Chapter 4 Betrayed
It had been a week since the funeral, but the grief hadn’t lifted.
It had just changed shape. Heavier. Darker. Like wet cement hardening around me.
I barely left my apartment. The blinds stayed closed. My phone stayed on silent, even though it buzzed constantly with messages I couldn’t bear to open.
When it buzzed again, I looked.
The screen lit up with yet another message I assumed would be more of the same. Accusations. Threats, Strangers telling me who I was.
But then I saw it.
A number I recognized instantly.
My breath caught as I grabbed the phone and opened it.
(843) 454-9163: Meet me at the Hilton. Room 207
Nick.
Maybe he had changed his mind. Maybe he wanted to talk. To finally listen. Maybe everything could start to make sense again.
I didn’t even think.
I just grabbed my keys and left.
I barely remember the drive. Red lights blurred. Turns I must have taken on instinct. The hotel was thirty minutes away, but every mile felt endless.
My heart was pounding by the time I reached the hallway leading to room 207.
I paused at the door, smoothing my hair, trying to calm my shaking hands. My stomach fluttered nervously and for the first time in weeks, I actually felt hope.
Then I heard a sound. A low, breathy laugh from inside. A man’s voice. A woman’s.
My blood ran cold.
I pressed my ear against the door and froze. The laughter shifted, turning into muffled moans.
And they were familiar in a way that made my stomach twist. I’d heard Nick sound like that before, not even a month ago.
For a split second, my mind refused to believe it.
No. No, it couldn’t be.
I pushed the handle. The door wasn’t locked.
It opened just enough for me to see everything.
Nick.
His shirt half off, pants around his ankles, his hands tangled in someone’s hair as he thrust against her.
Not someone’s hair.
Apple’s.
My sister.
For a moment, the world just… stopped.
I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think. My body moved before my mind caught up. I stumbled forward, hitting the doorframe. My heart slammed against my ribs, bile rising in my throat.
He must’ve heard me, because he froze. Every muscle in his body went rigid before he turned.
And in that instant, everything I thought I knew about him shattered.
The look in his eyes wasn’t guilt.
It was hatred.
The air left my lungs. My knees hit the floor. I clutched my stomach as sobs tore through me.
“This is a dream,” I whispered, my voice raw and broken. “This isn’t real. You didn’t… Nick, not with her. Why would you do this to us?”
He pulled up his pants.
When he reached me, he crouched and grabbed my chin, forcing me to look at him. His touch was rough, his voice nothing like the man I loved.
“It’s nothing you didn’t do,” he said coldly. “Now you know what it feels like. You’re a liar and a cheat, and I wish you all the evil in the world.”
I tore away from his grip, gasping for air. The pressure in my chest was unbearable, like a hand squeezing my lungs until I could barely breathe.
So this was what true pain felt like.
“Ashley,” Apple said softly from the bed. “You should go.”
I looked at her, searching for the sister I used to know. But all I saw was a stranger. Someone who’d helped destroy what was left of me.
Nick turned back to her, grabbing her ankle and yanking her closer across the bed. She laughed, a high, breathy sound that made my stomach twist.
“She can stay and watch,” he said, his voice cruel. “I don’t care. Let’s continue.”
My body shook uncontrollably. I forced myself to stand, every step feeling like it could break me in half. I had to leave. If I stayed, the pain would kill me.
I reached the door, my vision swimming. Before I closed it, his voice hit me one last time.
“I wish she never came into my life at all. She’s better off dead.”
The words sliced through me.
I stumbled down the hall. The walls seemed to close in, the air too thin to breathe. By the time I reached the parking lot, my legs gave out. I crouched beside my car, shaking, wheezing, my chest on fire. Not enough air. Not enough…
My fingers dug into my stomach as a sharp pain twisted low in my abdomen.
And then everything went black.
Nick POV 30 minutes earlier
Apple was the only one who didn’t look at me like I was about to shatter. She didn’t whisper or offer empty words. She just sat there beside me quietly, letting me lean on her without questions. Somehow, that helped. She was the only one who could give me even a shred of comfort.
“I know you miss her,” she’d said softly, her hand brushing against my arm. “But she’s gone, Nick. And torturing yourself won’t bring her or your sister back.”
Her voice soothed something raw inside me, but it couldn’t stop the ache that had nothing to do with grief.
It was Ashley’s face that haunted me, her eyes when she swore she was innocent, the sound of her voice when she said she loved me.
I missed her in a way that made my chest hurt, and I hated her in the same breath for what she’d done.
The two feelings twisted together until I couldn’t tell where one ended and the other began.
Apple leaned in closer; her perfume filled the room, sweet and distracting.
“Let me help you forget,” she murmured. “Just for tonight.”
And I let her.
Because I couldn’t take the memories anymore, the betrayal, the grief, the endless loop of what-ifs. I wanted to make the memory of Ashley go dull and distant.
So I pushed the doubt away and let myself be taken by the moment.
I pushed Apple down onto the bed and yanked her skirt up, tearing her panties off. I figured if I went hard enough, maybe I could forget Ashley.
The woman who’d betrayed me and made a fool out of me.
Apple’s eyes widened, but she didn’t stop me. She just nodded, like she understood what I needed, what this was. With rough, impatient movements, I unzipped my pants and pushed inside her. My thrusts were hard, desperate, almost punishing.
I didn’t care if it hurt her, didn’t care about anything except drowning out the ache in my chest. But even as my body moved on instinct, my mind was somewhere else.
We could have been so happy, Ash.
We could have had a family.
That child inside you should’ve been mine.
My rage flared and suddenly I had the urge to strangle Ashley to death. My thrusts became rougher. I couldn’t tell if I was trying to forget her or punish myself for still loving her.
Apple didn’t protest. If anything, she matched my tempo, quick and willing, murmuring that she could take it.
I told myself it was about forgetting, about survival.
Then I heard it. A small gasp.
I froze.
I turned my head toward the door and saw her.
Ashley.
For a second, everything inside me stopped. My pulse, my breath, my thoughts. Panic flooded first: what was she doing here? How had she found me? But after hearing her speak, the panic folded into a white-hot fury so sudden I felt like I might combust.
I yanked my pants up and crossed the room in two steps. My voice didn’t sound like my own when I spoke.
“It’s nothing you didn’t do,” I spat, grabbing her chin, forcing her to look at me. “Now you know what it feels like. You’re a liar and a cheat, and I wish you all the evil in the world.”
Her eyes widened, the pain there so real it almost broke me.
Almost.
Apple’s voice cut through the silence. “Ashley, you should leave.”
Ashley looked at her like she didn’t even recognize her. Hell, I didn’t recognize myself.
I wanted her to scream.
To fight back.
To hate me.
Anything that would make the emptiness stop.
But she didn’t. She just cried.
Wanting this to end, I turned back to the bed and yanked Apple to me by the ankle. She squealed.
“She can stay and watch,” I said, trying to sound indifferent. “I don’t care. Let’s continue.”
But after the door slammed and the silence swallowed the room, the victory I’d imagined never came.
I sat on the edge of the bed and buried my face in my hands. Apple put a tentative hand on my shoulder and murmured something I couldn’t hear over the ringing in my ears.
I thought making her hurt would fix the hollow.
It didn’t. If anything, it made the emptiness deeper, colder and more absolute. For the first time since the funeral, something inside me turned and asked a question I didn’t want to answer.
Had I become the kind of man I’d sworn I’d never be?