Authors: R.S Burnett
Kyle turns to me a question in his eyes, I shake my head at him.
“She didn’t cheat on me and lie to me about fathering a child!” he shouts at her.
“Can’t you see? This is what she’s wanted all along!”
“No. This is what I’ve wanted all along” he tells her calmly.
“Christ!” she throws her hands up in the air and turns on me “You couldn’t stay away could you? You didn’t learn!”
I take a few steps towards her “What was I supposed to learn?”
“To keep your mouth shut”
“But I didn’t tell him. I wasn’t never planning on telling him. It was unnecessary”
“You deserved it. Travis knew.” she sneers at me.
“What are you two talking about?” Kyle asks.
I turn to face him and Mason. “It was Chris. The night I got attacked, Chris was there. He was the one who did it, he told me I had to learn to keep my mouth shut”
“Why didn’t you tell the police?” Kyle demands.
“Because I didn’t remember right away. That night I went to Travis’s and you were there, I’d had a nightmare and remembered, that’s why I was there. I couldn’t tell the police because they would ask questions and then I’d have to tell them. I didn’t want you to find out like that” I shrug.
“Always so honorable” Amber rolls her eyes.
“Maybe you should leave” I advise.
“He’s my fiancé!”
“Not anymore” Kyle shouts.
“We can work this out” she insists.
“We can’t” he shakes his head at her “You cheated on me, you got pregnant by another man and tried pulling it off as my child, you had my ex-girlfriend, who also happens to be the woman I love beaten and you think we work it out?” he’s incredulous.
“Look, we can all work this out. You can stay with me. Louise can get back with Chris and then when the baby is born we’ll tell him or her who it’s father is and then in a way we’ll all be related that way, you two will still be in each others lives”
I look at her making sure she’s not serious, but I can tell that she definitely is. “You’ve lost your mind” I laugh “You think I want anything to do with that baby? The one who was conceived on the day of my father fucking
funeral
?”
“What?” Kyle shouts.
“Yeah I worked it out” I smile at Amber.
“Argh!” she screams “This isn’t how the plan was supposed to go!”
“And how was that? Which part aren’t we doing right?” I raise an eyebrow at her expectantly.
“I was supposed to marry Kyle, Chris marries you and then we both divorce you because it wouldn’t be long before you both started having your own affair and then Chris and I would be able to bring the baby up without having any financial troubles” she huffs.
My jaw hits the floor.
Kyle burst out laughing, bent over, hands on knees laughing.
Mason looks sick.
“I was never going to marry Chris” I frown at her “Even if I did, I never would have been unfaithful to him”
“But you were! You both were!”
“What are you talking about?”
“The night your dad died, you and Kyle were together. Don’t think that I actually believed you called him when you found out, you were together before that!”
“Nothing has happened between me and Kyle since he’s been back” I look to Kyle for confirmation, he winces “What?”
“I kissed you” he admits.
“When?”
“The night you hurt your hand. I spent the night with you, I kissed you just before you fell asleep. I woke up before you and when you came downstairs, you didn’t seem to remember anything that we had said or the kiss, so I dropped it”
“But Chris had already broken up with me then” I point out to Amber.
“Kyle wasn’t single though”
“My father had just died. I’d just lost the only remaining family I had and he kissed me, in comfort, in sympathy. It’s not as if he had a full on affair with me and got me pregnant!”
“He loves you!”
“And I love him but we haven’t acted on it! You met someone and started having an affair with him, he also happened to be my boyfriend”
“God, you are stupid” she laughs “I’ve known Chris for years, we met in college. We’ve been having an affair for four years. When Kyle left you we saw an opportunity and took it”
“
That’s
why you were so adamant we come here?” Kyle asks.
“Yeah, I knew that with her dad dying you’d be too distracted to notice that anything was going on between me and Chris”
“You heartless bitch!” he shakes his head “What the hell did I ever see in you?”
“It was easy honey” she smiles mockingly at him “I thought it was going to be harder than it was, what with you being so caught up in Louise and all but, it turns out all you needed was a lot of sex and often. She couldn’t be that memorable if that’s all it took”
“You did it all for money?”
“Of course” she shrugs
“You know that makes you a hooker” Kyle points out.
“What? It’s not as if you have any actually standards when it comes to women” she looks pointedly at me.
“Mason, I think you’d better take her home before I forget that she’s pregnant and hurt her.” I manage to get out through gritted teeth.
We all turn when my front door opens and when Chris walks in, I don’t know whether to laugh, scream or shoot him.
He looks around at us all before zooming in on Amber “You told him”
“Yeah, she told me” Kyle nods at him.
Chris walks further into the room and stops in front of me. “Has she got to the part were we get married yet?” he asks conversationally.
Before I even realize what I’m about to do, my hand is flying up and I’ve landed a punch on his jaw. His head turns to the side.
“You bastard!” I hiss at him.
“It’s okay, I expected that” he stretches his neck and shakes his head.
I bring my knee up, connecting with the target perfectly. He doubles over clutching himself in both hands, I bring my knee up again, landing straight on his nose. “Did you expect that too asshole?” I ask as he lands on the floor. I lift my leg up to kick him while he’s down but Mason pulls me away from him.
Luckily though, Kyle walks over and kicks him in the stomach three times. The only nose is Chris grunting in pain and then Amber screaming at us all to stop.
“Kyle” Mason calls when Kyle bends down and picks Chris up by the scruff of his shirt. “Leave it son”
Ignoring his father, Kyle punches Chris “That one is for what you did to Louise”
“Which part? Hitting her, tying her up or the surprise I left on her?” Chris asks.
“What’s he talking about?” Kyle asks me.
I shiver, repulsed “He ... relieved himself on my shirt”
Kyle head butts him “That’s for being a sick son of a bitch” he pushes him away.
“Get out. Both of you” Mason demands.
“Come on” Amber wraps herself around Chris’s arm.
“Wait” I call out to stop them but turn to Kyle with a frown “How do you know if Chris is definitely the father?”
“I always wore protection”
“Then why did you ever think it could be your baby?”
“He was too wrapped up in you to work it out” Amber smirks at me.
“Do me a favor” I cock my head to the side “When you’ve had the baby, come find me”
“What the fuck just happened?” I mutter.
Mason joins me on the sofa and passes me a glass of wine.
“We all got played” Kyle grumbles taking a sip of his beer.
“I don’t even know what to say” I admit.
“Just forget about them” Mason pats my knee “Don’t waste anymore time on them, we all fell for it. They used you both in the worst ways. You’re both better than them”
“How are you?” I ask Kyle.
“How am I?” he raises both eyebrows “How are
you
? Everything they did to you is a hell of a lot worse than anything they did to me. I can’t believe that they ...” he trails of shaking his head slowly.
“I’m fine. Shocked as hell and a little nauseas that it was all planned but other than that, I’m just glad everything is out in the open and it’s all over”
Cat, Tom and Travis turn up next.
“What are you guys doing here?” I ask surprised.
“You didn’t think we’d go without you do you?” Cat asks.
“You should have gone” I smile pulling her into a hug.
“What’s going on?” Tom asks.
“You better have a seat” I gesture to the sofa.
Mason and I get everyone drinks as Kyle explains everything to them. The reactions all vary from surprise to anger. Travis, already knowing as much as I did is surprised that it was all planned. Cat and Tom, not knowing anything are both furious. We all sit around the living room drinking and talking about anything and everything except Amber, Chris and their unborn child.
Everyone leaves early evening, leaving me alone to process everything.
If someone told me six months ago that someone I trusted was going to use my fathers illness to his advantage I would have laughed at them But, it just goes to show that you can’t trust everyone. People aren’t always who they seem to be.
I’m in the rock pools with a glass of wine, relaxing for the first time since I was in the airport when the door opens.
“Hey” Kyle says softly as he closes the door behind him.
I smile up at him “Quite a day huh?”
He chuckles “Yeah”
“How you holding up?”
“I’m worried about you” he admits taking his shoes off and sitting at the edge of the hot tub, his feet dangling in the water. “They used you more than me”
“Kyle” I shake my head “You were going to marry her. You’ve just found out that you’re not going to be a father after all and she was going to marry you for your money”
“I wasn’t going to marry her. I know that now. I was putting it off, but I wouldn’t have gone through with it. I think, in the back of my mind I always knew the baby wasn’t mine too”
“Still. It’s a lot to take in”
“True” he nods “But what they did to you was a lot worse. They used your fathers illness and death to their advantage. I’m sorry Lou, you can’t know how sorry I am.”
“None of it was your fault Kyle”
“He hurt you Lou, he hurt you because of me. They didn’t want you to tell me so they
hurt
you”
“I’m okay now” I assure him.
“I shouldn’t have left you alone out there that night, if I had been there...”
“Don’t. Don’t beat yourself up about it. It happened, there’s nothing we can do about it now. It’s over”
“How can I not? You went out there looking for me and I hurt you, then I left you there on your own and he hurt you because of me. No matter how you look at it. It all comes back to them hurting you, everything they did to you was because of me”
“No Kyle. Everything they did to both of us was because of them, it was
for
them”
He doesn’t say anything further so I decide to change the subject “My dad says thank you by the way”
“Huh?” he frowns at me.
“I haven’t had a chance to tell you but, he wrote me a letter before he died and gave it to your dad. He wrote in there to thank who ever it was that brought me back to reality, that was you so, thank you, from my dad”