by Sam Crescent
“You wanted to see me,” she said.
Dean nodded and gestured for her to go on ahead of him. She went to the kitchen and he made coffee. He really wanted booze, the strongest stuff he owned.
“I’ve been thinking, Laura. I’ve decided to move on,” He told her. He heard her gasp and he closed his eyes. He had to do this. “I’m selling this place and moving back to my old town.”
“You said you were moving on. Cape Falls was where you wanted to be,” she said.
“I know what I said. I’ve changed my mind.” He handed her the cup and she put it on the table.
“This is why you’ve brought me here? To tell me you’ve had your fun and now you’re leaving,” she shouted.
“I know you’re upset...”
“Down fucking right I’m upset. I gave you everything you asked of me. My friendship, my love, my fucking virginity and my body and now you’re telling me you’re leaving. You fucking bastard.”
The cup and the steaming coffee suddenly slammed into the wall. He watched the droplets of liquid slide down the wall.
“I hope you live a life of fucking misery,” she told him.
She walked out of his house and he followed after her. He didn’t stop her and watched her march away.
When he walked back into the kitchen he stared at the smashed cup and dialed the number. Peter answered on the first ring.
“It’s done,” was all he said and he hung up.
“I’m already in misery, baby,” he said.
Chapter Seventeen
Three months later.
Time carried on as normal. College started back up and Laura dropped out. She got the fulltime position at the library and her night times she spent at the diner. Her belongings were removed from home and she shared the apartment with Peter.
The talk of the town was Dean Riley. He’d come and gone all in a matter of months, taking with him her heart. Laura did her best to put a smile on her face and to show to the world she was fine. No one but Peter knew the truth. Some people suspected about her condition. She’d lost weight and looked ill.
On an appointment to the doctor's she’d been told she was pregnant. When she thought back, Dean had rarely used a condom. She didn’t tell Peter, but one of the women who worked at the clinic had seen her and knew about her condition. Now the whole town knew. She was the brunt of all the gossip. Peter helped her when he could, even though many had already made up there ideas about her. Her parents refused to speak to her. The doctor had said she was about three months along and she guessed the last time they were together had been the cause.
“I want to make this all right for you,” Peter said one afternoon.
Even though she was pregnant, because of all the hours she worked, she’d lost all of her excess fat. She could see the small curve of her bump.
Peter got down on one knee and Laura closed her eyes, hoping he’d vanish when she opened her eyes.
“Will you marry me?” he asked.
She opened her eyes and the tears sprang forward.
“I’m sorry, Peter. I can’t accept this,” she told. She handed him back the engagement ring and moved away from the sofa.
“I’m pregnant with another mans child. I appreciate everything you’ve done for me but I can't burden you with this. That isn’t fair and I won’t do it.”
Since Dean had left she’d tried to move on and make it work and failed in every area. Yes, the town would quieten down if she married Peter and he accepted the responsibility of her baby. She didn’t want that. This wasn’t his baby and she loved him only as a friend. A friend didn’t do that to another friend. Peter had tried to stop the gossip, but she couldn’t accept his marriage proposal. Like a heroine out of her books, she was cursed to love only one man.
“You don’t have to answer right away,” he said.
She ran her fingers through her lank hair. No life in her body or her hair. She was nothing more than a glorified zombie.
“Peter. I told you before. He, Dean, may not want me but I love him. It wasn’t some stupid schoolgirl crush.” She stopped. Talking about him always brought tears to her eyes.
“He left, Laura,” he argued.
The tears fell as they always did. She’d sat at a distance as the men who helped him move came to collect his stuff. Laura stayed there until the ‘for sale’ sign appeared.
“I know that,” she shouted at Peter, turning back to him for the argument. Peter cared about her but he never understood the pain she was going through.
“Love isn’t like some football game you can just turn off. I know he’s older than me and damaged, but I can’t control whom I love. Dean Riley is the man my heart fell for and I watched him leave me as if I meant nothing.” She rubbed the tears from her eyes. They were falling thick and fast.
“Do you want me to say yes to you? To marry you, Peter? Give birth to your children and pretend to be happy? When my daughter asks me about love and to know in my heart the only man I ever loved is a gazillion miles away, do I tell her, 'but hey, I settled for your father?'” Laura stared at him. Her eyes filled with tears, her whole body shaking with pain and fear.
“Maybe you would feel something for me with time,” he said.
She hated herself. Peter was kind and gentle. He thought he loved her. She didn’t really know and she wasn’t the type of woman to dispute his emotions. Laura turned from him and went through to her room and grabbed her diary. He followed her inside.
“I care about you, Peter. Really, I do. You’ve read this before and I think you should read it again. I don’t need it anymore.” Laura handed over her diary and grabbed her bag. “I’m going to work. Don’t wait up for me.”
The walk to the diner was slow and exhausting. She rubbed away the tears from her eyes for the thousandth time. People walked past her and she felt their stares.
The diner was busy considering it was almost Christmas. The changing area was dead when she walked in. Her locker stood in the far corner.
She thought back over the past few months and how quickly her life had changed. About five months ago she’d stood in this very spot thinking about Dean Riley and her unbearable crush on him. Her feelings hadn’t changed. She loved him still and she wished with all of her heart she could forget him and move on and love Peter the way he deserved.
Laura made herself move to the diner, her uniform hung from her body from the weight loss. She went through the same motions, taking orders and pouring coffee. Nothing mattered to her anymore. The life she’d wanted ceased to exist. Even her writing had stopped.
For the rest of the night she tuned out her own pain and carried on with her work, disregarding the pain in her whole body. Her hands shook and every time she moved she felt dizzy. She was pouring more coffee into a mug when the world went black.
Chapter Eighteen
Dean sat at his kitchen table nursing a headache. Last night the final proofs for his story had been sorted and he’d hit the whisky, a little too hard. The sudden banging on the door made his head feel like exploding.
“I’m coming,” he croaked and walked the short distance in his apartment from kitchen to the front door.
Peter Miller stormed through the door.
“Why have you come here?” Dean asked the young man. The last conversation he had with him had resulted in the end of his world.
“Because I care about Laura. Since you’ve been gone, she doesn’t live anymore. She only exists,” Peter told him.
Shit. Dean couldn’t deal with this. Not now.
“You’re the one who said she could love you,” he said to Peter.
“I lied,” said Peter.
Dean felt his gut twist and he turned from the accusing stare of the man younger than him. He walked back through to his kitchen and took some pills to ease his head.
“Laura, deserves something better and that something that isn’t me,” Peter told him, pointing to his own chest.
Dean snorted and swallowed his cof
fee. His head was easing in a matter of moments.
“If you could see her, you wouldn’t be arguing with me right now," Peter continued. "She’s dying, Mr Riley.”
He stopped and looked at the younger man who stood back from the table.
“What the fuck are you talking about? You told me to stay away from her, remember? I was a perverted bastard using her for sex,” he reminded Peter.
“Well, were you using her?” Peter asked.
“I fucking wasn’t. I loved Laura. I still do, but you told me she could get better. This is me staying away. I don’t even want to talk about the amount of times I’ve gotten in my car, ready to drive back to her. I promised I’d stay away.”
“Laura’s pregnant.”
Dean stared at him. “What did you say?”
“She’s pregnant, Dean. She’s in the hospital after collapsing. The doctors don’t think the baby’s going to survive. The stress and all the additional work she’s been doing has made her weak,” Peter informed him.
“Work? She should be back in college.”
“She dropped out, Dean. She’s been living with me and trying to save money to be ready for the baby’s arrival. It’s funny. I warned you that she’d be the brunt of all the gossip with you in town. Now with you away, she’s the brunt of gossip for being pregnant.”
Dean stared at the table. Laura was pregnant with his baby and she was in the hospital.
“I’ll step aside. Laura needs you and I didn’t see it before. I loved her and thought I could do the better loving. I was a fool,” Peter admitted.
Dean grabbed his coat and followed the younger man out of his apartment. He hadn’t moved far from Cape Falls because the thought of not being a quick drive away from Laura had frightened him.
Peter drove and was probably breaking every speed limit. An hour later they pulled up at the hospital. Peter quickly found a parking space and together they walked inside the hospital. Dean followed Peter to the maternity wing.
“She doesn’t know you’re here. Just give me a minute,” Peter told him and went ahead into a room.
Dean watched the room. Laura’s in there, the woman you love and who you gave up like the asshole you are. She's laying in the bed, scared and alone.
He knew then that when he entered that room he would have to make a decision. He glanced down at his finger where Carla’s wedding ring still sat.
“I’m sorry, baby. I’ve got to move on,” he said quietly. He removed the ring and fisted it in his hand. Peter came to the door and nodded for him to come in.
“I brought someone for you to see,” Peter said to Laura.
Dean walked round the door and his world collapsed. Laura was sitting up in bed. She looked terrible and beautiful at the same time. She gasped and they stared at one another.
“You said you didn’t want me,” she whispered.
“I’ve got something to tell you, Laura. I was the one who told him to leave. I thought I could love you more and give you everything that he couldn’t,” Peter admitted.
Laura remained silent and Dean nodded for Peter to leave. The door closed and Laura and Dean stared at each other.
“You’re here,” she said.
“I’m here and I’m not going anywhere,” he told her as he moved to the bed. “I’ve been an idiot. I made a promise to my wife that I would never love another woman they way I loved her.”
“And you do?”
“Fuck me, Laura. I’m so fucking in love with you it scares me,” he admitted and suddenly felt as if a great weight had been eased from his shoulders.
“But...”
“Don’t talk. Peter came to me after I took Kimmy to that dinner. I want to tell you that Kimmy was Carla’s friend. She came to see the woman I’d fallen in love with. Can you imagine how I felt? I’m a man of forty, successful, and my gut and heart was being twisted and pulled by a woman twenty years my junior.”
“You love me?”
“With all of my heart,” he told her and handed her the wedding band. “I don’t need this anymore and this is the only proof I can give you that I’m ready to move on.”
She took the ring from him. “This is the one you wear all the time.”
“I know. But I don’t need it because while I’ve been away I found this.” He pulled the necklace out that he’d taken to wearing since leaving Cape Falls. Hanging from the centre of the necklace was a diamond ring.
“Miss Laura Cox, would you do me the honour of becoming my wife?”
* * * *
Laura couldn’t believe what was happening. It didn’t feel that long ago she’d been watching him leave. Now he stood before her asking her the question she’d wanted to hear so many times in the last three months.
“I’ve got to tell you something first,” she said. Laura didn’t know how he’d take to learning she was pregnant with his child.
“What do you need to tell me?” he asked, sitting down on the bed beside and taking her hand in his.
She knew she should be angry with him. But how could she be angry? He was back and for the first time in a long time she could smile again. She loved him and wanted him to be near her.
“I’m pregnant.”
“Peter, told me. I’m so happy about this. I want us all to be together. A family.”
“What about what people think?” she asked.
“Do I look like the type of guy who cares what someone else thinks? I left because I was worried about you. I don’t want you to be gossiped about. I love you, Laura,” he told her. He cupped her cheek and leaned down to kiss her lips.
She gasped and in an instant her heart opened.
“I understand if you hate me...” Dean started to say, but she stopped him with a finger over his lips.
“Shut up," she told him. "Just promise me you won’t leave me again and then hold me. I can forget about the rest.”
Laura knew how she felt about him. The past and the hurt was forgotten at the thought of being with him for the rest of her life. Her happiest times had been with him.
“You’ll never get rid of me. I didn’t put the house up for sale, Laura. I still own it. I want you to be my wife and live with me there” Dean wrapped his arms around her.
She smiled as his scent surrounded her, comforting her.
“You’ve got to start eating though. I don’t like seeing you this thin. I want my Laura back.”
Epilogue
Dear Diary,
You may think I’m mad, but I took him back. No arguments and no fear. I’d missed him since he’d been away and having him back meant more to me than sending him off and making him work at being with me. We were married at Christmas. It was a simple ceremony. My parents refused to attend and some of the town folk don’t like us being a couple. Peter gave me away and signed as a witness. He’s my friend and I hope to see him happy with a woman of his own soon.
I didn’t lose the baby and I’m seven months along. Dean is nothing but attentive.
I’ve had a book dedicated to me, and a title named after me. Can you believe that?
Dean wrote about our encounters and how much I meant to him in a book titled, "To My Saviour, Laura Cox." At first I thought it would be insane and a stupid idea. When he wrote the blurb he explained that he’d combined a story based around characters in our lives. He and I and everyone else were made up, apart from Peter. He’s in it, of course.
My writing is back on track, but I’ve not returned to college. I don’t want to return, but Dean has put his foot down. I’ll be returning in a year or two. I hope I can keep him distracted so I don’t have to return to college. I love being his wife and I don’t need anything else.
Who would have thought I’d be married and happy in the few months of getting to know Dean? He means more to me than anything. We’ve crossed so many boundaries to be together. I love him with my whole heart.
* * * *
A note from Dean,
Thank you for giving me a second chance, even th
ough I don’t deserve it. I love you and will cherish you always. Being with you and crossing the boundaries from being friends to lovers and from lovers into a married couple has been the best decision I’ve ever made.
I’m pleased you turned up that night and forced me to recognize my feelings for you.
I love you, my Laura.
The End
www.samcrescent.wordpress.com
Other Books by Sam Crescent:
Blackmailed by the Beast
Contract of Shame
Evernight Publishing
www.evernightpublishing.com
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