Beautifully Done

by Riley Mackenzie

  Chase’s father was a lot of things, but nice was not one of them. The man did not have a kind bone in his body. I swallowed hard, feeling sick to my stomach, not wanting to process where she was going.

  “I remember feeling guilty for all the times we badmouthed him, thinking that Chase and Kim parents were the worst. Can you believe that?” She wasn’t asking, more like scolding herself. “He convinced me to stay the night at their apartment since I was probably not in the best shape to go home. Said he hoped another father would do the same for Kim. So when I found myself at their kitchen island, just like I had been a million times before, I felt safe. It felt comfortable. I remember being relieved that my high was coming to an end, or so I thought. He handed me a glass of wine to calm my nerves, said we were close enough to twenty-one. And well, the rules never did apply to him, did they?” She exhaled with disgust. “Instead, two sips added to my already altered state and intensified the high. Everything was accentuated tenfold. And somewhere along the way his supportive words turned into something else ... he turned into someone else. He wasn’t my best friend’s father anymore. I didn’t know who he was, but he was whispering things I’d never imagined in my ear, promising to take away the pain.”

  The intense pressure behind my eyes started to pulsate. Any moment a vessel was going to rupture, leaving my pooled blood to boil.

  Jack Colton was lucky he was already dead.

  Her voice was barely above a whisper, but I heard every word.

  Crystal fucking clear.

  “I knew it was wrong. It felt wrong. I hated it. Every single second. I was screaming at myself on the inside, but I never said no … I never said no.”

  She slowly peeled open her eyes, terrified to look at me. Time stood still.

  “Please, Asher, say … something. Please,” she gasped like she was in physical pain. Her shaking legs buckled and she sank to the floor.

  I had no words. Not one syllable. Instead I clutched her against my chest as tight as humanly possible and carried her to the couch. The ache of my bruised ribs was nothing compared to the pain in my chest, the devastation—on so many levels.

  When her quiet sobs ended, she touched my torn cheek and said, “I’m so, so sorry that I lied to you. I never wanted to hurt you. But you have to understand, I’ve spent a lifetime protecting my son from the truth. I couldn’t risk rocking his world until I knew what this was between us. It was never about trusting you. I have always trusted you, I needed to trust in us.”

  My fury was no less, but it was aimed in a different direction. I believed her, every word.

  “I believe you.”

  Talia sighed and dropped her shoulders, relief written all over her face. But I was far from relieved.

  “Why?”

  Her tortured eyes told me she knew exactly what I was asking. I needed to know.

  As screwed up as it was, I followed Talia’s logic. I got that she refused to believe that piece of shit raped her, based on a technicality. I got that in desperation she seduced Chase, knowing that their entire family were clones and there would be no denying the relation. I got that losing Kimi shredded her, and she needed to disappear after Chase’s reaction to her pregnancy bomb. I got that she blamed herself and had accepted responsibility for her entire situation. I didn’t agree with any of it, but I got it. I got her, I knew her.

  What I didn’t get was why she stayed away. The Talia I knew was exactly how she depicted herself on stage—she was confident, invincible, and beautiful. Confident enough with time to tackle her pain and humiliation. Invincible enough to survive her mistakes and forgive herself for deceiving Chase, and recognize who was really to blame. And beautiful enough, inside and out, to make things right with us—her best friends, her son’s brother. More than anything else, I knew the woman holding my face was still that same woman. That woman didn’t keep a twenty-year secret. That woman wouldn’t share my bed for months and lie to me. So the question remained, why?

  “California was Mom’s idea. She thought it would be a fresh start for both of us. And even though I never told her who he was, well, at least not right away, she supported me. I couldn’t have done it without her. I wish I could say the same for my father. We barely spoke. It was really hard at first, being the disappointment, being the pregnant girl on campus. But the moment I held my baby in my arms, nothing else mattered. Nothing. He was perfect. Sweet and innocent, trusting, and fun. He was Tack. He was my world. And still is.” A breathtaking glow radiated from her face when she talked about her son.

  “I still don’t understand why you never came back? As pissed as he would have been at first, you know Chase would have had your back.” There was not a doubt in my mind that Chase would have stepped up and pretended if he had known the truth. And he would have been the first in line to deal with his perverted piece of shit of a father, after me.

  “I did.”

  I expected anything other than those two words.

  “At first I was embarrassed, then life got crazy, juggling college and a toddler. I had to take summer courses to make up the time I missed. Time just kind of flew by, but when Kimi…” She paused, her pain was raw. “It was the first time I saw my father in three years. He actually came to California to deliver the news in person. In a way, Kimi’s death gave me back my father and gave Tack his grandfather. Once he laid eyes on Tack, he saw what you saw. At two and a half, it was already obvious. He broke down, but never asked. In the end it was my father’s words that changed my mind. ‘That young man has to bury his twin sister next week, and god knows I haven’t been a good enough father or earned the right to give you advice, but if there was ever a day to let him see Kimi’s smile again, the time is now.’ My father was right and not just about their identical smiles. Every day a little more Kimi came out in Tack, as if God handpicked all of her best qualities and gave her back to us, wrapped in a tiny little person. Chase deserved to share in that gift. And I knew you both would help protect my little boy from that monster. Deep down, I knew Chase would eventually forgive me...” Yeah, she knew him. “After you made him.” She knew me better.

  “I didn’t see you at the funeral. And not because I wasn’t looking, Tal, because I was.”

  Her eyes pooled with tears again, but she didn’t let them spill, rather she blinked them away and took a deep breath before she delivered the final blow. Or so I thought.

  “It broke my heart … not being able to say goodbye, not having the chance to make things right with Chase, not seeing you. He stole that from me, too.” She tried to shift her gaze from mine, but I captured her chin between my fingers.

  “Talia?” My voice was not my own, it was steady and controlled. I didn’t want to lose her.

  Her answer sent chills down my spine. “I. Hate. Him.”

  “Talia?”

  “The day before the funeral, without me knowing, my father called Jack. He thought he was doing him a favor, father to father; giving him time to prepare his family, lessen the shock. He still assumed Tack was Chase’s. When that monster walked in, he took one look at Tack and one look at me and screwed me worse than he did the night he stole my virginity.” Her words knocked the wind out of me and I ground my teeth, because it was better than the alternative. “Yeah, you surprised? I wasn’t as slutty as everyone thought—good cover for my immature daddy issues. I was just a whole bunch of talk and no action.” Talia sensed my irrational rage. My blood officially boiled. She palmed both of my cheeks and forced me to look her in the eyes. “Stop. Don’t give him the satisfaction. He’s dead. He can’t hurt me ever again. Please stop, you’re shaking. You have to calm down.”

  “Tell me what he did to make you disappear and change your name, and I’ll consider not exhuming his corpse to rip what’s left apart piece by piece.”

  “Please, don’t. It was years ago. It’s over. It’s done, Asher, please.”

  “Tell me,” I hissed.

  “He knew, the whole time, he knew … he didn’t even wait for
my mother to usher Tack out of the room before he unapologetically announced that screwing me wasn’t worth the trouble of dealing with this shit.” Her voice quivered, but she paused to rein it in. “Those were his words, he referred to my son as ... shit. It was the most humiliating moment of my life. I’m haunted by the look on my father’s face when that bastard said he did me a favor, said I was a tease who was begging for it the way I performed on stage, that he saved me from going home with some random low-life trash that night.” She cringed when she enunciated the words ‘begging and performed.’ “In the same breath, he cursed me for being stupid and not taking care of my situation when I had the chance. He was furious that I had the audacity to show my face back in his circle and told me if I knew what was good for me I’d take my bastard child and go back to California. He knew about Tack all along. I didn’t know how he knew, but he did...”

  I interrupted, needing clarification, because I was about to spit fire. “And your father just sat there?” Another man lucky he was already six feet under.

  “God, no. Actually the complete opposite, my father was completely crazed. He looked seconds away from having a massive coronary. I had to physically refrain him from attacking him. I had never seen my father so distraught. See by then, I had three years to come to terms with how sick and twisted Jack Colton was. I already hated him. My dad had no idea. I was actually relieved he wanted nothing to do with Tack. I wanted him nowhere near us. I told him he didn’t need to worry, that I’d rather die than tell my son who his father was, and that after Kim’s funeral, he would never see me again. He could forget we even existed … but that wasn’t good enough. I never dreamed he could do or say anything else to make me hate him more … I was wrong. So wrong.”

  She leaned her head against the back of the couch and turned her head to face me. She looked vacant. Like she could see through me. Her voice was raspy and strained. “He said if I knew what was good for me and Tack, I would go back to California and change my name. Not just stay away, but disappear, as in off the grid, his grid. My father cursed him and threatened to make him pay. That monster didn’t even blink when my dad used the word statutory rape. Just stood there like he held all the cards … because he did. So much for empty threats. Jack rambled on about some investments they were involved with together and how the pyramid was about to crumble. He mocked my dad for how stupid he was not to realize his name was inked on every fraudulent document.”

  “The Ponzi scheme.”

  “Yep. Then he said the fate of my life, Tack’s life, our life together was in the palm of my father’s hand. We either disappear or he would let the whole thing fall. They’d both lose a fortune, but my dad would face prison time. Prison! I couldn’t let my father go to prison.”

  “Son of a bitch. When it all finally came down, Chase bailed his sorry ass out from that pile and I helped keep HIM out of prison!” The irony of the sick situation twisted the knife already in my gut.

  “My father was ready to take the fall, he didn’t care. He was willing to do that for me. He said I sacrificed enough and he was proud of the woman and mother I had become. I would’ve never let him do that. I couldn’t. And it wasn’t until the monster’s final words that my father finally agreed. We had to leave; there was no other option. He…” She tucked her knees to her chest and began to rock slightly. Her eyes welled yet again, but this time they were full of fury. “He had evidence.”

  I didn’t think my insides could burn any hotter. My fists ached to meet contact with something, anything.

  Balance, cock, torque, strike.

  “What if it’s still floating around? I know he’s dead, but what if he didn’t destroy it, what if it’s still out there? Oh god, what if Tack ever saw it? Oh god.” Her fury turned to panic. She was losing it. I knew the feeling.

  “Tal, stop. Please. Look at me.” Her wild eyes were frantic and searching. “Look at me, Teeps.” I cupped her cheeks just like she had done to me not just a few minutes ago. “Calm down and tell me.”

  “He took pictures of me, that night, ahhh! I remember so clearly his beady grey eyes turning almost black as he spoke. His glare was so intense I felt it penetrating my bones. He threatened to expose them to the world if I didn’t go—we didn’t go.”

  “That bastard not only violated you, he documented it, son of a bitch! And then he forced you to change your identity, taking you from us.”

  Her spacey eyes caught mine before she collapsed like a lead weight against my chest, trembling. Her erratic heart beat in time with mine. Inhale. Exhale. We both struggled to regulate our breathing. I thought maybe she was done speaking, she seemed like she had nothing left. I wasn’t done. I was far from being done. I gently swept beneath her eyes to wipe away the sorrow, the anguish, the fear my Talia had lived with for so long. Too long. No more. I squeezed her tighter reminding myself she was here now. But I wasn’t sure I was going to get past the fact that he singlehandedly stole nineteen years away from us and from us knowing Tack.

  She sat up a little, begging my fiery eyes to meet hers before she continued, “He gave us twelve hours. He actually set a time stamp ... he said if we were to ever walk on his sidewalk, let alone come within a hundred mile radius of the air he breathed, or if I betrayed him to stay for Kimi’s funeral, he would screw us over even harder. The scary thing was we had no idea what he was capable of. There was no way I could risk calling his bluff. Not when there was more than just me involved. Tack and I had to disappear. It was easier. It was the only choice. There was no way I would allow him to grow up anywhere near that monster. He deserved better, we both did.” Her voice was quieter now. She took my hand in hers and gently stroked across my tender knuckles. At this point I had nothing else to say, my mind was made up. I knew what I had to do.

  “My dad arranged for us to go back to California the morning of the funeral, promising that he would fix everything, that he just needed a little time. I never got to say goodbye … she was my best friend. We may not have shared blood, but I considered her my sister, and I never said goodbye. That devastation was hard to get over, I’m not sure I really ever have. But I had the support of my parents, and even though they weren’t together, in their own way they were both instrumental in helping us. My mom was there for me emotionally. She was my rock when I was surrounded by nothing but piles of scattered pebbles. That’s how I felt a lot of the time, scattered and overwhelmed. I had so much on my plate. I never knew if I was coming or going. My mom grounded me. Honestly, if it weren’t for her I’d probably still be floundering. She forced me to pursue my goal. There were so many times I wanted to give up. I mean really—a single mom raising a toddler while in medical school was unheard of. Tack was my only true motivation. I wanted him to have what I had been lucky enough to have and more. I always felt I had to overcompensate because he never had a real male role model. I made a decision early on that I would keep my personal relationships away from him. He didn’t need men coming and going. I don’t know if that was the right decision or not, but I never wanted him to get attached to someone and then it not work out between us. As he got older he did meet a couple of my boyfriends, but at that point he was doing his own thing and didn’t pay as much attention to what I was doing. In the end, it seemed I did better single, or I guess I just never found the right person.”

  Was I the right person?

  “Fortunately, my dad was there for me financially. You know better than anyone, he wasn’t able to fix Colton’s mess—it was too far gone. It might have been the only decent thing he ever did, but Jack must have kept his word, because when it finally came out, my dad was dropped from the investigation almost immediately.”

  She was right, I did know, but instead that pompous bastard tried to cover his own ass and Talia’s dad got lucky that most of the evidence had been shredded.

  “He may have escaped an indictment, but he still lost everything, like every other investor. He knew it was inevitable. He insisted that Tack and I weren’t starting o
ut in debt, so he not only paid my college tuition in full but set up a trust to cover medical school. God, the guilt and stress he carried on his shoulders his last few years.” She inhaled deeply. “It had to contribute to his heart disease.”

  I kissed our joined hands.

  “With Dad gone, I needed to provide for us and my mom, and I couldn’t bear missing out on any more of Tack’s childhood. Derm might not have been my first choice but it allowed me that flexibility. Tack was my life, still is. I would never change my decision to go. We did what we had to do at the time and never looked back. My life in New York just could no longer exist. Talia Prince no longer existed.”

  We finally peeled our bodies from the couch and made it into the kitchen, downing two water bottles. Dehydration had set in, Tal from crying, me from losing half my body weight in sweat. It didn’t stop me from opening a bottle of wine. We needed that, too. Luckily the pizza joint around the corner delivered because neither one of us were in any frame of mind to go out.

  “You need to tell him, Tal. I know it’s a given and it didn’t need to be said. But now he’s got a research internship at the same hospital. They could run into each other. It can’t wait. Chase needs to know he has a brother.” I tossed my water bottle in recycling and picked up my wine.

  “They’re so similar, it’s scary.” She followed suit, sipping her wine. If she was referring to resemblance, they could have been triplets. “Tack’s the perfect combination of the two of them. He’s sweet and kind and wears his heart on his sleeve, just like Kimi, but then there are times, I swear that I’m speaking with Chase. He’s bossy and overprotective and can be intense as all hell."

  I couldn’t help but laugh. Talia missed the worst of it, thank god. She doesn’t know Lil worked Chase over and did a damn good job at bringing out his soft side. The asshole actually used words like pure sweet and baby, like all the time.