by Emma Easter
He felt himself sliding and falling as she wrapped her arms tightly around him and kissed him passionately. His mind screamed, begged for him to push her away, but he couldn’t.
Trisha could come here any moment from now.
He finally mustered up a little strength and weakly pushed her away. But she came back, pressed herself against him and kissed him even harder.
At last, he found he couldn’t resist anymore and succumbed. Even as she held his hand and drew him up the stairs and into the bedroom, he cursed his weakness. Like Trish had said to him before, he was a sick man, a compulsive philanderer. If she found out about this, everything he’d planned with Derrick would be ruined.
*****
“What do you mean you don’t want to get a divorce anymore, Trisha?” Audrey asked, a look of utter disgust on her face. She was still in her pajamas, as it was still very early. She stood up from the sofa and glared down at Trisha. “After just a few dates, Stan has succeeded in turning your head. Do you actually think he’s changed just because he said so?”
Trisha sighed. She’d known telling Audrey would be like this, but she had not been able to resist. She told her sisters everything. She turned to Sienna who was lounging on the couch in a silk negligee, hoping to get her support.
Sienna shrugged. “I kinda side with Audrey on this, Trish. That guy mistreated you for years, and I don’t think he’s going to change. Maybe you can wait for some time to see if he truly has before you drop the divorce.”
Audrey shook her head. “I actually don’t see any reason to keep waiting. Just go forward with the divorce and be done with Stan for good.”
Trisha looked at Audrey and then at Sienna. “You two don’t understand. You are not . . .”
“Don’t say it!” Audrey cut in. “Just because we aren’t married doesn’t mean we don’t know right from wrong. A leopard can’t change its spots.”
“But he has changed,” Trisha said.
“How do you know that?”
“From the way he has treated me since these dates started.” She stood and smoothed down her mustard shirtdress. “Anyway, my mind is made up. I want to stay married to Stan, especially because of the baby.”
Audrey laughed harshly. “Don’t come crying to me when he hurts you again.”
Sienna, sweet as always, glanced up at her with a look that said she was sorry to disagree but couldn’t help it.
Trisha huffed. “Well, I’m going to see him before I head to the bookstore.”
“So early,” Sienna said. “He’s probably still asleep.”
“I want to tell him what I have decided before he goes to work. He’ll be super excited.” She grabbed her purse from the couch. “I’ll see you guys in the evening.”
Sienna said goodbye, but Audrey turned away. Trish rolled her eyes, and then went out to her car. Audrey was so harsh. She was conditioned to be that way as a policewoman, but she carried it into all her relationships. That was why she had treated Ken so badly. She’d jumped to conclusions, believing he was cheating on her and had ignored his calls.
Well, I’m not going to be like Audrey. I’m going to give Stan another chance.
Trisha got into her car, smiling, imagining Stan’s face when she told him she was calling off the divorce. He would be so happy. All his hard work had paid off. All the dates he’d planned had been great, and she’d had a blast on each of them. Plus, she’d enjoyed his company tremendously. Most of all, she had come away with total confidence that she still loved him and wanted to remain married to him.
She got to the house and parked beside his Ford Fiesta. Getting out of her car, she walked to the door, found it was unlocked, and pushed it open. She came in and looked around. The house was as clean as when she’d left it, but she wasn’t surprised. Stan was mostly never at home. Hopefully, that would change once she moved back in.
“Stan!” she called and then began to climb the stairs. He was definitely still asleep, but he would want her to wake him up for this news.
I can’t wait to see the expression on his face.
She exhaled at the top of the stairs, walked to their bedroom door, and opened it.
And then her eyes widened in horror. She swayed on her feet and put her hand on her belly as a wave of nausea went through her. Lying beside her husband, with her body wrapped around him, was another woman. For a minute, she stood, trying not to throw up all over the floor, and then she yelled out his name, “Stan!”
He jerked up, and his expression went from fear to horror as he looked at her.
She finally made herself move just as the other woman stirred. She didn’t want to see the whore's face. She heard Stan’s footsteps behind her and forced herself to move down the stairs faster so he wouldn’t catch up with her.
She reached the bottom of the stairs, marched to the door and jerked it open.
Stan came up behind her. “Trish! Please!”
She turned around with rage. “Are you serious, right now, Stan? What could you possibly say for yourself now?”
He stared sheepishly at her, clearly unable to defend his abominable behavior.
“I didn’t think so.” She regarded him with loathing and her heart filled with hatred. “Tomorrow, I’m going to start to do everything I possibly can to speed up this divorce. I never want to lay eyes on you. Never again!”
“Trish, please . . .”
She ignored him and got into her car. She drove away and then stopped the car some distance away from the house. She put her head on the staring wheel and shut her eyes. Why didn’t I listen to Audrey?
She started her car again and drove straight to the house rather than the bookstore.
Audrey and Sienna were still in the living room when she got in. She swept past them and rushed into the bathroom.
They followed her, worry clouding their faces. “What’s wrong, Trisha?” Sienna asked.
Audrey laid a hand on her shoulder. “What did that dog, Stan, do now?”
Trisha couldn’t answer any of their questions as a mixture of rage and embarrassment surged through her whole being. She knelt and bent over the toilet and threw up all the oatmeal she’d had earlier. And then she fell into her sisters’ arms and sobbed.
Chapter Nineteen
Stan sat in his study and covered his face with his hands. Since the day Trisha had stormed out after finding him in bed with Carla, he had been postponing making this call to Derrick. However, he couldn’t delay any longer. He had to tell Derrick what had happened.
He scrubbed his face with his hand. Derrick will have my head.
He reached for the phone, and then his hand stilled on it. Clearly, he began to recall the day when Derrick had come to the house to make him an offer. He’d been away for a week on business and had taken the girl he was seeing at the time along with him. Somehow Derrick had found out about his affair. He’d paid him a visit, and they had sat right here in the study.
“I have a proposition for you that you would love,” Derrick had said as he sat back on the stuffed leather chair across from Stan’s. He looked his usual slick self in a bespoke navy-blue suit, his fingers threaded together.
Stan had thought it was about the affair he was having. In a way, he didn’t really care if Derrick told Trisha about it. His marriage had lost all the excitement, and he was considering filing for a divorce. He told Derrick, “As my future brother-in-law, I know you think it’s your duty to keep me on the straight and narrow, but . . .”
Derrick cut in. “I don’t care about your little affair. I’m here for something bigger . . . much bigger.”
Stan had raised his brows, extremely curious. “What is it?”
“It’s about an inheritance. The Gardner’s inheritance to be specific. A will left by the sisters’ late father.”
“I thought you already distributed their inheritance as their father’s executor?”
“There was another will. The day before he died, Phil Gardner led me into his home office, unlocke
d the bachelor-chest and pulled out a secret compartment. He brought out another will for the girls and showed it to me. He said it was to be read only after he and girls’ mother had died. He left them a fortune.”
Stan laughed. “Phillip Gardner didn’t have that kind of money. He was just a poor high school teacher.”
“No, he wasn’t. You know how much he trusted me when he was alive. I was like the son he never had, and he told me a lot of things. One of the things he told me was that his late father, John Barrel, was very wealthy. He said that throughout his life, he didn’t want anything to do with his father or his money because of how the man treated his mother. That’s why he took his mother’s maiden name, Gardner.” Derrick leaned forward and said, “In the will he gave me, he states that he has bequeathed Barrel’s Fortune to his daughters and their future husbands.”
Stan’s ears perked up. “Okay, so how much are we talking about here?”
“His father was worth an estimated six hundred million dollars. He was a widower who had no children except for Phillip Gardner and left everything he owned to him.”
Stan’s heart fluttered at the thought of all that wealth. He said, “So, if the money is supposed to be for the husbands as well, why didn’t you tell the girls and then wait until you could marry Sienna to get your hands on your own share of the money?” He smiled and held up his hand. “Don’t tell me. You wanted it all for yourself.”
Derrick smiled. “Why go after just a fraction of the wealth when you can have it all?” He shrugged. “Anyway, the will also says, and I quote, ‘They will understand what and where Barrel’s fortune is.’”
Stan’s hands had trembled with excitement. “So only the girls know where their father’s fortune is?”
Derrick nodded. “Yes. But they obviously don’t know about this second will. I planned to get one of them to fall for me and then find out what and where Barrel’s fortune was without tipping my hand. I started by asking Audrey out, but she was immediately suspicious and a bit too, well, perceptive. I had to move over to Sienna, since you and Trisha were already seriously dating. That wasn’t a tough choice to make as she is beautiful, but the problem was that she was only fifteen. Being ten years older than her, I had to wait until she was older to show my interest.”
“You are a patient man. You waited for three years before you made your move, but you played her well.”
“She wasn’t that easy. I thought I could get the information from her without having to marry her, but every time I hinted at it, she found a way to change the subject. I eventually had to ask her to marry me just so I could keep her interest and find a way to coax the information I wanted out of her.”
“That was why you left your job here and moved to New York to be near her, wasn’t it?”
Derrick nodded mischievously. “I told myself that if I ultimately didn’t succeed in getting the info out of her, I would marry her, reveal the will’s existence, and at least get some of the wealth, but she ran away.”
Stan had rubbed his hands together with glee. “I take it you want my help now and are willing to share the money with me once I deliver?”
“Yes,” Derrick said. “Since I didn’t succeed in discovering the location of the inheritance from Sienna before she ran off, I need you to find out from Trisha.”
“And I’ll get fifty percent of the wealth, or I talk.”
Derrick sighed. “Thirty.”
They’d finally agreed on forty percent.
Just before Derrick left, Stan had scrutinized his face and said, “There’s just one thing niggling at the back of my mind. The Gardners died a few days after you were shown the will.” He gave Derrick a cold suggestive smile. “Did you kill them?”
Derrick shook his head. “Of course I didn’t. You know they died in a car crash, right?”
Stan had searched his eyes. Derrick’s face looked impenetrable; he couldn’t tell whether he was telling the truth or if he was just a very good liar. Stan didn’t know whether to believe the man or not.
He came out of his reverie and sighed. I can’t keep postponing this call. He picked up the phone and dialed Derrick’s number.
Derrick answered on the first ring. “Yes, Stan, what do you have for me?”
“I . . . I failed.”
“What do you mean you failed? You called me not long ago to say it was all going according to plan, so what do you mean you failed?”
Stan put his hand on his face. “I . . . umm . . . Trisha caught me with another woman. She says she never wants to see me again.” There was silence on the other line for a full minute, and Stan began to think the man had hung up on him. “Are you there, Derrick?”
“Stan! Really! Your lack of self-control is astounding. So you couldn’t wait until you discovered what Barrel’s fortune is before indulging in your favorite pastime?”
“It wasn’t planned. The woman Trisha found me with just appeared at my door and . . .”
Derrick interrupted. “As titillating as I’m sure your story is, I am not in the mood to hear it. You’ve destroyed our carefully thought-out plan.”
Stan laughed harshly. “Well, you didn’t succeed in keeping any Gardner girl either. You failed with both of them.”
“Audrey is an annoying know-it-all. Not even the saintliest man can abide by her many rules.”
“Well, she is dating someone right now. I think they are pretty serious, so you just didn’t know how to handle her,” Stan scoffed, pushed to justify himself because of Derrick’s haughtiness. “Even Sienna out-maneuvered you.”
“Sienna is weak-minded, and you know that. She ran away not because of something I did. From the moment I found out about the fortune, I played my cards right. I would have married her if not for that ‘thing’ she told me about. I should have taken it seriously when she did.”
“Who is boring who with long stories now? Listen, we agreed that if I failed and Trisha went on with the divorce, you would find Sienna. I suggest you find her now and somehow get her to marry you. Trisha told me she’s madly in love with some other guy. They might just decide to get married any moment now.”
Derrick sneered. “Okay then. I’ll come to Rosefield right away and find Sienna. I know what her weaknesses are, and I think I’ve figured out how to play on them. I’ll show you how it’s done.” He didn’t say anything for a few seconds, and then he added, “And, Stan, you can’t tell anyone that I’m on my way. I want to surprise my dear little Sienna.”
*****
Sienna quickly put on a white one-shoulder chiffon dress. She accessorized with gold chandelier earrings and bracelet and then wore a pair of gold heels. Her stomach fluttered in nervous anticipation. She’d already packed her things into a suitcase in preparation for the wedding. She was thankful Audrey and Trisha weren’t home. They knew she was going back to school today but didn’t know she was getting married. They would have insisted on throwing her a big wedding if they knew and she didn’t want that now. All she wanted was to marry Bryan. Later on, she would surprise them with the news.
She smiled broadly. I cannot wait to be his wife.
After she finished with her makeup, she studied herself in the full-length mirror beside her bed and smiled, liking what she saw. She picked up her beaded gold purse from the bed, grabbed her duffel bag and went down the stairs.
She sat in the living room to await the taxi she had called to pick her up. Before she left for work, Audrey had volunteered to drive her to the college. She had immediately refused as she didn’t want to be seen in her dress. “Go to work, Audrey. I’ll find my way,” she’d said.
A car horn sounded outside, and she stood up. Must be the taxi. She rolled her suitcase to the door and opened it. And then her mouth fell open with shock.
“Derrick! What are you doing here?” Panic began to work its way through her as the images of their last time together came flooding back. This was the man she had promised to marry but had left at the altar. Guilt took hold of her.
Derrick looked at her and then his eyes grew watery. “You look beautiful, Sienna. Where are you headed?”
Sienna couldn’t speak.
Derrick said, “Sienna, I came here to ask you to come back to me. We belong together.”
She blinked and then choked out, “I can’t, Derrick. I’m marrying someone else.” The guilt tightened its grip on her until she felt dizzy, like she was going to pass out. She understood how it looked. She’d jilted him, and now she wanted to wed another man. What could be more heartless than that?
He looked devastated. “You can’t, my darling. You promised your life to me. And remember what you used to tell me, about doing God’s will no matter what. Would God want you to build your happiness on someone else’s misery?”
She shut her eyes as her heart began to race with anxiety and shame. She whispered, “I’m sorry.”
“You left me at the altar heartbroken. I couldn’t eat or sleep for months. I did nothing but replay the sad events of our wedding day over and over again. I have been a broken man since that day. That was why I came here, to ask you to return so I can be whole again. I’ve tried everything else, but nothing will do until you come back to me.”
Sienna felt herself swaying on her feet. She held on to the door as waves and waves of guilt and sheer panic went through her. Already, Bryan would be waiting in the chapel. Soon, he would begin to wonder where she was and probably start thinking she had abandoned him at the altar too. She had to get to him quickly.
She opened her eyes and looked at Derrick. But was it fair to him? She had been the cause of his misery. How could she skip away to find happiness while leaving him to his despair? How would she be able to live with herself if she did that?
“I need you back, Sienna,” he said in a broken voice.
Her pulse began to race as her emotions roiled. She took a deep breath to try to calm herself and managed to say, “I can’t.”
“Yes, you can. You can’t just leave me like this. I loved you. I still love you with all my heart. I can’t live without you. It’s why I came.”
