Truth & Consequences: A Miss Independent Novel

by Leach, Kiki

  In contrast, her heart still had yet to find a way to start mending itself. And after conversations with both her sister and her assistant, Vanessa wasn’t sure if it ever would, nor was she sure if she ever wanted it to, unless it was mended by him.

  Part Twenty

  Melanie stood in the middle of Central Park checking the time on her Dior watch.

  It was half past the hour, which meant that Nicole Sanger was late for something in which she had in fact asked for and set up to begin with.

  This didn’t really surprise her all that much, but it sure as hell didn’t stop her from being pissed off about it.

  It was bad enough that she had agreed to meet in private (though very public) with the woman who so unapologetically had been sleeping with her husband for over a year, and had more than likely started things up again the moment he ran off to tell her how he felt.

  Now she had the audacity to waste Melanie’s time by showing up late, if she had ever really planned to show up at all.

  In truth, she wasn’t even sure why she agreed to meet with Nikki in the first place. She knew there was a high chance that the outcome wouldn’t be pretty due to the ongoing circumstances. And since Nikki had never bothered to apologize for being part of the reason that her family was destroyed in the first place, she didn’t expect one to suddenly come flying out of her mouth now. Especially since she seemed to finally be getting all the things she had ever wanted – Oscar, the lead in a famous Broadway production, as well as another man who was more than willing to pay anything in order to make it happen for her, all while seeming to live in ignorant bliss. Melanie wondered how William would feel if he ever found out the truth about them. Just the look on his face would be enough sweet revenge for her, because she had no doubt that a man like William would make the both of them suffer for playing him as a fool for far too long.

  Then again, why should he have to suffer just because he decided to fall in love with someone who valued what was between her thighs more than she seemed to value other people and their feelings?

  Maybe keeping it to herself would be a better idea. Telling him wouldn’t do any good.

  Then again, what if he already knew about what was going on between Melanie and Oscar, and didn’t care? Surely after their time spent in the Hamptons, after all the fights that had taken place and awkward moments shared back and forth between the two women, as well as the longing glances shared between Oscar and Nikki, she had to tell him something about their past. Maybe he had seen something else for himself and decided to accept it for what it was as long as he could still have her too.

  But what man would do that, getting what he wanted or not? What man would stand to be trampled by a woman who claimed to love him, or so openly share him with another man, especially one as powerful as him who could get absolutely any woman he wanted from any scope of the world? The fact that he had chosen to be with someone like Nikki was something Melanie could never seem to understand.

  In her eyes, Nikki was as tainted and disgusting as they come. She couldn’t imagine what so many men, including and especially her husband, saw in her aside from a pretty face and decent figure. And maybe even that accent from time to time. Right off the bat, she could understand Maurice’s infatuation and love for Vanessa, no matter how infuriating she seemed to be throughout their entire relationship. But Nikki? That was a puzzle she had yet to solve. Not that she had any interest in ever doing so.

  When she looked down at her watch one last time, she thought about skipping out on the meeting altogether. She had other things to do that day, like spend quality time with her kids, and maybe even a little more time with Maurice if he allowed it. Even if they weren’t going to be moving past the ‘friendship stage’ any time soon, if ever, she realized after he left her standing alone on that sidewalk just an hour or so before that the last thing she wanted was to have him out of her life. Maurice was the kind of person you treasured even if all you ever received from him was a decent handshake. She was willing to stick around and continue hoping for more, but wasn’t exactly holding her breath.

  When she finally decided she had had enough of continuing to wait around for someone she had no real interest in seeing or speaking with as it was, she saw Nikki walking forward with her purse clutched in one hand and her cell phone up to her ear in the other. Convinced she was talking to none other than Oscar to tell him about their meeting and why, Melanie was about two seconds away from laying her flat on the concrete.

  And then she remembered she had kids. And a successful business. And a widespread reputation within the industry that unlike Vanessa, she couldn’t afford to tarnish so publicly.

  Crossing her arms and leaning to the side, she glared directly at Nikki until they were just a few feet away from each other.

  Nikki stopped and plastered a fake smile across her face.

  Melanie was in no mood to be pleasant and wrinkled her nose. “You’re late.”

  Nikki quickly spoke something in Spanish into the speaker of the phone before hanging up and stuffing it inside her purse. She brushed flowing strands of hair from her eyes and held on tight to her purse. Her hands were sweating so badly due to her nerves that it almost slipped to the ground.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, appearing genuine. “There was tons of traffic on the way here.”

  Melanie looked around, noticing only a handful of people passing through the park, and furrowed her brows.

  “Mm, I can see how easy it is to get held up in the crowd.”

  “I walked all the way here, Melanie, I didn’t get to take a cab like I assume you did?”

  “I don’t care if you came in from Mars or on the back of a seahorse.” She rattled her head, more aggravated in finally seeing her than before she even showed up. “I just want to know what the hell this is all about.”

  Nikki gulped. It’s not as if she wasn’t expecting hostility from Melanie upon seeing her, it’s just that she hadn’t expected it to hit her like a violent gust of wind that could knock her down on her ass with one giant blow.

  She took a deep breath in and slowly released it, all while looking directly into the eyes of the woman married to the only man she had ever loved, eyes that burned right through to her core like pounds of acid.

  “It’s about you and me,” Nikki said, anxiously tossing her hair back as more wind circled her face. “It’s about you, and me…” She momentarily dropped her eyes, and forced herself to push out those last two words. “And Oscar.”

  Melanie felt blindsided. Sure, she was expecting something about Oscar to be mentioned, seeing as he was the only thing they had in common. But she sure as hell wasn’t going to stick around and have an actual discussion about a man she was still married to with his mistress.

  She held up her hands and started backing away. “That’s it. I have much better things to do with my time, and this sure isn’t one of them. So goodbye.” She zipped around Nikki and headed for the opposite direction.

  “Melanie, wait. Please.” Nikki followed after and skirted around in front of her. Melanie stopped, though she remained tempted to shove her out of the way. “I’m sorry for how everything has gone down between the two of you--”

  “You mean between me and my husband -- You’re sorry?”

  “Yes,” said Nikki. “I’m sorry for everything that happened while you were in LA. I’m sorry for the part I played in it…”

  In theory, Melanie probably should have just accepted the groveling for what it was, even if none of it was sincere, even if she didn’t believe it, and gone on with the rest of her day.

  But the more Nikki seemed to babble on in an attempt to make herself look like the downtrodden victim as opposed to the ‘home wrecking slut’ Melanie had proclaimed her to be, the more the woman herself started to believe that the mistress in question needed to just shut up and listen.

  “You’re telling me that you’re sorry,” she said, abruptly cutting her off.

  Nikki crinkled her brows.
“I think that’s what I was doing--”

  “Are you also sorry that my kids wake up every morning, asking me every DAY when their daddy is coming home? Are you sorry that it takes every little bit that I have inside of me to remember that I am their mother to keep from telling them that Daddy is NEVER coming home thanks to some two-bit bimbo who couldn’t keep her legs shut around him?! ARE you sorry?” she asked again. But Nikki never responded. She shook her head and bent forward. “You’re not sorry for anything, Nicole Sanger, except for maybe being unable to actively choose between which man you want more. The one who left his entire family for you, or the one willing to give you absolutely everything that you ever wanted and more.”

  “You don’t know anything about my relationship with William,” said Nicole.

  “I don’t have to know anything about it. I can read as much as I need to on the cover of every society page in town. I’ve heard through friends about you nabbing the lead in Wicked thanks to the understudy suddenly falling ‘ill’. I can only imagine how well that worked out for you.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “It means that women like you only get things in life one way. Your talent has always been on your back and knees. I don’t see how, with such little experience, you could’ve landed such a prestigious role in that play without performing one act or the other. Or does the line that often waits for you around every corner of this city mean that can you do both at the same time now?”

  Instinctively, Nikki pulled her hand back and struck Melanie across the face.

  Almost immediately, both women stepped back from each other in shock.

  Nikki’s throbbing hand hung high in the air as if it were frozen. Her eyes looked like giant saucers beneath the lids and her mouth fell open. As air passed through and down to her lungs, her lips, tongue, gums and teeth had become absolutely dry. She couldn’t believe what had just happened. She couldn’t believe what she had just done, or why. It wasn’t as if Melanie didn’t have every right in the world to call her a slut, to label her as trash for sleeping with a man that she knew was married, knew had children, and knew wanted more than all of that combined with her. But it seemed as if absolutely everything and everyone had been getting to her as of late, between the stress of the play starting so soon and William’s suspicions, Oscar coming back around and then the incident with Sheila just a few hours before. She knew somewhere deep down that she was bound to snap at some point, due to being unable to handle it all in the way she once thought she could. She just didn’t expect, nor did she want the result of what seemed to be unraveling for her by the day to land directly across Melanie’s face.

  Melanie’s cheek twitched from the sting of Nikki’s slap-happy hand. She rested her palm against it while snarling in her direction. And though she had the urge to strike her back, and hard enough to where she couldn’t get up again, she was more than aware that just slapping the absolute shit out of her rival until she bled wouldn’t solve as many problems as she would have liked and would have in fact created more. With people around, she knew it was possible that she would come out looking the worse of the two, because once she was able to get her hands on Nikki, there was no stopping her from going completely full throttle and pummeling her until only her mother was able to identify the body in the morgue.

  As Nikki finally lowered her hand, she took a step forward. Melanie tightened her jaw and stared so hard and long at her, that Nikki thought twice about getting back into her space and took another few steps back instead.

  “I’m sor--”

  “Go to hell,” Melanie interjected, her words just as hard and angry as her face. “Don’t you dare even form your lips to say that you’re sorry for this! You’re no more sorry for slapping me across the face than you are for continuing to screw my husband. I don’t know what the hell Oscar was thinking! Not only are you an expensive whore, but a stupid one too. Because if you honestly believe that what happened here today with this meeting and your actions is going to stay just between us, you are dead wrong.”

  Melanie shoved Nikki aside as hard as she could and reached down inside her purse for her phone while heading out of the park.

  Panicking, and fearing that the news would get around to the entire city before she had a chance to even shine on her opening night, Nikki ran her hands across the top of her hair and began fidgeting.

  “Mierda!” she screamed out. “Mierda, mierda, MIERDA!”

  She reached down into her own purse for her own phone, and raced out of the park as fast as her legs could carry her.

  Part Twenty-One

  It had been hours since Nathan spoke to Vanessa on the phone, and as he lay back on the rotten cot lining his isolated cell, all he could think about was how much more concerned she was with Maurice than she had been with him. More and more he was beginning to realize what had basically been slapping him back and forth across the face for months now: everything she had ever felt for him had died a slow and painful death long before he was ever officially ready to let it all go.

  If last night had proven anything, it was that everything they ever shared, wanted and had hoped for in the future was finally buried in a steel box deep within Vanessa’s soul – a box she forced herself to lose the key to the moment he admitted why he had once again gone out of his way to ruin her life. For her, love for him had turned into immense hate. For him, love for her had turned into pain and anger and rage and disillusionment.

  He closed his eyes and attempted to think back on the times in which she seemed to hate him a hell of a lot less than she did that day, but was jarred awake by the gruff sounds of Officer Joe, who made it a point slide his Billy-club back and forth across the bars as soon as he entered.

  Pissed enough to want to put his fist through Officer Joe’s face, Nathan was trying as hard as he could to keep from landing a permanent place inside of that hellhole and jumped up from his bed. He went to the other side of the cell to stare out of the tiny window in the wall that was just big enough for him to stick his head through and clinched his fists, then unclenched them, and then clinched them again.

  “Hey, Taylor!” Officer Joe called out once he dropped his club to his side.

  Nathan turned his head to the side and clinched his jaw while peeking through the bars. “What?” he angrily responded.

  Joe wrapped his hands around two bars and leaned his head forward. “You’ve got a visitor. Someone really looking forward to seeing you right about now.”

  Convinced it was Vanessa coming to bail him out after all, Nathan stood up straight and prepared himself for her presence.

  “You ready?” asked Joe. He backed away from the bars and headed back over to the door. He opened it wide and nodded to the person standing on the other side, then held out his hand.

  As soon as the person waiting to see Nathan stepped inside, he handed Joe what looked to be a few hundreds and some change. The moment the door shut, Nathan flung his arms through the bars and hung his head while balling his fists.

  “Shit.”

  Maurice stood in front of him and like an anxious child, waved his hands in his face. “Surprise.” His deep voice carried throughout the room. “I’m guessing from the pissed off look, you weren’t expecting to see me standing on the other side.”

  Releasing a sharp breath, Nathan resisted the urge to grab him by the collar and pull him through the bars to join him.

  “What the fuck are you doing back here, man? Miss me that much?”

  “No,” Maurice replied. “V told me about you still being locked up, so I thought I’d come back by after stopping at the office to see you behind bars for myself, since we were separated.”

  “Maybe you should stick around to see her again later when she comes down here to bail me out herself.”

  He grinded his teeth and swallowed hard. “She told you she’d be down here to help you out?”

  “Straight up made a promise when I called her this morning.” He tightened his jaw. />
  “Really.”

  “Yup.”

  Maurice stuffed his hands inside his pockets and stepped forward.

  Nathan unclenched his fists and lifted his head.

  “You know the entire time I was in that dirty cell and staring up at the ceiling, aside from wanting to get the hell out of there, all I could seem to think about was how much I couldn’t understand what the fuck it was that she ever saw in you,” said Maurice.

  Nathan chuckled and shook his head. “I could say the same damn thing about you, not so pretty boy. I never knew somebody who could fuck so many women before in his life but still be whipped by one for the better part of it. I hope before you fucked V for the first time that you were protected. She’d probably kill you if you gave her something she couldn’t get rid of.”

  “Nah,” he replied casually. “She likes it raw.” He leaned forward and winked.

  Nathan felt the anger bubbling against his skin like acid. He clinched his fists again.

  “There’s no way in fuck she’d be with you without protection.”

  “Alright. Alright,” he said with a smile. “You got me on that. The first time, we wore protection. She’s always known what I was about, but it never stopped her from wanting me back, even when she was with you. Because she knew that unlike you, I’d always put her first. And I wasn’t just looking for pussy.”

  “I was never looking for just pussy when it came to V either,” spat Nathan. “It was always more than that with her.”

  Maurice nodded while thinking back on their years together in high school.

  “You used to tell me about it,” he said. “How much you loved her, but I never saw it. You’d say you wanted to be with her for the rest of your life and in the meantime, you were looking at every ass on every cheerleader on her squad that walked by when we stood out there on that field, as if she didn’t even exist to you. I told you after practice one day, remember? That if you kept treating her like she was invisible that’s exactly what she would become. I didn’t know you’d take it one step further by fucking her best friend too.”