Chapter Thirty-One
“The last one happened not too far after the three women. I really let what I had done haunt me. I was back in my apartment in New York for a while, just spiraling when I asked Jackie to help me sort out another situation. I felt like I really needed to get my fix again. Jackie helped and a lovely brunette, who I won’t name, but I’m more than happy to go into depth of each of these people and stories at a later date.
She and I were having fun and she taught me a lot about how to express my needs in a safe way.
We spent a night together, and well, I wanted more.
I hadn’t had this safety before, but obviously, I wanted to keep things discrete and keeping someone around in New York, as you have witnessed is hard for me, without someone wanting to snap a picture of us or write about it.
So, I invited her out here… we had another couple of fun nights until, I think the lure of this place, the lifestyle…
well she got caught up in it. She began to have too much fun and although initially this was simply nothing but a paid agreement.
As we went to leave, she gave me the ultimatum.
She wanted more from me, or she was going to tell the whole world about the past couple of days…
and she had proof. It was that one that I regret the most. It was that one that honestly felt like a cold-hearted murder to me.
It was that one that well, still makes me question who I am and what I have been capable of,” he said.
I bit the inside of my cheek to stop myself from cry, from running.
From jumping in the ocean right now even with my terrible swimming skills and hope that I could swim all the way back to the coast. But then I’d also be leaving him… us.
“I really thought that I was the only woman that you had bought here,” I said. Henry reached for my hands, squeezing him tight.
“You’re the only woman that I bought here that I’ve truly cared about Molly, and I mean that with my whole heart. You’re the only woman that I have said those three small words too, and you really are the only woman that I have ever loved.”
“And the blonde?” I said.
“The blonde, well, the blonde did happen very recently. It was while you were here in fact.” My body froze, I felt the blood drain from my face as Henry squeezed my hands tighter, leaning in closer, staring directly at me making sure that I was still here.
I was, at least I think I was but taking on all of this information there was definitely a part of me that had checked out.
“But listen, there has been something that I have been dealing with behind the scenes that I once again haven’t told you about, but it wasn’t to hide anything from you, it really was just to protect you.”
“You’re telling me that there was a woman. Here. While I was here. While you still proceeded to tell me that I was the only woman that you bought here.”
“The blonde that you saw was not invited here. She trespassed here. My security back home has had an eye on her for a while, she is a reporter that was following me. We still don’t exactly know what exact information that she had, but whatever it was, it’s safe now… at least I hope.”
“Do your security back home monitor this place?” I asked. I had seen security throughout Henry’s building in the city, but it had only just dawned on me now that I had never seen any security here.
“They don’t monitor it no. They can obviously come here if I ask them too, but I am lucky that I have not been in that position to need to yet.
It was another reason why I created this AI system.
It’s also been the very best security system that I have.
It can sense everything that is going on, that is as long as it’s going on inside the island.
Where we are situated, it’s just completely out of the way of well, everything.
In the five years that I have owned this island, there has never been anyone in a fifty-mile radius.
I guess that’s why I have been slack on building a stronger system to monitor the surrounds.
But after this weekend it will definitely be something that I am focusing on.
However, much time that you want to spend here, whenever you want to come here, I want you to know that this is your absolute safe haven from now on. ”
“How did she get here?”
“That is something I unfortunately still don’t have the answers to, however she got onto this island is something that I will need to try and figure out with my security team when they are back in the city.
It was the AI, Ruth specifically, who spotted her on the outskirts of the property when she arrived.
I hadn’t had much to do with her in the past, but I did know her face clearly.
I had seen her watching me for years. When I saw her here, when she tried to act nice, like she had randomly found herself on this island and needed help.
She wasn’t exactly a great investigative journalist to let that be her spill.
Either way, as soon as I saw her here, I just saw red.
Let’s just say that none of us will be dealing with her again. ”
“So once again you knew that I would see that?”
Henry nodded. “I never meant to hurt you, I never meant to scar you from the image. I wanted you to see something. Something that would question me. I know it’s wrong and it’s so stupid now that I think of it.
It’s not something that I planned, not on this trip originally.
But I couldn’t help it. I had to. I’m falling too in love with you, and I needed you to know everything.
All of it. I didn’t want to move any further into this relationship knowing that I had to keep any parts of me hidden.
You’re the one, Miss Molly, I am sure of it.
You’re my one, the one that I want to do life with and the one that knows all of me. ”
“And you promise me, you swear on my life, on your life, on everything that you have that everything that you are saying to me is the truth and nothing but the complete truth,” I asked.
“At this point of our relationship, with everything that I have told you, with everything that you know about me. Do you really think that I would lie about this? You know that I’m not proud of this. You know I don’t want to be telling you this story right now.”
I shuddered, trying to take control of my breath.
Deep inhale, deep exhale. He loved me, he loved me more than anyone.
But love and hate obviously existed inside him simultaneously.
He could tell me how much he wanted his life with me, and then end someone else’s in a single second.
I struggled to see the other side of him.
To imagine the very things that he has said he had done.
I struggled to see it, because I didn’t want to.
I didn’t want this to be anything than just words.
But I had seen it, I had seen the very remains of all of it. I touched and held their hair.
“There’s still something else that you’re not telling me the whole truth about,” I said, choking on my words.
Wondering if I really did want the truth.
Because if the truth matched any of the scenarios that I had running on repeat in my head, maybe it would be better to float around in the unknown for a while longer.
But then again, I really did know too much already.
Henry cleared his throat, “I know,” he said, “and believe me when I say that this is the hardest one to tell,” his voice shook.
Oh no, oh no. I pulled my hands away from his as my heart jumped down into the depths of my stomach, but I felt it pounding throughout my whole body.
My hands and lips were shaking as I reached for another wine.
Something to soothe or numb everything that was going on inside of me.
He didn’t need to say anything more. He had said it in those very words, This is the hardest one to tell.
“It was the AI that alerted me about you and Dylan, the conversation that you had, the things that he didn’t know the whole truth of but tried to tell you.
I’m sorry, I know that it seems like an invasion of privacy.
But I created the AI for security purposes, to alert me, or whoever else is in charge of the building at the time, if they see anything going on that is out of the norm, around the building.
And it was Ruth who thought that the conversation with Dylan was out of the norm.
It was never meant to end like this. Not at all.
But it was just over that night, that I found the blonde, or Aria … ”
My whole body was shaking now as I wiggled my chair back from him.
Was he serious, was he using the very excuse that because a stalker had invaded his property, one that he had managed to kill, to completely take their life away from them…
just because that was fresh in his mind, then that was why it was okay to do it to Dylan?
Henry didn’t try to move forward, to hold me still, to reach out to me, to grab me.
Instead, he paused, keeping me held in nothing but his gaze.
He was now crying again, begging for forgiveness.
Waiting for my acceptance. I thought that I could forgive him, Henry was too much to lose.
But this was something else. Any desire I had to comfort him swirled into a pool of nausea at the depths of my stomach.
Coming to terms with the words he spoke I wasn’t too sure if I was going to vomit of faint.