WORTHY, Part 3 (The Worthy Series)

by Lexie Ray

  “Jane?” I asked, just to be sure.

  “We haven’t made out before, have we?” she asked, peering at me so closely that we nearly bumped noses. “Don’t take this personally, but you’re not the only one. I’m sometimes a make-out whore when I get drunk enough. You’re cute, though. Want to kiss?”

  “No,” I said, putting my hand on her bare shoulder and pushing her away a little bit. “It’s me, Michelle. Your sister-in-law?”

  “You’re not my sister-in-law,” she scoffed. “Michelle had the best hair ever. I mean, kind of goldilocks, but curly and long and blond. Nothing like yours.”

  “Jane, look at me,” I said. “I’m Michelle.”

  “And another thing,” she slurred. “I wasn’t going to say it because it’s impolite, maybe, but I think I will. She had the ugliest fucking scar on her face, too.”

  “It’s me, Jane,” I sighed. “I lived at the compound with you. You took me out drinking. You showed me pictures of Violet cheating on me with Jonathan.”

  “Holy shit, it really is you,” she said, spilling her drink in her haste to get her arms around me. “Michelle! Where have you been? Everyone’s been wondering.”

  “I’ve been busy,” I said. “How are you doing? How’s everything?”

  “I went to Europe,” she said, nodding to herself. “Pretty sure, anyways. It was amazing. Went with a bunch of girlfriends. Do you have any idea how many guys I fucked? I tried to make it at least one for each country. It was strenuous.”

  “Good for you,” I said, uncomfortable. Jane was incredibly drunk, and her over-sharing had always made me cringe. It was like no time had passed at all.

  “It was seven,” she said. “Seven guys. Five countries. Italy was the best.”

  “All right,” I said, throwing back my drink.

  “Shots,” Jane said, grabbing at me. “Shots. Let’s go.”

  “One shot,” I said. “That’s all.”

  I couldn’t forget that horrible night of tequila shots at the club with her and Brock even if I tried — well, the parts that I could remember, at least. I might’ve been pretty close to becoming an expert at drinking now, but shots were something I still couldn’t completely stomach.

  I endured a tequila shot, sucking on the lime just like Jane herself had taught me, then turned back to her.

  “Are you working yet?” I asked. “If you’re still thinking about being a lawyer, I can probably help.” The firm always needed new lawyers, and wouldn’t that chap the Whartons’ asses to have Jane come work for the very people who were going to end their company?

  “Ugh, working at getting drunk,” she said, taking a messy slug of her drink. “I’ve decided that I’m just going to be a philanthropist. What the hell, you know? I’ll just sling my parents’ money around for a living. It sounds pretty sweet.”

  “It does sound pretty sweet,” I agreed, just for the sake of friendliness. I wondered how that would stand with Collier and Amelia, then found that I didn’t really care. I turned to see what progress Ash and Hans had made with the stripper and whipped quickly back around to Jane. The stripper was totally nude except for the cuffs, and that was just something I didn’t need to see.

  “Total waste,” she repeated, staring at the stripper chasing Ash and Hans around.

  “Brock’s not around here, is he?” I asked, a sudden stab of hate working its way through my damaged heart. Half of me wished he had come as Jane’s date. I wanted to see just how hard I could slap him before anyone could pull us apart. He’d been such an asshole to take advantage of me blacked out that night, to take those horrible photos and send them to Jonathan. It had been so creepy. He had to have had a tripod or something in the room to be able to manage it.

  “Why, you have the hots for him?” Jane crooned. “I thought you were supposed to be married to my brother.”

  “Well, you know as well as I do how well that’s going,” I muttered. “I just wanted to tell Brock to go fuck himself. That’s all.”

  Jane whooped with laughter. “I wish I could witness that,” she said. “You’ve got an edge, now, Michelle. I don’t know what it is. Maybe the hair.”

  “Yeah, maybe the hair,” I said. “So, I heard Jonathan got his memories back.” It wasn’t really smooth, but I figured Jane was too drunk to pass judgment. Was I shamelessly plying her for information? Sure. I definitely wasn’t above that.

  “You heard correctly,” Jane said, nodding exaggeratedly. “Doctor said it was some kind of shock response to losing you, or something. I don’t know. It sounded like mumbo jumbo to me.”

  “What do you mean, losing me?” I asked.

  “He tried to find you one day and he couldn’t,” Jane said. “I don’t know. I didn’t know you could just lose a person. He kind of got all crazy, talked about hiring detectives or something, but Dad wouldn’t let him. Said you’d be found when you were ready.”

  Collier. The man was just full of wisdom, wasn’t he? Would things be different if Jonathan had found me in the hospital? I doubted it. At that point, I hadn’t wanted to be near anyone with the last name of Wharton.

  “And how is he?” I asked. “You know, generally speaking.”

  “Kind of an asshole,” Jane said, wrinkling her nose. “Drinks a lot, but not the fun kind. Likes to be by himself.”

  “By himself?” I asked, struggling to keep my voice and mannerisms casual. “You mean he’s not seeing anyone? I thought he’d be with Violet, you know?”

  Jane burst into something between a laugh and a snort. “Violet? Why?”

  “Well, because of the time they spent together traveling the world,” I said. “You know. After he and I got married.” Was she really too drunk to remember all that drama? She’d been the one to break that news to me.

  “You’re crazy,” Jane giggled. “My brother hates Violet’s guts.”

  “What?” That was news to me. From the way they’d looked in those photos Jane had shown me, they seemed to be really cozy with each other. In love, even. They had been engaged to be married prior to Jonathan losing all his memories — and meeting me. And I’d never seen him be anything but polite to Violet, even when she was acting like an idiot.

  “Can’t stand her,” Jane said, shrugging. “She is pretty dumb.”

  I shook my head. “But I don’t understand,” I said. “I thought that with me out of the picture, they’d be together. What was with that whole world traveling thing? Didn’t that rekindle their romance or whatever?”

  I didn’t know why I was trying so hard to put Violet and Jonathan together in my mind. Maybe it was out of guilt for how I’d been with Milo. Maybe I wanted him to be happy, to find satisfaction in someone. Maybe I just wanted to be punished even further for everything that had happened.

  “Oh my God, that,” Jane said, slapping her knee. “Wait until you hear the whole story!”

  I was a glutton for pain. Everything fell away — the crush of people, the stripper pursuing Ash and Hans, even the drink I was holding in my own hand. I focused completely on Jane. I wanted to hear every last gory detail, was desperate to hear all about my husband’s torrid worldwide love affair with his former fiancée.

  “Well, Violet hated you,” Jane said. “You were rivals, even with that nasty scar on your face.”

  I blinked and tried not to be offended. It had been a nasty scar — though it was gone now — and Jane was ludicrously drunk. Plus, Violet had been a professional model. Back then, there hadn’t been any competition. She was definitely more attractive than I was. Now, though, I’d like to think I’d give her a run for her money.

  “So, when Jonathan had to leave during the reception, Violet hatched this plan,” Jane continued, pausing to slurp down some more of her cocktail. “She would do anything to marry my brother. So, she sent me some old photos from the vacations she and Jonathan used to go on. You know, back before Jonathan lost his memory.”

  No, I didn’t know. Of course, I’d seen photos of them together. Violet had giv
en Jonathan whole boxes of them, trying to jar his memory into remembering that he loved her and not me. I started feeling a little faint and was forced to grip the bar that extended out from the kitchen window. I was thankful that I was wearing semi-sensible sandals and nothing too high. If I passed out, the floor wasn’t that far away.

  “Violet got me to promise that I’d show the photos to you and get you to believe it was happening now,” Jane added almost cheerfully, seemingly not aware — or maybe not caring — that she was confessing to betraying me in the worst way possible. “And that worked pretty well, but it was all my idea to get you in compromising photos with Brock.”

  I actually had to put my drink down at that. Jane continued to grin at me like a lunatic, and I had to resist the urge to slap the shit out of her.

  “I need you to say all of that again,” I said. “Talk slowly. Don’t leave anything out.”

  “How drunk are you?” Jane laughed. “Never mind. No judgment here. All right.”

  I struggled to follow her, to keep up with the positively insane shit I was hearing right now. The photos I’d seen of Jonathan and Violet were all old photos from before — when they were still together, back before I had ever even entered the picture. I grappled with that. How could I not have realized that it could’ve been a possibility? Jonathan wouldn’t have known to defend himself, having no memory of the vacations he’d taken with Violet.

  What was even more disturbing was the fact that it was Jane who’d taken the photos of Brock and me, standing there in the room while I was blacked out drunk, helping him pose me in the most provocative ways. It was horrifying and invasive, and I couldn’t make it make sense in my mind. How could anyone think that was an acceptable course of action in any way, shape, or form?

  “Why would you do something like that?” I asked, utterly dumbfounded. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. If Jane was speaking the truth, that meant that all of the drama between Jonathan and me while he was gone had been completely orchestrated.

  He had never cheated on me.

  I had never cheated on him.

  The people who we’d been closest to had lied to us, had manipulated us, had ruined our lives, had caused me to lose my baby.

  “My dad always tells me that I need to channel my energy more positively,” Jane said. “I just get bored sometimes.”

  “You just get bored sometimes?” I repeated slowly.

  “Yep.” More exaggerated nodding — so exaggerated that it made Jane lose her balance, and she had to grab on to me to remain upright. “Thanks!”

  “Don’t mention it,” I muttered, moving her firmly away from me.

  My world was already in shambles. How could it be falling apart even more? Everything had been a lie. Everything. Jonathan and I had waged war on each other because of two psychotic bitches — one who wanted my husband for her own and the other just for shits and giggles.

  I had to remind myself to breathe. Everything was coming apart.

  This meant that Jonathan and I — if he knew the truth, if I could give him the truth — didn’t have to hold grudges. That we could start over again, if we wanted to. That nothing bad had happened, I mean, really happened.

  Except something bad had really happened.

  Jonathan and I had been so upset at each other at the cottage the last time we’d been together. We’d had that horrible, hateful sex, and I’d run off into the woods afterward. It had been after dark, I hadn’t been myself, and I’d fallen.

  If I hadn’t run off, if we hadn’t had hateful sex, if we hadn’t been upset at each other, if Jane and Violet had kept their meddling fingers out of our lives …

  The what ifs were killing me. They were so hard to think about. I shouldn’t think about them. They’d drive me insane.

  But if not for Violet, and Jane here, who was giggling like a lunatic, I might’ve had a baby.

  Jonathan and I might’ve been parents.

  It was all I could do not to wrap my fingers around Jane’s neck and never let go. She deserved it. She deserved every bad thing in the world. She deserved to feel what I felt, to be so desperate that she’d change her appearance and her name just to get away from herself.

  She had ruined everything. She and Violet had completely destroyed my life.

  I knew on some abstract level that what I did next would define me for the rest of my life, but I could barely remain upright, let alone gauge and analyze what I should do. After a few minutes of silence — Jane drinking and watching the highly sexual stripper display, oblivious to my crisis — I suddenly hatched a half-assed plan. If I would ever try to use this information in any way, or even if I just wanted to hear the words again tomorrow to make sure I didn’t dream up this entire encounter, I’d need some proof that this had actually happened.

  That Jane had confessed to fucking everything up.

  “You know, would you do me a favor?” I asked, fumbling with my clutch until I pulled out my cell phone.

  “Sure!” Jane the drunk was apparently Jane the magnanimous.

  I set my phone to the recorder and pressed play, hoping it would pick up her voice over the music.

  “Just tell me that story one more time,” I said, putting the phone practically in her face. “I want to make sure I remember every single word.”

  After Jane happily complied, I ended the recording, made sure it was saved, emailed it to myself just be sure that it wouldn’t get lost, and put the phone away. Then, I drained my drink and sat the empty glass carefully on the bar.

  “Hey, Jane?” I asked sweetly, smiling at her.

  “Uh-huh?” She smiled back, completely ignorant to the magnitude of what she’d just revealed to me and what it meant for my future. I doubted seriously that she would even remember having seen me when she woke up in the morning.

  “Fuck you,” I said, just as sweetly, before punching her as hard as I could right in the face.

  Jane crumpled immediately to the floor, but the music was so loud and there were so many people and distractions that no one noticed.

  “Oh my God!” I yelled, attracting the attention of several people around me. “This girl is so drunk that she just passed the fuck out! Does anybody know her?”

  I let the Good Samaritans have at Jane, whose nose was bleeding all over her dress. That was the second of her outfits I’d ruined — the first with my vomit on the night when Jane had made her move to ruin my life out of boredom, for fun.

  It was still hard to believe. It was even harder to stomach.

  Jonathan and I had been manipulated, and the cost had been way too high. Our love for each other had been tested to extremes it didn’t deserve because of some evil people.

  I made it to the toilet before I began vomiting. I hadn’t had that much to drink, so I knew it was the shock of the situation. The shock of knowing that my reality of the past year or so was a complete and utter lie. That I could’ve been living happily with Jonathan, immersed in our love, maybe even raising a daughter together.

  I knew that I couldn’t keep thinking like that. I knew better than most people the futility of that kind of train of thought. I’d wished my parents back so often and so hard that it had consumed me for the longest time.

  If I kept wishing that Violet and Jane had never been vicious human beings, that I’d been allowed to have my happiness and my baby, it would kill me.

  I saw that insanity for exactly what it was. It would kill me. There wouldn’t be any coming back from that.

  I flushed the toilet and rinsed my mouth out in the sink. My eye makeup had run a little bit, so I cleaned myself up. I didn’t recognize the woman in the mirror anymore. I didn’t know who she needed to be. Michelle Wharton wanted to curl up in a ball and weep, and April Smith wanted to march right back out to the party and make Jane pay even more for what had happened.

  But I knew I could do neither. Everything had changed.

  I was neither April Smith nor Michelle Wharton anymore, and I realized that I didn�
�t want to be either of them. I realized that I’d been April Smith for so long with the hope that someday I’d be plain old Michelle again, recovered from all of her tragedy.

  That was never the way any of this worked. Shitty things happened to people all the time, whether they deserved it or not. People wasted years of their lives mired in regret, swimming against the current, exhausting themselves with attempts to go back to the way things were, to try to get back to where they used to be before their great tragedies.

  Jonathan and I had been duped into believing we were cheating on each other. One way or another, through a horrible set of events, it had led to the death of my unborn child.

  There was nobody I could go back and be again. There was nowhere to go but forward, to give up on gathering up the pieces. I had to just leave them and march on.

  How I dealt with this was going to be what defined the rest of my life, whatever I chose to do with it, and the longer I stayed in that bathroom, the longer I was putting off what I was swiftly realizing what needed to be done.

  I needed to talk to Jonathan. I needed to tell him the truth of what happened. With Jane’s voice recording, I had all the resources I needed.

  I stared at the stranger in the mirror and willed her to have the courage to go figure out what could be done with the sad situation she and her husband found themselves in.

  I willed myself to have the courage to let go of my tragedy and forge my way forward, and I knew that Jonathan was the doorway to that future.

  Chapter Eight

  The last time I’d walked through this office in the Wharton Group building, I’d been a scared and insecure girl, not sure how to conduct herself or how to make everyone stop staring at her or talking to her. I’d also been going to bring a picnic lunch to the love of my life. I didn’t know if that person was still in me anymore. I didn’t know what I was doing here. But now people were staring at me for a different reason. I was smoking hot, and I knew it.

  I was smoking hot, and I was going to win my husband back.

  “Is he in there?” I asked the man at the desk nearest the frosted glass that separated Jonathan from the rest of his employees.