Conrad and I dated for almost three years, and not once had I met his family. “My father is barely in the country anymore. Even I don’t get to see him that much, and I’m his son!” He had once complained to me when I had asked him about meeting his father and why I had not done it. “My mother is just as busy as my father, even if she’s in the country. We can’t always catch her. We have all the time in the world, Lauren. You can meet her anytime because I’m not going anywhere,” he had assured me again when I brought up the topic of meeting his mother. Every other event of meeting the parents after that would always lead to an argument, and Conrad was a brilliant man. He would make sure that he twisted the narrative, even to me. He would accuse me of not trusting him and being too clingy and obsessed, and sometimes I believed him. Now, just three months into screwing my best friend, he had told his uncle about her and was bringing her to a family event.
“It’s so refreshing to see you for two whole days in a row, don’t you think?” Katarina laughed as she carelessly flung her arms around Damien’s neck in a loud display. “It feels just like old times, this rare sight.” “Alright, Katarina,” Damien said, pulling away from the hug and taking her hands off. “I’m sure you’ve met my fiancée, Lauren.” “Ah, yes!” Katrina exclaimed. “The one who’s old enough to drink, or so she claims. The entire family is just dying to meet you.” “Why are you here?” Damien asked as she walked with us down the long hallway. As if he could sense the tension I felt, he took my hand and made small, soothing circles on the back of my hand to silently assure me that it would be okay. “Last I checked, I was told that it would be a family-only gathering.” “I’m almost like family to you, Damien. It’s quite insulting that you don’t see me that way. Your sister invited me, anyway,” she replied in her defence. At the sound of that,
“She used to be my girlfriend.” “What?!” Deirdre, Conrad’s mother, was the first one to exclaim at Conrad’s confession as everyone else at the table looked at me. “Damien, did you know about this?” Darla questioned, searching for answers from her brother’s face. “I don’t believe you knew that the woman you’re about to marry was your nephew’s girlfriend. How does that sound to you…” Darla paused with what she was saying to her brother so that she could look at me. “And you? Did you not know that they were related? How old are you exactly?” “She didn’t know. We only found out about the connection just yesterday” Damien defended me. “Now, can we have our meal in silence, please?” “Not just yet,” Deirdre said before I got the chance to sigh in relief. She turned to Conrad with raised eyebrows, the entire table falling silent as we all waited for something to happen. “And are you okay with this? Did something bad happen between you two?” Not wantin
I didn’t know what to feel as I watched Shirley and Conrad celebrate that he had just given her a ring and asked her to marry him. I felt a gentle squeeze on my knee, reminding me that Damien was still sitting beside me. “If you want to leave, we can stand up and make an excuse,” he whispered in my ear, but that was the last thing I wanted to do. It would be an admission of defeat, and I had to get used to the fact that Conrad was never going to regret what he did, and neither was Shirley. “It’s fine,” I assured him, turning back to the couple as everyone still cheered and congratulated them so that I could tell them with a smile, “Congratulation, you two.” “Thank you,” Shirley answered for them as she looked at the ring on her finger and made a squealing sound, hugging Conrad once again. “It looks like we have two weddings to plan. Which one do you think is coming sooner?” Deirdre asked nobody in particular, looking around the table and waiti
“Mom?” I called with my ear still pressed against the phone, even though I knew that she had hung up the phone. “Mom, I really do have the money. I’m not going to call the police.” “What did she say?” Damien asked me, noticing that my mother had hung up the phone and I was practically talking to a ghost now. He walked over to me and took the phone, looking at the screen to make sure there was nobody on the other side. “Call her back. Maybe you can let her know that we have the money. She doesn’t seem to believe me. She probably thinks that I’m just trying to trick them so that I can get them arrested.” Damien wasted no time in dialling the number and placing the phone against his ear, rubbing my shoulder reassuringly. “She’s not responding,” he reported, dialing the number again, frowning the second time as he looked at me. “It’s not going through anymore. I really think we should go along with my suggestion and really get the police involved if you
I stared at detective Spencer for almost a full minute before I could gather enough strength to speak. It was one thing for his family to not approve of the relationship I had with Damien, but a whole detective who barely knew the happenings inside of Damien’s life telling me that was something I had to be cautious about. “I don’t understand. If there’s something you think I should know before going through with this marriage, you need to tell me. You’re a cop, so it would be on you if you hid something that could possibly be a danger to me,” I reminded him, glaring as if that would intimidate him into vomiting every answer I needed. “Let me ask you one thing, and I need you to be honest with me,” he said, and I nodded. I wasn’t even sure that I would be able to lie to a detective without getting caught out. “Do you love him? Are you here because you’re in love with him, or is there something else involved that you both don’t want anyone to know?” he asked.
“You’re going to bring the money to me, but you won’t tell a single soul,” the man on the other end of the phone commanded me, causing me to swallow a lump in my throat. If I told Damien, he wouldn’t know about it, right? “That includes the man you have been going around town with, Lauren.” I stopped dead in my tracks when he said this, but I refused to ask him how he knew about Damien. There was nobody else that he could be talking about. “I don’t understand,” I attempted to play dumb, but this only made him laugh darkly and send a chill down my back. “You think I wouldn’t catch up with you and figure out what you were doing? You know, I paid a little visit to that apartment where you used to live. It turns out you moved out with the help of a man that seems to have a lot of money,” he said, confirming to me that he was referring to Damien and had been asking around. His braveness was surprising, and the relief I felt was heavy after finding out tha
“What are you doing with that?!” I exclaimed, attempting to make my way towards the door and run for my life if it came down to it. “Relax, Lauren. I’m not going to hurt you if that’s what you think,” he chuckled lightly, pointing the gun away from my direction but still scaring me with it anyway. I didn’t even get to ask why he would have a gun before figuring the answer out by myself – he had the money to get something like that, legally or illegally. “You’re not going to attempt to shoot those people, are you? You do know that it’s not just one person, right?” I asked, starting to regret letting him know that this was about my mother. His getting a gun prepared was a recipe for disaster that I didn’t want to know the taste of. “I’m going to drive you all the way and pretend to be a taxi driver. I’ll drive away, but I’ll scope out the area and find somewhere close enough but not too close,” he suggested. “You can’t do that,” I disagreed with a shak
6 MONTHS LATER “What are you doing?” I laughed as Damien pulled me out of bed that evening and practically sat me down in front of the vanity to brush my hair and get me ready. “The dinner’s in one hour,” he reminded. “I don’t want to be late for this.” I frowned and turned around to face him, prompting him to stop brushing my hair. “So, you’re worried about family dinners all of a sudden? You know, the last time we had this, you seemed like you would have been better off dead than being there.” “People change.” He shrugged, a grin sitting on his face that made me realize that there was something he wasn’t telling me. I couldn’t drill him about it because I had a secret of mine. I took the brush from his hand and started to do it myself when he placed a kiss on my cheek. “I love you,” he said. I had gotten used to his random love confessions whenever he felt the need to say it. It had been six months since…well, everything. I moved back fr
“Lauren, are you okay?” Damien asked as he opened the door to the house where he was staying later that night. Instead of giving him an answer, I pushed myself into his arms and broke down in tears. That might, I cried all the tears that I had refused to cry the whole time. Every emotion that I had refused to let out and express, all of it was on the ground around. And Damien just let me. “You’re fine, you’re fine,” he told me in sweet whispers as he led me to the bedroom and set me down on the bed. He held me there for as long as he possibly could. “He was doing that to them for years. Shirley and I were friends—best friends—in high school, and I didn’t even notice. How could I not notice what she was going through at the time?” I asked when I had no more tears left. “What do you mean? What was she going through?” Damien asked, sounding confused as he stared at me and waited for me to recollect and gather myself. “Her father was taking advantage of
I had spent two more nights in the hotel biting my nails anxiously as I waited for any update from Jameson about Shirley’s father and if he had been caught. I spent those days wondering if he knew now that she was dead, and if he felt guilty about being a big factor in it. It was no surprise that I jumped and snatched my phone from the nightstand when his name flashed on my screen one evening while I was forcing myself to close my eyes and go to sleep. “Lauren, I need you to help me identify the bastard,” his voice boomed coolly into the phone when I picked it up. “I might be a bit sorry for him if he’s not the one and I got the wrong guy. I’ve taken matters into my hands right now.” “I’m coming. I’m coming right now. Send me the address,” I rambled. His words sent a new rush to me, the sleep that was eluding me long forgotten as I got up and dashed out of bed and started gettingready to leave. When Jameson hung up, a quick text from his numbe
I stared at the unopened email that had been scheduled to be sent to me by Shirley. Several questions whirled in my head as I sat on the edge of my bed, not sure what to do or even whether to do anything at all. Had she planned to send that, knowing what she would do to herself? Was she going to apologize in the email? Was I even ready to open it? “Oh, Shirley.” I shook my head with a defeated sigh. God knew I loved her with everything I had in me, but she went ahead to stab me in the back. And even at that, I still loved and cared about her. Was Katarina’s death really all that drove her to do what she did? The more questions I had, the clearer it became to me that the answers I needed, along with closure, were trapped in that email message that I had refused to open. Finally, I clicked on the bold letters that showed the subject of the email, and it came into full view, to the detriment of my heart. To: LAUREN. Subject: I’M SORRY… ‘By the tim
I didn’t know how long I stood there, watching Conrad choke on his tears above Shirley’s body. My heart broke for him, and I could feel Damien’s rigid body standing beside me. “Let’s go,” Conrad finally said as he got up and used the sleeve of his shirt to wipe his tears. “We need to take her away and give her a funeral. She may have done horrible things, but she was not entirely a horrible person.” Conrad turned to me with a faint smile on his face. “Are you coming, too?” I froze as my mind whirled with thoughts upon thoughts. I hadn’t thought about the funeral, going to it. I didn’t even think that I would be leaving Beverly Hills that soon after just getting there. “I don’t think I should. I mean, I just moved here. Leaving would be difficult,” I said. “I’m not asking you to leave Beverly Hills permanently, Lauren,” he argued. “I just want you to attend the funeral and return. I know you don’t want to be there, especially after everything she did to you
I opened my eyes the next morning the most satisfied I had been in the past few days. There was a small smile on my face as I snuggled even deeper into Damien’s chest. It felt like leaving was something to not even be thought about. “Good morning,” he said, his voice startling me as he kissed me on the head. “Did you sleep good?” “I did,” I answered as I finally got the strength to sit up, getting a good view of him. Before I could say a word, there was a knock on my door. I got out of bed after a moment and opened the door to find Maria standing there with a Tupperware container in her hands and an apologetic smile on her face. “Can I come in?” She asked. At first, I considered shaking my head and telling her that it wasn’t the best time for her to come in, but I decided against it. I stepped aside for her to walk in, which she did. I took note of how she looked around in the living room as if trying to find something. “Why are you here this early, Maria?
My feet were glued to the ground, my mouth gaping open without much consciousness as I still tried to get more air in my lungs. I didn’t know whether it was Damien’s presence or the fact that I had finally stopped moving, but my lungs didn’t seem to be allowing much air. “I came as soon as I could,” he said, glancing at Melissa. “She didn’t want to let me in.” “Of course I didn’t let you in!” Melissa scoffed apologetically as she now helped me move forward. “You think I hand the keys to anyrandom man who walks in here and claims to know a tenant?” Without paying any more mind to her, Damien approached me and got me out of her arms. I had half a mind to collapse into his touch and break down, but I held myself upright as Melissa helped me open the door. “Are you going to be okay?” She asked me, still looking worried for me. “What even happened to you?” “Just a little run, I’m fine. As soon as I drink water, I’ll be fine. Thank you,” I said. She took
Damien hung up the phone without another word. I didn’t know what to do with that response or the lack of it. I fell into the couch and had to stop myself from crying. Had he finally gotten sick and tired of my constant back and forth with him? I didn’t even get the chance to tell him just how much I loved him. What was the point of doing it anyway? Nothing was going to get fixed that way. “Hey, are you okay?” Fred placed a gentle hand on my shoulder after a while of me sitting and staring at nothing. I jumped at the suddenness. “I said your food is ready. Let’s go.” We walked into the kitchen, where he had spread garlic bread and toast with sunny side up eggs. A pot of coffee was brewing on the counter as we both sat. Fred let me dig into the food, but I couldn’t shake off the effect that his long and hard stare had on me. “Is there something you want to talk about?” I engaged, letting him know I could tell that he was staring. “Oh, um.” He cleared
“Lauren?” I grunted, turning around and waking up as I heard my name. Fred shook me awake, and the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes was my phone in front of my face. “What is it?” I asked, sitting up on the couch where I had fallen asleep after arguing with Fred about where to sleep since he wanted me to take the bed for him to take the couch. “Your phone is ringing. I just walked by and saw it,” he said, handing me the phone. I rubbed my eyes, trying to focus on the screen of the phone and the caller ID when the phone stopped ringing. I looked up at Fred who has his arms crossed and was leaning against the door which led to the kitchen. “Aren’t you going to call who it is back? It could be an emergency, especially after what happened yesterday.” All of a sudden, I was reminded of the yesterday’s incident and what I had witnessed. A headache was brewing in my head now, and I grabbed the phone as tightly as I could. I wasn’t sure I was r