1. Shattered Truths
Chapter 1
Shattered Truths
Cole
“I need everything to go perfectly, Sam, you know? I just really want to do something special for her. She deserves it,” I say into the phone at my ear, scrambling to gather up the things I’m taking with me.
“One, two—where’s the third one?” I panic, instantly looking around my disordered living room for the third gift box I’d had custom made for my fiancée.
“Don’t worry, Cole. Everything is going to go exactly as planned. In fact, it’ll be even better than you think. I can just imagine the expression on her face when she sees everything,” Sam giggles gleefully.
My heart hasn’t stopped racing since I began this process, but Sam’s words soothe me. Calmness flows through my entire body for the first time today.
“Don’t worry. I’m here, making sure everything is in place. Now get your ass over here and make your woman feel special,” she says.
I can almost see her jumping up and down in excitement at the plan we’re putting into place.
“Roger that,” I grin, and then hang up.
Damn. I hadn’t been this tense even when I proposed to her. I straighten my shoulders, wiping my clammy hands on my thighs and adjusting my collar.
Two years ago I bumped into this sexy blonde at the Pike Place Starbucks as I rushed in to get my caffeine fix to keep me sane in the crazy Seattle traffic. I was surprised when she asked for my number. I wasn't used to women making the first move, and we instantly hit it off.
I didn’t know then that she would become the most important thing in my life.
She’s given me everything I could’ve ever asked for. The love I always needed, and now, the family I’ve always wanted too.
Lydia and I have been engaged for five months now, and two months ago, she gave me yet another beautiful surprise. She’s pregnant.
I always worried how I would react when the time finally came to be a father, but there was nothing to worry about. I couldn’t have been any happier to hear the news.
I smile remembering her squeals as I lifted her high into the air and twirled her around. I’d never felt joy like that before.
She was perfect, and in that moment, I realized that with her, I could be too.
Two years ago, I was just another guy working an entry level job at an advertising firm in downtown Seattle. There was nothing special about me. Then I met her, and today I have a beautiful fiancée and a baby on the way.
Life has a way of coming at you fast, and I couldn’t be happier.
She’s given me so much, in so little time. Today, I want to give back a little bit of that love. She deserves it. She deserves the world, but this is a good starting point.
With the help of her co-worker, Sam, I’m going to surprise Lydia with an elaborate romantic gesture at work. This pushes me way out of my comfort zone, but if it’ll put a smile on her face, then I’ll do anything.
My living room is a mess from putting together the gift boxes, but I don’t even care. I glance around the clutter, making sure that I haven’t left anything behind. Then, I grab the large bouquet of red roses—the largest I’ve ever seen—along with the three gift boxes I have for her, her favorite perfume, J’adore, matching earrings, and necklace and head out the door.
Lydia’s office complex is just a few minutes away. I spend the entire ride there reminding myself why I’m doing this. I’m not a fan of grand romantic gestures and public displays of affection, but Lydia is. So here I am.
“It’ll all be worth it, if it puts a smile on her face,” I console myself as I walk up to the office. She shares a desk with Sam, my accomplice.
“Oh my gosh!” Sam coos, hand flying to her mouth as soon as she sees the bouquet of roses in my hand.
“These are so beautiful! She’s going to love them,” Sam beams, clearing out a spot on the table for me to place the boxes. I can feel every other eye in her office curiously peering at me as I walk to her table, but I ignore it.
I smile proudly at Sam, but my brows furrow slightly.
Lydia is nowhere in sight.
“Thank you, Sam. Where is—”
“Don’t worry, your Mrs. isn’t far away,” she grins, wagging her eyebrows playfully.
“Our boss called her up to his office to file some paperwork. She’s already been gone about—” she steals a quick glance at the sparkly watch that dangles from her wrist. “Almost thirty minutes,” her brow furrows as if she can’t understand what’s taking so long. “I’m sure she’ll be back any moment now,” she smiles.
“Just take a seat.” She gestures to the vacant seat across from her.
“Actually, I need to use the restroom real quick,” I say. I need to splash some water on my face or something. My heart is beating a million times a minute, nervous sweat coating my forehead and brows.
I need to put myself together a little bit before she gets back.
“But what if she gets back before you? You don’t wanna miss her, do you?” Sam asks pensively.
“I’ll be quick,” I grin at her.
“Okay, it’s the fifth door on the left, just down the hallway.”
“Thank you, Sam.”
I walk briskly out of the office, feeling all the other eyes follow me as I do so.
I walk down the hallway, trying to locate the restroom as Sam had directed me.
Was it the fifth door on the right or left?
Shit. I think she said right. Yeah, it was definitely right.
Stepping into the dimly lit room, I try to adjust my eyes to the darkness. It looks more like a supply closet of some sort than a restroom. Stacks of shelves line the wall, filled with files and records.
“This is definitely not the restroom,” I mutter underneath my breath.
I’m just about to turn around and walk out when I hear something that catches my attention.
“Mmm...you feel so good, baby,” a gruff male voice moans from behind the shelves, followed by a rhythmical thumping sound.
“So fucking good,” he continues, breathless pants filling the room.
I can’t help but roll my eyes. I don’t even work here, yet I’m annoyed on behalf of those who do. Could they really not wait till they got home?
It’s an office building, for Christ’s sakes.
I turn to make my way out, hoping to actually find the restroom this time, and suddenly I hear a sound that stops me dead in my tracks, the blood turning cold in my veins.
“Yes, baby, please don’t stop!” a throaty female voice moans.
My heart slams violently against my ribcage, eyes frozen wide in their sockets.
I know that voice.
I know it all too well.
But that’s impossible.
She moans loudly, the thumping sounds getting more rapid now. Those same moans that I’ve heard in my ears so many times before. That same breathy voice whispering my name.
I’d recognize it anywhere.
But…it can’t be.
My stomach churns, a sickening feeling in my gut now.
“Just like that, baby, you know how I like it...” her muffled voice says while I stand there numbly in the dark room, unable to do or say anything.
Unable to even breathe.
I'm trying to make sense of what I’m hearing, but my mind refuses to process what I know is happening, because it’s not a reality that I want to face.
Even though I can hear her voice only a few feet away from me, merely separated by the stack of shelves, I can't believe or accept it.
Not until I’ve seen it with my own eyes.
Forcing my numb legs to move, I take a few steps to where the sound is coming from. The closer I get to them, the more nauseous I feel.
I should just turn around right now and walk away.
I can pretend that this didn’t really happen, and go back to the life that I know, with the woman I’ve been in love with for the last two years. I could take the easy way out, somehow even convince myself that this was only a figment of my imagination.
But I can’t.
I push past the stack of shelves separating us, until I’m standing right in front of them, watching the scene unfold before my eyes.
My fiancée, Lydia, the woman who’s having my baby, the woman I’ve been planning to spend the rest of my life with is right there, dress hiked up, pinned against the wall, getting pounded into oblivion by another man.
The older man has his hands under her ass as he holds her up against the wall, the top of her dress is pushed down, breasts on full display as they spill out of her bra.
His pants are down around his knees while her legs wrap tightly around his waist as he thrusts into her relentlessly, muttering things wildly into her ear as she moans and begs him not to stop.
The sickening feeling in my gut morphs into something that words fail to describe, the edges of my vision turning a hazy red.
I can taste the bile in my mouth. I swallow, and it takes all my willpower not to vomit on the floor right then.
I need to move. I need to get as far away as I possibly can from her right now, but my feet seem to be frozen in place. All I can do is stand there watching them so deep in the throes of their own passion that they don’t even notice me standing behind them.
I want nothing more than to let loose this animalistic rage brewing inside of me. To pull him off her and beat him to a bloody pulp. But the rational side of me realizes it wouldn’t matter.
He’s not forcing her.
She’s clearly enjoying it just as much as he is. Her screams of pleasure are an indictment of just how little she cares for me.
We were going to get married, have a baby, start a family.
Indescribable pain chokes me suddenly. The breath leaves my lungs, and suddenly, there isn’t enough air in the room.
“Yes, baby, don’t stop! Yes! Just like that! I’m so close!” she screams into his ear. He grunts loudly too, matching the rhythm of her hips.
Ears ringing and hands trembling, I start to stumble away from them.
I can’t be here. I can’t—I just can’t see this anymore.
My heart contracts painfully in my chest, breaking into a million pieces while the woman who swore she loved me more than anything else begs another man not to stop fucking her.
“Yes, baby! Yesssss!” she screams.
I turn around and stumble out, my hands holding on to the shelves for support. I can barely make out where I’m going through my blurred vision. I just know I need to get the hell out of there right now.
In my haste I knock a metal tray full of staplers and other office equipment off one of the shelves sending its contents flying all over the floor.
The sound ricochets like a gunshot in the quiet room.
“What the fuck—” the man mutters under his breath, hurriedly dropping her. He struggles to pull up his pants, while she frantically fixes her dress and smooths her hair.
Finally, she raises her face up.
The moment her eyes meet mine, I can see the shock and realization in them.
She knows as much as I do that we’re over. There’s no fixing this.
There’s no apology, and there’s no forgiveness, not after this. There’s only pain, so much pain.
Suddenly, an even heavier crushing feeling of disappointment and betrayal tears through my body with the realization that this is not the first time.
This whole time, I’ve been played for a fool.
“Cole, please, I—I—” she struggles for words, but there is nothing to say. There’s only the truth, and I already know what that is.
“Please, I know how this looks, but I swear, I can fix this. I can fi—”
She’s got to be fucking kidding me.
Without letting her get another word out, I turn around and walk out of the cramped room that now smells stale and disgusting. She races after me, but I’m faster, and I shut the door tightly behind me, bolting it from outside and locking them in.
I take two steps away from it, staring at the closed door as my heart contracts painfully in my chest.
I can hear her fists hitting the door, but I don’t care. They can fucking die in there for all I care.
Turning around, I take slow steps, stumbling back into the hallway.
It feels like the walls are closing in on me, and there just isn’t enough oxygen in the building anymore. I need to breathe, and I can’t do that here. Not when she’s so close to me.
I push through the door across from the supply closet.
“Fifth door on the left, not right,” I chuckle humorlessly.
If I hadn’t gotten the directions wrong, I wouldn’t have seen her. I would’ve still been just as excited to give her the flowers and gifts right after she just let another man screw her against a wall.
This is the woman I was going to marry.
The woman I was going to have a child with.