30. Nick
30
NICK
I missed her calls and I felt horrible. Scarlett had tried to reach me when she was hurting and scared, and I had been driving. Ironically, I was driving to her place to have dinner with her. We both pulled into the parking lot at the same time, and when I saw the way someone had defaced her car, I knew instantly that she was upset. I spent the better part of the evening trying to comfort her, and when she laid Ethan down, she asked me to leave.
In the morning, I stood staring at her car with a bucket in one hand and a scrub brush in the other hand wondering how I was ever going to get this mess off before it destroyed the paint job. Luckily, what she thought was black paint was nothing more than shoe polish, but I knew the caustic ingredients could still eat through the clear coat and do lasting damage if it was left on too long.
I dipped the brush in the bucket of hot soapy water and brought it to the driver's side door and scrubbed hard. Nothing was more frustrating to me in this whole situation than how this town had turned on Scarlett. I was fine when it was just me. I knew how to handle it. They were still saying nasty things about me at times, but the tides had turned in the past few months and now I was actually gaining sympathy at times.
But Scarlett couldn't seem to catch a break. I knew it was Fiona too. She'd been caught red-handed telling ladies at the coffee shop that Scarlett lied about Ethan. That I wasn't really his father and that she was manipulating me into dating her so she could access my money. It didn't make any sense at all, because I had the DNA results tucked away in Ethan's medical file to prove that I was his father.
It wouldn't matter though. Even if I went on Marjorie Whitman's show myself and showed the world the DNA results, they'd still say Scarlett was after my money. And why wouldn't they? She had kept Ethan a secret for years and then come back into my life. She and I both knew it wasn't as it appeared, but why would anyone even believe us?
I had to really scrub to get just the first letter off. Judging by the looks of things, it would take all day to do this, but I couldn't ignore it. I'd given Scarlett the keys to my car, but she was too upset. She kept Ethan home from school and decided not to open the bakery, and I told Emily to push all of my appointments to later in the afternoon.
It hurt watching her suffer because of other people's lack of morals. More and more it made me want to ask her to move with me to somewhere we could both live normal lives without people breathing down our necks all the time. Fiona had already destroyed my life once and after painstakingly building back from that, it felt like she was out to destroy me again. And this time there was collateral damage.
"Oh, that's not good. Such a shame," I heard and I knew who it was before I turned around. Fiona clicked her tongue and shook her head at me, and I looked down to where her toy poodle sat beside her. She wore spandex and running shoes, though I knew she wasn't the type to go for a run.
These coincidences just kept happening, random chance meetings where she appeared out of nowhere or just happened to be where I was at the same time. We'd spent the better part of eight years having not seen each other once, and now I saw her twice a week in supposed very random moments. I knew she planned them. She had to be watching me or having me followed. It was creepy.
"Did you do this?" I asked her, scowling. I dropped the brush into the bucket and set it on the ground then wiped my hands across the front of my jeans.
"That?" she scoffed, turning her nose up at me. "Why would I do that?"
She played such a good liar, but I wasn't believing her at all. This whole thing had her name written all over it, even if it wasn't her hand that defaced Scarlett's property. She might not have paid someone to do her dirty work, but with her father's name and prestige, all she had to do was incite people to dislike me and things like this could happen.
"You tell me." I was so angry, but I was controlling myself. Acting like a fool in public would only give people more reason to believe her and talk badly about me and Scarlett. "What happened between us years ago is so far in the past. I can't see why you won't let it go."
"I didn't do this, Nicky." She walked closer and her dog trailed along with her. It growled at me and I glared at it. "I think it's just awful the way people are treating her." Even the tone of Fiona's voice was fake, pretending to care. "I mean, at least they're feeling sorry for you now."
My shoulders tensed as she reached out and smoothed her hand down my chest and left her palm splayed there. I couldn't believe she was saying those things. I didn't want sympathy; I wanted people to leave me alone.
"I mean, that's a good thing, right? They're on your side now. They don't want her to ruin your life." She smiled at me and tapped my chest with her index finger as she leaned closer.
"I don't want them to pick sides, Fiona. And Scarlett isn't ruining my life. I love her. She's not after my money; we're a family." I spoke through clenched teeth, and she rose up on her tiptoes and pressed a kiss to my cheek.
"I'm only trying to help you, Nicky."
I took a step away and pushed her hand off my chest. "You should leave," I grumbled and she bobbed one shoulder.
"I guess if I can't have you, maybe you deserve a gold-digging whore." Her smirk and the way she looked up at the apartment building made my stomach turn.
I glanced up in the direction Fiona was looking and saw Scarlett. She stood in her dining room looking out the window over the parking lot and I could tell she was crying. It made any trace of self-control that I had vanish. I turned on Fiona like a rabid wolf.
"I said leave. You've done enough. Now get out of here or I'm calling the police." My angry shouts would never be enough. She had no idea the karma that was coming for her.
"Bye, Nicky," she said, smiling and wiggling her fingers at me.
I turned abruptly and went straight to Scarlett's apartment door. I had no idea how much of that she'd seen, but she didn't have context. There was no way she could even hear what I had said to Fiona. If she'd seen that kiss without any context she'd be upset.
The door was locked and I knocked on it. "Scarlett, please open the door." I tried not to raise my voice too much. I didn't know how the people in her building would react or if they treated her differently since this all started. I really didn't want to make things worse for her by drawing attention to us. I just wanted to explain to her what happened and why. "Scarlett," I called again, but it was clear she wasn't coming to the door.
My shoulders sagged and I leaned against the door feeling defeated. I was tired, physically and emotionally, and I didn't have the energy to fight anyway. Both Scarlett and I deserved better from this town, and I knew as long as Fiona was messed up in this, we'd never catch a break. I hated Marjorie Whitman for sticking her nose back into my business last spring. If she never did that, Fiona would never have heard I was dating someone and none of this would be happening.
I slunk back out to the parking lot to finish scrubbing the car, but I never saw Scarlett in the window again, and she didn't respond to any of my messages or calls. I prayed she just needed a bit of space and that this wasn't her way of saying she was done with me. I wouldn't blame her if she broke it off. I never deserved her anyway. She would definitely be better off without me.