different news station. Ever since the news broke, her attention had been so consumed by what they were saying and how they were reacting. Her face lacked emotion on the surface, but Shawn could tell that something was bothering her. Every single news station was reporting about the blog post, but her sister.

"Where is she?" Beyoncé mouthed, never allowing her voice to be heard. Instead of seeing her sister on her normal station, there was a fill-in for her. Bey had never seen the man before, but she didn't care. She wanted to hear her sister's opinion on the entire ordeal.

Shawn tapped on the door and waited for her to acknowledge his presence. She had come to the office as soon as it opened for work, but she was too consumed by the breaking story. His staff had told him that she's refused their services and had been watching television since she got there.

"Come in," Bey said lowly, never removing her attention.

"Are you okay?" Shawn asked her. He placed his hands in the pockets of his suit pants as he walked near her. He stopped once he got closer to her. Just like her, he was watching the news and watching as the story was taking so many different turns.

"Are you watching this?" Beyoncé asked him. She finally turned to look at him with a frown on her face. "Are you watching this victim blaming?"

Shawn attentively watched her. "It's like," she started, trying to formulate her words, "it's like most of them only read about the party, the alcohol, the time of day, and the clothes. No one looks at the fact that the victim is not the one that needs to be on trail. To bring up the current occupation of the victim?"

The victim was a Victoria's Secrets model. She wrote the blog post late at night, and released it to the public. Ever since dropping it, she hasn't spoken a word about it. Many celebrities have come to her defense about the ordeal, but there weren't any big celebrities or someone that could be in the same boat as her. No one from Victoria's Secret has said a word.

Shawn looked at Bey and sighed. "That's how the world is, Bey. Not everyone is going to just go along with a blog post."

"Rape culture is so stupid. So, because this woman attended a party that she was invited to, got drunk, and wore little skimpy clothing, she deserved to be raped? She asked to be raped? Because she walks down a runway in lingerie and poses in that same lingerie for many ads, she's making it seem okay to rape her?"

"We're on the same side with this," Shawn reminded her. "I believe everything she wrote, but I also have to realize that there are some people that don't see it that way."

"Then, they're capable of doing the same thing," Bey replied quickly.

Shawn took a step back from her to examine her behavior. It was something that he usually did when her mood changed from something other than happy. He liked knowing what made her tick or what put her in a certain mood. Right now, he was seeing a type of passion from her that he'd never seen. It wasn't the typical passion that she had for her business. It was personal. "Does this have something to do with your statement?"

"What statement, Shawn?" Bey asked in a stressed tone.

"The whole people like to take things that don't belong to them."

Beyoncé's eyes narrowed, and he could see her putting up her defenses. It was like her entire body tensed and she looked like she was in protective mode. Shawn stepped back from her to give her a bit of space to think about what she wanted to do next. He gave her enough for her to either express herself or walk out on him. Her eyes darted toward the door, and he realized that she'd made her decision.