“My daddy died when I was a kid like you, and do you know what happened?” Ryder speaks, setting my nerves on edge.
“What?” Tobias is keen to hear his answer, always intrigued with other people’s stories.
“It turned out that he wasn’t actually my daddy, and my real daddy came to find me. Would you like that to happen to you?”
Tobias stiffens next to me. His intrigue washes away, and tears pool in my eyes. They’re not tears of weakness, though. These tears burning my eyes are caused by sheer anger.
“How dare you!” I spit out, losing my patience. “Keep your damn mouth shut.”
“God, we missed you and your mouth.” Ryder smirks. “Say you missed us too, Ally.”
Ryder was never this malicious when we were kids, he was the one who was nice to me. He was always there for me when Huxley wasn’t, or when he was and was being an asshole to me.
“Are we going home, Mom?” Tobias whispers for only me to hear.
I look up to find Hux watching our every move, and I swallow the panic building in my chest. How can this be happening? I ran from this man because he doesn’t know how to love. I raised my son to know love and to show it.
“We’re going on an adventure,” I tell him, wondering if I’m even going to survive Huxley Bailey-Vaughan again. I barely did the first time around, and I have the scars to prove it.
The car comes to a stop eight hours and some odd minutes later. Ryder jumps out first, and Hux looks across at Tobias sleeping with his head resting on my lap.
“Do you need a hand with him? It’s getting late, we shouldn’t wake him.”
I snort. Is he for real? Huxley doesn’t care about such things. If he knew how to care, our life together may have been exceptionally different.
“Let’s get this straight. You will never have a hand in his life, and there is no we when it comes to us or him.”
I shudder when he smiles at me.
“It’s damn good to have you home, Bug. Take him in. Rose will show you to his room.”
“His room?”
“Yes, Allison, his room. My son will have his own fucking room and plenty more. Now get the fuck out of the car, and unless you want me to carry him in, wake him up and take him inside.”
He swings his legs out of the car and climbs out with ease. I wonder if I sit here long enough, will someone close the door and drive us away, not realising we’re in the back?
“If she doesn’t move in the next ten seconds, get in there and get them both out,” I hear Hux order, and it has me moving quickly.
“Tobes,” I whisper, gently coaxing him awake.
I take a second to appreciate how soft he is as he comes around, and then he frowns as he stretches his stiff muscles.
He climbs out first, and I follow him to find we’re outside the Bailey mansion. If it wasn’t for Tobias being here, it’d be like I never left. The stone is still intimidating, and the ivy still clings to the walls like the vines that used to feel like they were strangling me. The waves crashing against the nearby cliffs are loud, and the wind whips viciously around us.
“Don’t tell me you’re still living at home with Mommy and Daddy?” I snort.
“It belongs to me now. Daddy dearest died a couple of years ago and I inherited this place, as well as all the businesses in town. I own everything and everyone who works for me. Now that I know I have a son with you, it will be handed down to him.”
Looking quickly at my side, I sigh in relief when I see that Tobias is too busy looking around to hear him. Huxley’s family has owned the majority of the businesses since they founded the town. The bank belongs to them, the school, the hospital, and so on. It’s easier to list what they don’t own, which are a handful of restaurants and the Harbour.
An older woman appears on the front porch, holding her hands on her hips, and it takes me a moment to recognise her as Rose. She was hired to watch over Hux as he was growing up. She’d clean and cook for him, and she was more of a mom than his actual mother. She certainly loved him more.
“Tobias, you see her over there?” Hux points to Rose. “She’ll make you something to eat. Anything you ask for.”
“Anything?”
“Yes, son. Anything.”
Thinking with his greedy belly, he’s quick on his toes and runs over to her.
“Don’t call him son,” I warn Hux when Tobias is out of sight.
“It’s what he is, and it’s what I’m going to call him,” he snaps.
He starts to walk inside, and I automatically follow, wanting to find Tobias. I know every inch of this house. I spent enough time here from the age of sixteen to twenty-one.
The polished marble floor in the hall still gleams as it did the first time I came here. The only difference is that the huge family portrait is now gone.
It was Mrs. Bailey-Vaughan’s pride and joy, and Huxley’s biggest embarrassment. He hated it being so formal and stiff. His face in the painting barely resembled him, and I found it hilarious.
“Follow me,” Hux grunts, gliding through the hall to the office his dad used to live in.
I’d never been in this room before, and as he heads around the large wooden desk, my eyes fall on Dash Johnson. The door closes behind us, and I spin around to find Ryder leaning against my only exit.
“Take a seat, Ally,” he purrs, and I move away from him.
I look back at Dash. I could never work out why he was such great friends with Huxley. I obviously had no idea who he truly was.
Dash is as handsome as he was back in school. He was the quieter one of the group. And thinking of their group, I look around the office.
“Is Craig going to jump out and surprise me, or do we have to wait for him to barge into my life too?”
“Considering he’s as dead as your husband is, it’s not wise for us to wait for him to show up,” Hux advises me, almost growling.
“He’s dead? How? When?” At school, the four of them were untouchable. They were above death, or so I thought.
“Look who gives a shit now, boys,” Ryder cruelly mocks, falling onto a small couch by the bookcase.
“It’s none of your business, and we have our own to sort out, unless you want to prolong this and hang around?”
Narrowing my eyes into slits, I couldn’t think of anything worse. I take the seat farthest from everyone and grip a little too hard onto the armrests.
“Thought not,” he grumbles, lighting another cigarette. Thomas, his father, would hate him smoking in here. He would hate the nicotine clinging to the old books that line the many shelves. Hux nods to Dash, who takes over.
“My client wants access to his son. He wants the birth certificate changed, the child’s surname changed—”
“Client? You became a lawyer?”
“I did, and I didn’t drag my ass out here at this time of the night to play catch-up with you. Do you agree—”
“I don’t agree to anything. Tobias is my son, not his.”
“We can get a judge to order a paternity test. It’ll only prolong the inevitable. We all know Tobias is Huxley’s son.”
Put them side by side, you can’t deny they have the same hair colour and eyes. Their bone structure could be commented on being similar, but still, I fight them.
“Do you know that? Did you ever see me pregnant?”
He rolls his stormy grey eyes and scribbles down something in his notebook.
“It doesn’t matter. The test will come back positive and you’ll end up losing in court. You have a few thousand dollars to your name thanks to your dead husband, which won’t last you very long. You’re three payments behind on your mortgage, with no income to catch up and pay it off. There is photographic evidence of you purchasing alcohol repeatedly in your grief while being Tobias’s sole caretaker. I can carry on if you’d like?”
I try my best to hide my surprise, but I fail miserably. Was he following our every move? I thought we were safe when all along we were nowhere near it.
“How long have you been watching me?” I snap at Hux.
“Long enough to make shit flow your way so I can get what I want. I’m the wealthiest man in the North. I own ninety-five percent of this town and a lot more after that. If you force my hand, I’ll take what little you have. Do not push me again, Allison.”
I want to be back at the cemetery with Conner. I want his calming, soothing presence wrapped around me. Better yet, I want the three of us back home where I’m cooking dinner, and Conner is helping Tobias with his homework. I miss those nights the most.
No one in Bailey Cove knows the concept of love or kindness. I thought Ryder knew kindness at one point, but it seems I was wrong. I was wrong about a lot of things.
With one nod from Huxley, Ryder and Dash leave the room. As wary as I am of them, it’s always better to have people around when Huxley is involved.
“Until we’re in agreement, you’ll stay here. I’ve had our old room set up for you, so you should be comfortable in there. You always did like the luxury, and I know that Conner, that piece of shit, couldn’t afford to give you nice things.”
Leaping out of my chair, I slam my hands on his desk and unleash my built-up anger.
“Don’t mention his name. Don’t ever speak of him again. You have no idea what he means to me, so do not push me when it comes to him.”
The bastard unashamedly laughs at me.
He pushes out of his chair and walks around the desk. I manage to turn around before he cages me in between his arms.
“Your favourite body wash is in your bathroom. Use it. I don’t like this smell on you.”
“Hux, we’re not kids anymore. You can’t keep me here with threats and old memories of how I used to smell.”
“You’re wrong. I can do what I want, and I’ve always wanted you. Go and find our son before I tell him a bedtime story about the princess who ran away from the prince and had their baby in secret. I’ll tell him how the prince has now become the king, how he found his baby boy, and how he’s now the prince. Prince Tobias Bailey-Vaughan.”
I dart around him and rush to the door. If I have to cling to my son’s side at all times to save him from hearing that story, I will.
“Welcome home, Bug. I can’t wait to play with you again.”
I slam the door on him and his filthy, smarmy voice.
I hear Tobias talking in the kitchen, and Dash falls in step with me as I make my way to my son.
“You shouldn’t have underestimated his patience when it came to looking for you. I’d advise you to run again, but I wouldn’t want to hide another mess for him.”
Before I can speak and ask questions, he falls away and turns the corner, leading to the back door.
Tobias walks out of the kitchen and toward me, with Rose tailing him.
“Bedtime, Master Tobias,” she calls over.
“Mom, she scares me,” he whispers up at me, causing my anger to spike again.
“I’ve got it from here. Tobias will be sleeping in my room tonight.”
There’s no way I’m letting him out of my sight. Not in this house, and not with Huxley around.
“Huxley said—”
“I don’t give a shit what he said. I’m his mother, and what I say is all that matters.”
She clasps her hands together and says, “There’s no need for colourful language, Allison. I’m just explaining to you that he won’t be happy.”
“I don’t care,” I tell her, then look at Tobias. “Mommy used to live here a long time ago. Do you want to see my old room?”
He nods and clings to me as we walk past Rose. I feel her scowl clinging to my back until we’re upstairs and heading for the west wing. The plush cream carpets are still as thick under my feet as they were back when I was here as a teenager. The pieces of art hanging on the walls are still as expensive, and the trinkets and ornaments on the side units are still polished to the highest shine.
“Who are you?”
Tobias and I spin around to find a young boy standing in one of the bedroom doorways. He can’t be any older than four or five years old, and he looks as cute as a button in his pyjamas covered in spaceships.
“We’re…friends of Huxley’s. Who are you?” I ask.
“Trenton.”
He hears something before we do, and quickly runs back into his room and closes the door. Rose arrives at the top of the stairs seconds later, coming to a stop when she sees us. She looks between us and the little boy’s room. Rolling my eyes, I guide Tobias to my old room and hate that it feels so natural to know my way around this old house. I’ve been away for so long, yet being here feels like no time at all has passed.
“Why did you live here, Mom?”
Because before I hated your real father, I was completely infatuated with him, almost obsessed with him. I keep that to myself and say, “I had nowhere else to go. The man who lived here back then was a very nice man who looked after me for a while.”
“What was his name?”
“His name was Thomas.”
Thomas Vaughan was a man who came from old money, who married Regina Bailey, whose family owned this town. Together they were the original power couple. I wonder if Regina has passed on too?
Opening the door to the room I stayed in more than I did at my parents’ home, I’m taken aback. Nothing has changed, not even the bed sheets. They’re the same cream and gold sheets I picked out when Regina was going through a phase of buying new bedding throughout the house.
Tobias runs across the room and jumps on the huge bed, until something catches his eye across the room. He leaps off the bed and bounces toward the mirror, picking out a photo tucked into the frame.
Looking back at me, he asks, “Why is the man from the car cuddling you, Mom?”
I can’t move.
I can’t explain to him how his real father is somewhere in this house, using threats to keep us here because a long time ago we were together.
I can’t.
“Put that back and go wash up in the bathroom. You’ll have to sleep in your boxers tonight.” It hits me that we have nothing here of ours.
A knock on the door has my heart racing. Walking across the room, I don’t expect Huxley when I open the door. I’d never known him to knock and respect anyone’s privacy, but Ryder and Dash could still be around. But it’s Rose, and she stands on the other side, holding two small bags.
“Since the boy is staying in your room tonight, here is his things.”
She hands them over and walks off. After shutting the door, I open the bag I know I bought him a few months ago and find his pyjamas and toiletries from home. What the hell?
Taking Tobias’s things to him, I ignore the fact that nothing in the bathroom has changed either. This is like a freaking time warp back to nine years ago.
“Here, baby. Make sure you brush your teeth.” I hand him his toothbrush. “I’ll be back in a minute. Don’t leave this room, okay?”
“Okay.”
Wandering through the house, I make my way back to the office and throw open the door to find it empty.
The kitchen is empty.
The outhouse is empty.
The library is empty.
The parlour is empty.
The old game room is empty.
I find him outside, lounging on a cushioned bench, hitting on a joint. The smell assaults me and I step back. Shaking my head, I can’t find the energy to judge him. Weed is probably the next best thing besides medication for him. He definitely needs something to calm him down. Then again, it didn’t help when we were younger.
He’s lost his suit jacket and shoes; his shirt sleeves are rolled up to his elbows, and new tattoos peek out at me.
He knows I’m out here, but he doesn’t look my way. He carries on looking up at the stars, and I join him from where I stand by the table.
“No matter where you were, I was always under the same stars as you,” he murmurs. Ignoring him, I look around and sigh. I used to love it o
ut here at night. It should be one of the few nice reminders of this place. I have a feeling by the time I leave here, though, I’ll have none left.
“If you’ve come out here to chew my ass off, I’m not in the mood to take you seriously.” How charming of him.
“How did Tobias’s things end up here? Did you go to my house?” To hell with his mood.
He leans over and stretches his leg out, then kicks the chair out beside him, causing it to topple my way. Taking a slow pull from the joint, his head rolls in my direction, his bloodshot eyes laughing at me.
“Your house, although clean, wasn’t very nice. It’s not you at all. I don’t know how you thought you were happy there. No matter how many posters you put up in my son’s room, it would never conceal the shithole you were raising him in.”
Shithole? Says the guys who lives in a mansion. Everywhere that isn’t home to him is a shithole.
“So you broke in?”
“I did no such thing. The back door was unlocked, so I walked straight in. It was like you were waiting for me.”
Only he would believe that was true. Knowing he’s been in my home, a place I made for myself that had nothing to do with him, makes me feel violated.
Crossing my arms over my chest, I rub my arm to hold off the chill.
“Stay away from my home.”
It comes out as a weak plea, and I hate myself for it. It’s mine, Conner’s, and Tobias’s home.
I turn for the door and he speaks again, bringing me to a stop.
“I’ve had all your shit boxed and shipped here. It arrives in the morning.”
“What?”
“When I said you were coming home, I wasn’t wasting my breath. You should be grateful that I’m letting you have your knickknacks in my house and wear the clothes he bought you.”
This is taking things too far. Stepping closer to the bench, I look down at him with such pity, it leaves a rancid taste in my mouth.
“Do you know why I left all those years ago?”
“Because you’re a cunt?”
I gasp, and quickly get over it.
“Because my love was good for you. It wrapped around you like a safety net. Your love wrapped around me like vines from a horror movie, squeezing until there wasn’t any love left. We can come to some sort of arrangement regarding Tobias, but we won’t be living in this house, and it won’t be on your terms. I’m not a silly teenage girl vying for your attention anymore.”
Bug Page 2