Exquisite Betrayal (33 page)

“
She remarried and moved to
Georgia.”

“
Well, that explains part of it, but
not why she wouldn’t tell us where to find you.”

Now I’m pissed as hell at her. She’s allowed
me to live a life in debt, fraught with worry over it, when all
along she’s known about this.

“
So what do we need to do, Mr.
Patterson?”

“
All I need is your mailing address,
Miss McKinley, and we’re set.”

I give him the information. He tells me
everything will be sent express courier to me and explained in a
detailed letter. If I had any questions afterwards, I could call
him.

***

This will and trust information gives me
renewed energy. First thing on my agenda—hell, the only thing on my
agenda—is to call Peter Braxton. I set up an appointment for the
next afternoon. When I go visit him, I give him every little gory
detail I can remember. I even give him a copy of the email I sent
to Kristie and Ruth with the attachment of the article I’d written.
He assures me we have a cut and dry case. We’ll be able to sue
Critics Abound and smash them.

“
Mr. Braxton, I want the entire
settlement to go to Ryland Thomas and Tilly Sinclair. By the way,
they’ll be slapping me with a lawsuit that I don’t intend to fight.
They can have everything I own.”

“
Miss McKinley, you can’t just lay
down on this. You were wronged as much as they were.”

“
Maybe so, but they were the ones that
took the brunt of it and I can’t live with that.”

He looks at me then, like I’m a horse that
he’s thinking about buying. “Tell you what. Let me talk with Joe
Carter. I’ve worked with him before. Maybe we can team up and hit
Critics Abound for everything they’ve got.”

“
I want them to pay, Mr. Braxton, and
we can do that. But again, whatever I win, if anything, I want it
to go to Ryland Thomas and Tilly. I don’t want any part of it. You
can take your legal fees out of it, which I’m sure is what you
normally do, but that’s all I’ll take.”

He nods. “I’ll be in touch.”

***

After tons of begging, cajoling, threats and
plain old pleas, I give in and agree to meet the girls in Vegas.
I’ve a bad feeling about it, but they’ve assured me I don’t have to
do anything or go anywhere that Ryland Thomas will be. They want me
to get out and forget about everything for a few days.

We opt for a different hotel this year, and
since I’ve come into that money, we stay at The MGM Grand. It’s not
as fancy as The Bellagio, but it’s a heck of a lot nicer than the
Space Nugget. We laugh as we check in. It’s close to the convention
for the girls. For me, it doesn’t matter because I’m not attending.
I haven’t read anything since any of this has happened. All the
girls are begging me to come back to the blog, but I just don’t
know if I’m ready. I’m still too raw, the pain so acute; I don’t
think I can handle it.

I sit at the pool during the cooler morning
hours and by eleven, I’m inside. I don’t want to get any spa
treatments because they remind me of Ryland Thomas. So one day, I
wander around the strip and do a little window shopping at some of
the finer designer establishments. I get my toes done in my
favorite sparkly pink then head back to the hotel where I pick up
my phone and hit the pictures button and start scrolling through my
album of Ryland Thomas. And I cry. And cry. And that’s how the
girls find me when they get home.

Tonight they want to party. I don’t
feel like doing anything except curling up in bed. I know they’re
worried about me. Each of them suggests that I go home with them. I
decline, but thank them. They finally talk me into a night on the
town and I get drunk, which is a bad thing. A sad, drunk woman is
always a bad idea because they end up crying on everyone’s
shoulder, which is exactly what I do that night. We go bed because
the next morning, R.T. Sinclair is giving his speech… his reveal
about his true identity. I
will
be in attendance for that.

***

I slip in at the last minute and stand in
the back corner of the room. The lights are dimmed and no one
notices me, or I hope so anyway. There isn’t an empty seat in the
house, so the fact that I’m standing isn’t anything unusual. His
name is announced and I feel myself die inside again and again as I
watch him take the stage with Tilly by his side. She’s thinner, but
still every bit as beautiful as always.

Ryland Thomas steals my breath as I knew he
would, but it’s the cracking of my heart, and the fucking crater I
feel, that kills. I want to scream with the pain. I honestly do
because it hurts so fiercely. Oh God, why did this happen? How did
it turn so wrong? Am I a bad person? Did I do something so terrible
that I deserve this pain, and the pain it’s causing the two people
I love the most in the world? I can’t comprehend any of it.

He starts to speak, slowly at first and then
his voice gains strength and resonance. He becomes more confident
as his explanation carries on. Tilly is smiling at his side, her
pride shining forth. I have to clench my hands to stop myself from
applauding.

“
You see, it wasn’t that I didn’t have
faith in you, dear readers. I didn’t have faith in myself. But I
was pushed, pushed by an exquisite betrayal, a hurt so terrible,
that I realized it was time to face all of you and tell the truth
in person. The article told the story, not in the way I would have
liked. And the truth of it all is that, if Fallon McKinley had
asked to write it, I would’ve given her permission. I would’ve
given her anything in the world. But for reasons known only to her,
she went behind my back to tell it. So here I stand before you, the
real Ryland Thomas Sinclair, and I can only hope you’ll still grace
me with the love for my books as you always have.”

I bow my head and leave the room. The pain
of the last couple of weeks has now intensified into a blinding
ball of fire and it’s centered in my brain as his words penetrate
my mind. Tears blind me and I can’t see where I’m going; I only
know I need to get away from this place.

Every person in that room will think the
worst of me and there is nothing I’ll ever be able to do or say to
convince them otherwise. But I don’t really give a shit about them.
The one I care about is Ryland Thomas, and those words he spoke had
such finality to them that I know they will never be changed. That
final sliver of hope I had held onto has just slipped through my
fingers as I listened, and along with it went that tiny bit of
sanity that kept me from losing it. I walk and walk and have no
idea where I’m going; I simply keep putting one foot in front of
the other.

Time fades away from me. Images blur; all
sound diminishes and the only things I’m aware of are the words,
‘exquisite betrayal’ and ‘a hurt so terrible’, which keep
reiterating themselves in my mind.

There’s someone tugging on my arm and I’m
trying to make him stop. I want to be left alone, but he keeps
bothering me. I finally look up and I have to blink several times
before I can focus. Only then do I notice it’s a police
officer.

“
Ma’am, look at me.” He’s moving his
hand in front of my face.

I shake my head, clearing it. Lifting my
eyes up to the sky, I notice it’s almost dark now. My mouth is like
sawdust, parched and dry, and my feet are burning with pain as
though they are on fire. I look down to discover my shoes are
missing and my feet are raw and bleeding.

“
Do you need help?”

My hands fly to my face as I start crying.
What’s wrong with me? “No, sir, I’m just upset about something. Can
you please call me a taxi? I need to get back to the MGM
Grand.”

He walks me to his car and drives me there.
My feet are such a mess. I don’t understand what I’ve done to
myself.

“
Thank you, Officer.”

“
Ma’am, maybe you should see a
doctor.”

“
Yes, thank you.” I make it back up to
my room where two of the girls are frantic. They immediately call
the other two and tell them I’m home. I fall onto the bed and they
screech when they see my feet. “I think I’m teetering on the edge
of sanity.” I cry again.

Mandy asks me, “Did you hear his
speech?”

I nod and they all group hug me. “Everyone
thinks I’m an evil demon. Why did this happen?”

Kat sits down and grabs my hand. “You
know what? You’ve been silent for too long, Fallon. You need a
catharsis. You
have
to write
the truth. You can’t go on like this with it all bottled up inside.
We’ll put it on our blog and get everyone we know to post it.
People that know you will help. You’ve been wronged, in a bad way.
Right now, to hell with Ryland Thomas. You have to do this for your
own self-preservation. Look at you. You’re a mess.”

“
Yeah, you are. And you need to do
something about it,” Mandy pipes in.

I sit up. “Maybe you’re right.”

“
You can even video yourself and maybe
the damn thing will go viral. You
have
to do this, Fallon,” Mandy says.

I start thinking. There are other things I
need to do first; like give Ryland Thomas his things back. I’ll try
to talk to him again, but if he won’t speak, I’ll write him a
letter.

Don’t they say you have to hit rock bottom
before you can crawl back up? Well, I went beyond rock bottom in
Vegas. I’m back home now and I’m still in the depths of hell, the
ninth ring, to be exact. I’m putting together a plan that’s going
to help me start my climb back out because it really sucks to be
here. There may not be much left of me when I get out since I know
my heart has been blown to bits and scattered around like tiny
grains of sand. Besides, maybe it’s not even possible to put me
back together again.

I know how tough it was after Daddy died,
but God Almighty, this makes that feel like a trip to Disney World.
I have to try, though. I can’t simply sit here and wither away. I’m
pretty damn sure I tasted a bit of what losing your mind is like
and I don’t want to do that again. I have to at least take a stab
at mending myself. I know I won’t ever be the same Fallon. I’ll
most likely be all crooked and uneven with jagged pieces sticking
out everywhere, but at least I’ll be functional and better than I
am now.

I call that lawyer, Mr. Braxton, and find
out about writing the article. He gives me the okay. The girls are
right. It is a catharsis writing my side of the story and it eases
my pain somewhat. My heart isn’t right, there’s still a crater
where it used to be, but I’m doing the best I can for now.

I’m at the point where I’m ready for the
action part. I’m dreading it, however I know it needs to
happen.

First, I call Tilly, but get no answer. I
leave a message, asking her to call me. I don’t sit around and
wait. Instead, I get a nice, pretty box, filling it with the velvet
box that holds the diamond stud earrings that Ryland Thomas gave
me. I add to it the title and registration for my car, plus the
extra set of keys. Then I sit down and write a letter, explaining
my side of the story. And yes I pour out my guts, every last single
bit of them. I tell him how I want him to have everything I own,
including any settlement I win from the case I have against Critics
Abound. Then I write him a check for sixty-five thousand dollars.
That should cover the amount of student debt that he paid off for
me, the cost of the car and anything he bought me since Christmas.
If he spent more than that, I instruct him to let me know the
amount, as I will gladly reimburse him. Finally, I explain about
the trust from my dad. I tell him I will happily sign everything
over to him. I know it sounds absurd, but money is meaningless to
me at this point. I end the letter and stick it in the box. The
last thing I put in is the original article I wrote, the one that I
intended to be published on R.T. Sinclair. I put the lid on the box
and hug it to my chest for a few seconds.

My phone startles me when it rings. I check
to see who it is and it’s Tilly. I’m quick to answer because I want
to speak with her so badly.

“
Tilly.”

“
Fallon. Don’t call me again. I
thought I made it clear when I sent you that text. You’ve damaged
us enough. Neither of us want to have any contact with you from now
on.”

“
But Tilly, please
—
”

The line is dead. She’s hung up. She won’t
even listen to me. My heart has been trampled on so much by now
that I’m not surprised by her reaction, but the hope I had in maybe
getting her to listen to me for a couple of minutes, paralyzes me
for a moment.

Tilly’s call may have addled me, but it
doesn’t deter me. Now it’s time to go to Ryland Thomas’s. My nerves
kick in and butterflies go to war in my belly. I pay them no
attention because nothing is going to stop me from doing this.

I pull up in front of his house and
park the car. I have to stop for a moment to catch my breath
because I’m about to freak. I white-knuckle the steering wheel and
focus on the issue here. He needs to know the full story, and if
he’s not willing to speak to me, I hope one day he’ll read the
letter.
I have a one percent
chance
, I keep telling myself.

After I take a deep breath, I knock on his
door. It’s the first time I’ve been here since the media left. My
feet shuffle on their own accord, and I stand there so long that
I’m getting ready to turn around and leave when the door swings
open and I hear that luscious voice say, “Iris, I told you it would
be unlocked…” My heart, if it’s even possible, plunges further into
the depths of wherever the worst hell it can be. Iris. He thought I
was Iris.