by K. C. Crowne
I said nothing, letting her know without words that I wanted her to go on. A sick, tight feeling took ahold of my stomach. If she’d gotten back together with him, I needed to know.
“He wanted to try again,” she said.
“And what did you tell him?”
“I told him no.”
Relief washed over me.
“But that wasn’t all we talked about. He told me there was simply no way you and I would’ve come into one another’s lives through sheer coincidence.”
“Is that right?” I asked, my stomach hurting.
“Right. And the more I thought about it, the more I realized he had a point,” she continued. “I dated your brother, and then out of nowhere, you come into my life. And you’re not some random friend, not a coworker – you’re his brother. What are the freaking odds that this would happen?”
The only thing I could’ve said at that moment was a lie, and I was sick of them. I hated looking the woman I cared about in the eye and lying. I wanted it to be over. From the sounds of things, so did she.
Annie locked eyes with me, staring at me hard enough to feel like she might burn straight into my soul. “I’m going to ask you this clear-as-day, got it? And I want you to answer it with a simple yes or no. Are you ready?”
I knew what the question would be. I would have a choice – tell the truth and risk losing it all or lie.
“I’m ready.”
“Duncan.” There were equal parts anger and sadness in her voice, as if she already knew but didn’t want to believe it. “Did you know who I was before we met each other?”
“Yes.”
She said nothing. Annie took one slow breath, then another, her eyes closed as she fought for control or fought tears, I wasn’t sure.
Finally, she opened her eyes and spoke. “Why? Why did you lie to me?”
“Because I couldn’t stop thinking about you. But you were my brother’s ex…”
“So you came up with some elaborate lie to work your way into my life.”
“It’s not like that.”
“Really?” she asked, a spark of anger in her voice. “Then tell me what it is like.”
I tried to think of a way to explain it, but at that moment, under that pressure, everything that came to mind sounded like an excuse.
“I can tell you right now that it’s the only part of us that’s a lie,” I assured her. “I care about you, more than I’ve ever cared about a woman before. And that’s the God’s honest truth.”
She shook her head, and I knew my words weren’t doing me a bit of good.
“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “Because it’s all built on a lie. You lied your way into my life, and now I can’t trust a word that comes out of your mouth. And more than that, you lied to my face.”
“I did what I needed to do to make sure you stayed in my life,” I defended. “You mean too much to me to risk losing you.”
“But I didn’t mean enough for you to tell me the truth.”
“I’m telling you now.”
“It’s too late.” She sighed, running her hand through her hair and looking away for a moment before turning her eyes to me. “Duncan, you need to leave.”
Her words were like a cold blade into my gut.
“Can we talk about this again?” I asked, a pleading note in my tone. I was losing her. “This can’t be the last time I see you.”
“It just might be. But right now, all I want is for you to be gone.”
It was like the life had been drained out of me. There was nothing else to say. “Goodbye, Annie.”
“Bye.” The word was clipped and curt.
There wasn’t another word that would do me any good. I turned and left.
My mind was blank as I drove back home, a wet sleet blurring my windshield. When I was home, the second I stepped into my living room the stand I’d bought for her caught my eye.
She’d never see it.
We were done.
I’d made the mistake of a lifetime. And all I could do was try to pick up the pieces.
Annie
I stood there in a daze for the longest time. There was a good chance I might’ve spent the entire night like that, staring off into space, my expression blank as I tried to process what had happened. But Gia emerging from the bathroom where she’d been hiding snapped me back to my senses.
“Holy…shit,” she said. “That really just happened.”
“It really just happened.”
She hurried to my side and put her hand on my shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze. “Are you alright?”
“I don’t even know how to begin to answer that question.”
She nodded, and without saying a word, went to the fridge and pulled out the two glasses of wine she’d hid in there before Duncan came up. A big spread of Chinese food could be explained, but two glasses of wine would be a little harder.
And the irony hadn’t been lost on me that I’d lied to him about that. Well, it was keeping with the theme of the evening.
“Come here,” she said, putting the glass of wine in my hand and leading me to the couch. “You need to sit down – you look like your knees are about to buckle underneath you.”
She helped me get seated. The glass of white was cool in my hand, and the idea of a sip to take the edge off sounded nice. But I wanted to approach the issue with a clear head, so I set it down on the coffee table in front of me and sat back.
“Tell me what’s on your mind right now,” she said. “At this very instant.”
“I feel like I’ve been tricked,” I said, the words coming out clearly and simply. “Like this was all some kind of screwed-up game. I mean, doesn’t that make perfect sense? You meet an amazing guy, everything’s going perfectly, and you start thinking…” I trailed off.
“You start thinking what?”
“Don’t make me say it. Especially not now.”
“I know it hurts,” she replied, putting a hand on my leg. “But you need to get it all out.”
I shook my head in disbelief. “I was actually, really starting to think there might’ve been a future between us. Something serious. Maybe even…”
Gia put her arm around me. Tears began to form in my eyes.
“It’s okay,” she said. “I mean, it’s most definitely not okay, but it will be okay.”
“It’s like he was a con artist or something,” I said. “He made all this seem so natural, but in the back of his head he knew the whole time that it was a trick.” I let out a wry laugh. “What if the guy he saved me from at the coffee shop was some dude he’d paid? I wouldn’t put it past him at this point.”
“I doubt he’d go that far,” she said, setting down her own wine glass. “But I get what you’re saying – now you have to wonder what he’s told you that’s been a lie.”
“It could be everything. Maybe he’s not even a doctor.”
She smiled. “That’d be a hell of a length to go to, getting himself on a magazine cover just to trick you.” Gia smiled, and I couldn’t help but match it with one of my own. “Listen,” she said, a firmness to her voice. “I know this is all kind of crazy. And you’d be totally justified in kicking his ass to the curb for it. But is that what you want to do?”
“Huh?” I was confused.
“Okay, maybe I’m playing devil’s advocate here, but does that mean you’re done with him?”
The first thing to come to my mind was of course it does! But before I answered, I understood what she was saying, that if I were to end things because of this lie, it’d mean throwing away our relationship, what we’d built so far.
It was enough to give pause.
“You like him, right?”
“I did like him. I…I understand what you’re doing, Gia. But the fact of the matter is our relationship is totally built on a lie. He went out of his way to make it seem like our meeting was this cute, unplanned thing, but in reality it was all some scheme to get into my pants.”
“It might n
ot just be about sex, you know. It might be that he actually liked you. Likes you.”
I was confused. “What are you saying? Are you trying to convince me to get back together with him?”
“No-no-no,” she said, shaking her head. “Just that this is a big decision you’re about to make, and I want to be sure you’re not doing it in the heat of the moment.”
More tears trickled down my face. “I feel so, so stupid,” I sobbed, leaning over and letting my head fall onto Gia shoulder. She wrapped her arm around me and pulled me close. “This whole time I thought he was something he wasn’t. And on top of that, me and him getting involved made Andrew reconsider what he’d done.”
“It’s a mess,” Gia sympathized. “But you’re handling it like a champ.”
I laughed through the tears. “Thanks, but I’m a mess. I know I’m doing the right thing, but I feel like my heart’s been ripped out of my chest. I wouldn’t exactly call this handling it well.”
“Are you kidding?” she asked. “You have two crazy brothers obsessed with you. And you managed to deal with one of them admitting he was lying right to your face without grabbing a handful of General Tso’s and shoving it up his ass.”
Another laugh. “I don’t know what I’d do without you, Gia. Thanks for being here for me.”
“It’s my freaking pleasure,” she said with a big grin. “Now, the hard part’s over.”
My face went blank, a thought occurring to me. She frowned at me and asked, “What’s wrong?”
“It’s what you said, about the two brothers. I wish I’d never met them.”
Gia said nothing at first, keeping her arm wrapped around me. “I get it. I really do. Sometimes it feels like that’d be the easier way. But you’ll get through it.”
I didn’t know whether or not to believe her.
Two men had come into my life, and both had left it for the worse. The only thing I could think of was whether or not I’d ever be able to love again.
At that moment, it sure as hell didn’t look like it.
Duncan
I kept thinking about the conversation with Annie last night, the events playing over and over again like a nightmare that’d been particularly fresh in my mind.
It was over. I couldn’t believe it, but it was over.
I was thinking I had some brilliant plan to win over my brother’s ex. I’d been so damn certain I’d had all the angles worked out, that nothing could go wrong. But too late I realized I’d been so convinced of my plan’s brilliance that I didn’t even stop to consider that anything might go wrong.
And it had, in the worst way possible. Not only did Annie know I’d lied, and had broken up with me in response, but Andrew knew too.
My brother, the man who’d only recently come back into my life, now knew I was a liar who’d gone behind his back to date the woman he’d loved.
It was a mess. And on top of it all, the amount of mental space the situation took up meant I couldn’t concentrate worth a damn at work. The numbers and letters on the computer screen in front of me were a blur, and despite the amount of coffee I’d been throwing back, I couldn’t make heads or tails of them.
A little after lunch, the sandwich and chips I’d ordered mostly untouched on my desk, a chime sounded from the intercom letting me know that someone was there to see me.
“Yes?” I asked.
“Dr. Pitt, Dr. Adam Brand to see you.”
I wracked my brain trying to remember if I had a meeting planned. “Was he on the schedule?”
“No. But he says it’s an emergency.”
Dr. Brand was one of my oldest colleagues, a skilled general practitioner I’d tapped to run one of my new clinics in Denver. He was a serious, business-like man through and through, and not the type to call something an emergency when it wasn’t.
“Send him in.”
“Of course.”
I did my best to get my head back in the game. I wasn’t sure what was going on, but this was work – I couldn’t afford to let what had happened with Annie distract me from it.
A knock sounded at the door and I bellowed for him to come in. Dr. Brand stepped into the office. He was a stocky, forty-something man of average height with a head of thinning red hair and a lean face with features that always seemed to be in a grave expression. He wasn’t exactly the most jovial man in the world, but he was competent as hell, and wasn’t without his own wry sense of humor.
Most importantly, I trusted him.
“Adam,” I said, stepping over and giving him a handshake. “Good to see you.”
“Likewise, Dr. Pitt.”
I half-smirked. “Adam, for how long have we been working together?”
“Since the first clinic. Years.”
“And you’re still calling me Dr. Pitt.”
The corner of his mouth ticked up almost imperceptibly. “What can I say? I’m a stickler for formality.”
“Don’t I know it?” I replied as I poured us both cups of coffees. “So, what’s the issue?”
He nodded with thanks as I brought him the cup of coffee, the two of us sitting down in the meeting area. “Deborah Wingard.”
The name was immediately familiar to me, a nurse we’d let go months back. “What about her?”
“You remember the situation?”
I tried to scan my thoughts to call back the details. Maybe it was the Andrew and Annie situation, but I could barely remember.
“Remind me.”
“She was a nurse working underneath me, one of the first new hires at the clinic.” He sat back and crossed his legs, as if getting into a subject he didn’t care for one bit. “And at first, she seemed on-the-ball – a solid hire who’d come with just as solid recommendations.”
“Go on.” I did my best to pay attention, but my mind kept drifting, the expression of anger and sadness on Annie’s face appearing in my mind again.
“You alright over there?” Adam asked.
“I’m fine. Bad night’s sleep last night.” I wasn’t lying – I’d managed about three hours of shut-eye total, spending the rest of the night tossing and turning.
“Just need some more of this,” I said, tapping the side of my mug. “Go ahead.”
“Anyway, the longer she worked for us, the more I began to get the impression that things weren’t all as they seemed.”
“How so?”
“Things we couldn’t prove…like items missing from patients’ belongings. Money, things like that. Also, expenses tacked onto their final bills. Just a few dollars here and there, but costs that added up. And whenever I questioned her, there was no way to prove it was her. After all, she could simply claim she provided whatever service was on the bill. But it all stank to high heaven.”
“Go on.”
“Finally, one day, I caught her bumping a patient to add a friend of hers to the schedule – clear preferential behavior, clear violation of nurse ethics. Between that and everything else that was happening, I let her go that day. But she didn’t take it well.”
“Didn’t take it well how?”
“She said she’d sue us for everything we had. I didn’t believe her, thinking she was just being vindictive. And sure enough, after that day, I didn’t hear a word from her. Not to mention, all the billing discrepancies and patient theft stopped as of then.”
“But the problem’s not solved,” I guessed. “Otherwise you wouldn’t be here.”
“The problem’s far from solved, actually. My office got a call from her today. She’s lawyered up and was coming to meet with you.”
“Excuse me?” I sat up, more focused than I’d been all day.
“Said she was going to drop by your office today. And that’s why I’m here – to let you know and to be at your side when it happens.”
My eyebrows arched in surprise. “She’s just…dropping by?”
He nodded. “I was nearby when I heard, otherwise I would’ve given you more notice, but—”
Another chime from the inte
rcom sounded through the office. “Shit,” I said, pointing at it. “Is that her?”
“Dr. Pitt, someone’s here to see you – a Deborah Wingard.”
“We can’t let her in here now,” I said. “Not without a member of the legal team.”
“I already spoke with them,” he replied. “And they told me that if we go full-lawyer on her from the start, it might make this thing blow up into something it doesn’t need to be. Right now, we’ve got a perfectly clear-cut case – she was fired for a good reason. If we hold the line and stick to our guns, be firm, we can maybe talk some sense into her.”
“Dammit,” I mumbled, clenching my fist. “We can’t have a damn lawsuit while we’re in the middle of expanding. It’d be the worst possible kind of attention.”
“Right,” he said. “So, let’s try to defuse this together.”
I took a slow breath, gathering my thoughts. But damn, I was still tired and distracted and not in the right headspace for something like this. It couldn’t be put off, however. We needed to handle it.
“Alright – send her in.”
Less than two seconds later the door opened. Deborah Wingard burst into the room, five-feet-three-inches of wiry energy, her body reed thin and a manic glint in her blue eyes. Her bleach-blonde hair was pulled back into a tight ponytail, making her already intense expression even more so.
“You Dr. Pitt?” she asked.
“That’s me,” I said. “A pleasure to meet you, Nurse Wingard.” She looked me up and down as if I were pulling some kind of trick on her. With a bland expression, I gestured to my colleague. “And you know Dr. Brand.”
“Yeah, I know Dr. Brand,” she snarled, putting maximum disdain in her tone.
“Please,” I said. “Sit. Let’s get this situation worked out.” I stepped over to the coffee pot and poured her a cup. Caffeine seemed like the last thing she needed, but I wanted to be polite.
She took the cup and plopped onto the couch, a bit of coffee dribbling over the side. “The only way this situation is going to get worked out is if I get my job back or you give me one of those, what’re they called, golden parachutes.”