Chapter 23 Sevyn
The baked spaghetti was stuck to the bottom of the pan. Garlic knots had not only burned, but the bread was dried out and were hard like rocks. The dough for the homemade apple pie was still on the counter, and my legs were numb.
I had been sitting in the same seat for the last twenty minutes.
I had determined that I wasn’t going to watch the trial from the onset, but when Deuce ran out because he was called to testify, I had to watch the trial.
A part of me felt that I was being supportive of him by watching and that if I wasn’t there in the flesh, I could be there in the spirit.
But there was another part of me that felt he was hiding something from me, and I couldn’t sit back and play the fool. I felt like things would come out in the trial that would give me the answers that I was searching for.
I had called Amani and told her that I wouldn’t be able to make it.
But by the time I called, she was already in our neighborhood to pick me up.
She had suggested we have lunch together at Deuce’s house.
I agreed because I still looked forward to her company, and I knew she wanted to escape her children for one afternoon.
I could easily provide her the outlet that she needed while keeping my mind preoccupied.
I knew that I wouldn’t do anything but sit around and worry about Deuce if I were alone.
She had come and sat with me while we ordered Thai food on DoorDash.
We ate lunch, talked about life, about my new business that I was starting, and her career as a life coach.
She had decided to pursue that path when she was looking for something to do while her children were little.
She wanted to work from home so that she could take care of them rather than placing them in daycare.
Someone had suggested that she become a life coach because of how wonderful she was with guiding people, providing life advice, and organizing people’s lives.
Thinking that might be a good idea, she had taken courses and become certified.
I admired Amani because she seemed like a good wife, if the way her husband and kids adored her were an indicator.
On top of that, she was always calm and peaceful, and she was pursuing a career while maintaining a family and a household.
Nothing too much ever ruffled her feathers. I aspired to be like her.
But today I was a long way away from that. She sat beside me on the couch and held my hand as I rocked back and forth.
“Sevyn, everything isn’t always what it appears to be.
When questions are asked, they are going to be asked in a certain way for the advantage of the side who is asking it.
He’s not going to be allowed to tell the whole story no matter how it clears things up, because it might also muck it up for the other side. ”
I nodded and swiped at the tears falling from my eyes.
“Breathe,” she cautioned, squeezing my hand. “There was a reason he didn’t share all of that. Give him the benefit of the doubt.”
I cast my gaze her way and then tore it away and stared back at the screen where the man I loved was talking.
Deuce and Amani could have been twins; they looked so much alike.
It was difficult for me to believe the man I stared at on screen was the same one I shared a bed with, my body with, and opened my heart up to.
“How were you certain that the fetus Officer Ward was carrying belonged to you and not her husband, Detective Fullwood?”
“Officer Ward and I had been involved for the last year, as I stated earlier. She was no longer involved with her husband, but we also discussed having a non-invasive prenatal DNA test. She suggested it to assuage any concerns I might have that it was his baby.”
“And were there any concerns?”
“No.”
“How could you be so sure?”
“Because Officer Ward and I spent every moment together in our off-duty hours. Whenever our shift ended, we left the precinct and met up somewhere else. We stayed together until it was time to return to work again. She wasn’t dealing with her husband in those days.
I was the only man she was with. The only one she loved. ”
“Objection, Your Honor!”
“Sevyn, I’m turning the TV off.”
“Please don’t.”
“Why? You’re torturing yourself. None of this has anything to do with your relationship with him.”
“It does. He didn’t tell me anything about a baby.” That was what hurt so badly. I knew about the affair, because he had told me, but he failed to mention the baby. My pain circulated around the baby. It was all about the baby, and yet, I couldn’t explain that to her. I wasn’t ready.
“It all happened before you, Sevyn.”
“Of course you would take his side. You’re his sister,” I declared, standing up and walking around the couch to go into the kitchen.
Amani muted the TV and quickly followed me. “Honey, if that’s what you think this is, you’re wrong. Yes, he is my brother, but right is right and wrong is wrong. I wouldn’t side with him because he’s my family. I’m simply speaking the truth. All this happened before he met you. He . . .”
I could no longer hear Amani’s voice. My head ached, and I squeezed my eyes shut to press out the pounding and the pain. I felt myself waver slightly, and I gripped the counter to prevent myself from falling.
Instead, blackness surrounded me briefly before I heard Ethan’s voice.
“How do you see my role in this child’s life moving forward, Ethan?”
“Baby, you know that you will be a vital part, but there are some things that will be just between Pandora and me. I’ll do everything to make you feel included, but some things I don’t even think you want to be a part of.
For instance, I know that Pandora wouldn’t want you in the delivery room and neither would you want to be there.
Come on, baby. Let’s not do this tonight.
We’ve been through too much, and today has been a very difficult day.
She don’t deserve your energy today or any day. ”
“I’m already sick of her being an issue. It’s just starting, Ethan. Can you imagine how she’ll be when she has the baby and with your mother on her side?”
“You have nothing to worry about.”
“That’s easy for you to say. You’re not the one who is being disrespected at every turn. You don’t have to worry if I’m the one out there tempted to cheat again or creep with my ex, Ethan.”
“I didn’t cheat, okay? We were broken up, Sevyn.”
“We were not broken up, Ethan. We were separated and supposed to be working on our marriage.”
“No, Sevyn. Your memory has become convenient. You had served me with divorce papers that day.”
“I may have served you, but I don’t think that she conveniently popped up in your life that day. I doubt that she would have just been that easy to reach. I’m not stupid, Ethan. You were already in contact with that girl before then. Run that game on someone else.”
“I’m not doing this with you tonight. You just lost your grandmother, and it’s an emotional time for you. Although the circumstance does warrant you being upset, I don’t think it’s a good idea to have this argument now.”
I swiped tears from my face while steering with one hand. Just as I pulled my hand away, I hit a puddle of water, and the car instantly hydroplaned.
“Oh shit!” I cried out as I attempted to steer in the direction of the skid.
“Baby, just calm down. You’ve got this. All you—”
Ethan’s speech was cut off as someone stepped out into the road in my path.
The figure was walking fast, and his head was lowered as if he were lost in thought.
He didn’t see me coming. I wanted to blow the horn, but I doubted that would be enough to save his life.
The rain poured down, but I would have a better chance steering into the opposite lane than I would if I stayed where I was.
I was going to hit the man. He looked up at the last minute, and I saw his eyes.
Those chocolate eyes so dark that they almost looked black.
There was no fear in them, almost like he welcomed the impact of my car on his body.
His body. Time froze, and I saw every detail. Muscular arms bulging underneath a navy-blue hoodie with CSPD and their logo emblazoned on the front. Black Nikaj joggers matched the shoes on his feet.
A diamond earring twinkled in his left ear, and his bow-shaped lips were painted in a grim line. He jumped back at the last minute, but it was too late for me.
“Ethan!” I cried out as the car spun repeatedly.
Ethan’s head flopped forward and back as the impact slammed into his side of the car, crushing it inward. My head snapped forward and banged against the steering wheel just before I lost consciousness.
My husband reached over to grab the steering wheel, but I had already turned the steering wheel in the opposite direction.
I lost control of the car, and the moment that I looked up, it was too late.
A bright light blinded us as a loud noise reverberated through the night, and something hard and forceful hit us on his side.
“Deuce!”
“What?”
“It was Deuce,” I whispered with a gasp as I looked into Amani’s face that looked so much like his.
Could it have been a trick of my mind because I was staring into his sister’s face?
No. I had seen Deuce the night of the accident.
He was the man who stepped into the street.
He hadn’t been called to the scene. Deuce was already there because he was the reason the accident occurred.
My mind turned over several facts as Amani stared at me and asked if I was okay. I wasn’t. I rushed out of the kitchen with my heart in my throat. I pulled out a large manila envelope that I hadn’t bothered with since leaving the hospital.
I sat on my bed and emptied the contents. I maniacally pawed through the contents as I searched for the one thing that I needed to see.
“Sevyn, you’re scaring me, honey. What’s going on?” Amani asked, walking into the room.
She held her phone tightly in one hand while she looked at me with a guarded expression.
“I have to find it. I have to find it.” My words were on repeat, and while I knew I looked crazy to her, I also knew that I made perfect sense in my mind.
I would not slow down until I found what I was searching for.
As if that thought conjured the paper, my fingertips touched exactly what I was looking for.
I pulled the yellow carbon paper from the stack of papers I had poured from the envelope. I used my thumbnail to search the paper. When I finally found what I was looking for, my heart exploded.
M. Brown was the responding officer along with E. Miller. I scanned the details of the accident report that Waverleigh had ordered for me, but neither of us had read it. Her, because she hadn’t had time, me, because I wasn’t ready to relive that night again.
I had been worried that the moment I read the report, I would relive every painful detail of losing my memory, my husband, and my life as I knew it. Therefore, I hadn’t read it. I had ordered it because I wanted it available whenever I was ready to read it. Now was that time.
“He wasn’t the responding officer,” I stated sadly.
“Honey, what are you talking about?”
“Deuce wasn’t the officer who responded to the accident. He was simply there that night.”
“I know. He told us that, Sevyn.”
“Did he tell you that it was because he caused the accident, Amani?”
“What?”
“Right here,” I stated softly as I pushed the paper to her. I climbed off the bed and with stooped shoulders, I walked to the living room.
“What does all this mean, Sevyn?” Amani asked, walking out of my bedroom and down the hallway.
“He’s only been in my life because of guilt.
He was worried how I was going to respond when I recalled the accident.
I have been blaming myself for my husband dying all this time, and he knew that he was responsible.
He held the key to the answers that I sought, and he held them back.
Just like he wasn’t truthful about Lena and the baby.
So many lies, Amani. I don’t know what to believe anymore. Does he even love me?” I sobbed.
“Believe me when I say that I know this looks crazy, Sevyn, but I know my brother. He would never intentionally use anyone or hurt you. He loves you. Give him a chance to answer the questions that you have before you jump to conclusions.”
I shook my head and pushed back past her in the hall on the way to my bedroom.
“No. I have to get out of here.”
“Sevyn, don’t just leave like this. He deserves to have you tell him upfront.”
I spun around angrily on her in the doorway of my bedroom.
“I deserved the truth, but he’s been holding it back from me.
So don’t come telling me what he deserves.
I’ve been an open book to that man letting him pour through the details of my life.
He hasn’t given me the same respect. He deserves to come home and find that I’m gone, and I’m never coming back. ”
I walked in my closet and grabbed a carryall bag. I tossed some grooming items inside. When I finished with that, I grabbed a suitcase and tossed as many clothes inside as I could. One final bag, I filled with my shoes.
“Please, Sevyn. If I could call him and tell him to come home right now, I would. But I can’t because he’s still on the stand. Please don’t leave like this.”
I shook my head as the tears continued falling.
“I cannot stay, Amani. Please don’t ask me to.
My heart hurts so badly right now. I don’t know who he is anymore, and I can’t trust him.
I don’t know if anything is true—his feelings, his declaration of love, or his protection.
He probably only did all he’s done to keep me close and find out what I remember. ”
“I’m sorry you feel that way.”
“Yeah, I’m sorry that he felt I deserved this.”
“I hate to ask you this, but if you leave here, where are you going?”
Waverleigh had left for Pennsylvania, and unfortunately, I had nowhere to go.
“Whatever you’re thinking about, slow down before you make a drastic decision.
I know that my brother hurt you, and I’m sorry that he did.
But you’ve got more than just your heart to consider now and more than Deuce’s.
It’s not about just you two anymore. Before you saw the trial, there was a glow about you, you’ve been nauseous over the smell of the food, and you’re gaining weight.
” She stared at me knowingly before her eyes dropped to my belly.
She turned around and walked out of my room. My stomach heaved, and I barely made it to the bathroom in time to vomit. My heart hurt so badly. Why had all this happened to me now? My life had always had such bad timing. I felt so screwed. There was no way that he would let me leave if he knew.