“Please, have mercy. We’re just small business owners.
“If you remove the bad review, I’ll give you a freeble next time!
At first, I assumed it was spam. But then the messages became nasty.
“I know where you work. I’ll make you pay!
Calls flooded my phone day and night, filled with threats.
“Hello?”
A rough voice snarled back.
“Don’t ‘hello’ me. I begged you, offered you free stuff, and you still left a bad review. You ruined me. I’ll be watching you?
I tried explaining he had the wrong number, but he recited my work address perfectly.
- 17.
Monday morning, I arrived at the office to find several men waiting.
“Who’s Grace Emerson?”
My colleagues looked frightened but kept quiet.
Val, however, shouted, “Grace! These guys here for you?”
The men spun around, spotted me, and charged with raised fists.
I whipped out pepper spray, sending them to the floor, clutching their eyes.
“Call the police!” I yelled.
When the cops arrived, one of the men pointed furiously at me.
“Officer, she scams us with fake reviews, demands free food, and then still gives us bad reviews. She’s ruined our businesses!”
The men claimed to be online sellers, driven to the edge by “me.”
I shook my head, “I don’t leave bad reviews. You can check my phone.”
They refused to believe me, saying, “You probably deleted the orders. We’ve got records. We know it’s you–phone number, name, address.
When I glanced at their proof, I noticed all the orders were for snacks.
I locked eyes with Val. She quickly looked away.
My colleagues vouched for me. “Grace would never do that. We all know her better than that‘
But one of the men’s eyes reddened as he cried, “If it wasn’t you, then who? This business was my family’s livelihood
“Someone must have placed the orders using my info. Could you share the order records? I’ll help you track down who did this.”
- 18.
After comparing every snack Item, I realized Val had recently handed out the exact same foods.
