The Certainty of Deception

by Jeanne McDonald

  “No? Then why did you leave me again this morning? You promised you’d stay, yet the moment we were discovered you bolted. It wasn’t Jackie discovering us that I was afraid of this morning. It was her discovering us and you bolting again. Gah!” she exclaimed. “I knew it was a mistake to sleep with you last night, but I thought maybe, just maybe if we spent time together, we could figure this thing out. Stupid me.”

  She moved toward the car door, placing her hand on the handle. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe we’re just no good for one another. All we ever seem to do is hurt each other.”

  “It’s not what you think,” I repeated.

  There are a few things I learned to be certain in this life. One, the truth always hurts. Two, lies will always be revealed. And three, a person can run from their past, but no matter how hard or fast they run, the past will inevitably catch up with them. My past had finally caught up with me.

  “I’m going to go, Drew. Have a safe flight to Boston tomorrow.” McKenzie pulled the handle.

  My heart lodged in my throat. My grief was almost enough to choke me to death. “You don’t understand. I didn’t leave you. I didn’t run away from you. I ran away from her. I had to get away from her.” Hot tears spilled down my cheeks. This was the moment I’d been afraid of since McKenzie and I embarked on this whirlwind relationship. I knew the day would eventually come, but I never expected it to be like this.

  McKenzie tilted her head sideways. Resignation was written all over her face. “Away from who? Olivia?”

  I covered my face in my hands. Sobs broke free from my chest. I hated to cry, but I couldn’t control it any longer.

  McKenzie wrapped her fingers around my wrists, pulling my hands away from my face. “What aren’t you telling me, Andy?”

  The words were out before I had a chance to think about what I was saying. “I’m not the man you think I am. I’ve done something terrible and I’m afraid you’ll hate me for it.”

  McKenzie blinked repeatedly in confusion. “What do you mean?”

  A tremulous note hung in my voice as I whispered, “I killed my daughter.”

  Startled, McKenzie released my arms and backed away from me. “You did what?” she gasped. Fear released the anger in her eyes. For the first time she was seeing me for the real monster I was. “You better not have hurt Olivia. Oh, God. I knew you weren’t happy about the pregnancy, but I never thought-”

  I grabbed McKenzie by the arms. She tensed in my grasp, squirming in an attempt to get away from me. “No. Not Olivia’s baby. I’ve done nothing to harm Olivia or the baby.”

  McKenzie relaxed slightly, and quit fighting against me. “This makes no sense then. What are you talking about?” Her confusion was evident through both her tone and expression.

  I sighed, freeing her from my grasp. “Can we go inside? This is a long story. One I’d like to tell you in private.”

  She looked around us, seeing a crowd of kids coming out of the TGI Friday’s that was connected to the hotel. My pained eyes were met with her analyzing gaze. A million things probably passed through her mind all at once. I figured she even considered if she wanted to hear what I had to say. I had confessed to murdering my child after all.

  Sometime during our fight, the rain had finally stopped. Now, only cool drops trickled from the trees and bushes. We stood silent in the cool of the night, waiting for her to decide if she wanted to give me a chance. It didn’t take long. She gently pressed her thumbs to the corners of my eyes, looking deep into them. What she wanted to find, I was unsure, but she must have found it. She released my face and said, “Okay. Let’s go inside.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Inside my hotel room, I pulled my sunglasses off the collar of my shirt, tossing them onto the dresser. I rushed to the bathroom, grabbing us both towels. When I returned, she still stood in front of the closed door, dripping wet and shivering. She leaned forward, glancing around the room, holding her arms tight to her chest as she bounced in place.

  “You can come in,” I invited, holding the towel out to her.

  “Oh, thanks.” She took the towel from my hand and started patting it over her face, down her neck and along her wet chest. Even from where I stood, I could see the goose bumps formed over her flesh. My eyes followed the towel as she rubbed it over her pebbled breasts. Realizing I was staring, I quickly diverted my gaze and began drying off. “We need to get you out of those clothes,” I observed.

  Her steady, blue eyes weighed me carefully. “I beg your pardon?”

  Rubbing the towel over my head, I stopped, rolling my eyes as my head flopped forward. “Not like that, Mickie. I meant you’re soaked and you should change before you catch pneumonia. Geez. What do you take me for? A Neanderthal?”

  Her mouth twitched in a snarky, little grin. “Yes.”

  “Oh, hush,” I groaned, motioning her to the bathroom. “On the counter, you’ll find a t-shirt and those flannel night pants you used to love. Put them on and hang your wet things on the curtain rod.”

  “No peeking,” she teased, as she walked passed me.

  My body straightened, and I threw three fingers in the air. “Scout’s Honor.”

  “I never took you for a Scout,” she humphed with a shrug. “I’ll be right back.”

  The bathroom door closed, leaving me alone in my room. “Take your time,” I muttered to the empty room.

  While McKenzie changed, I stripped out of my wet clothes. Before I tossed them in the corner, I emptied the pockets. Thankfully my new cell phone wasn’t ruined. Gavin would’ve killed me if I had to replace another company phone in less than forty-eight hours. However, the Tiffany’s & Co. box was soaked. With a deep sigh, I deposited it on top of the dresser and threw my clothes aside. I quickly toweled off and pulled on a t-shirt and night pants.

  In the quiet of my hotel room, I could hear McKenzie washing up in the bathroom. I sat down on the bed, crossing my legs at my ankles and leaned back against the headboard, closing my eyes. What I was about to do was not only the hardest thing I could imagine doing, but it would infuriate my father when he discovered I had exposed many guarded family secrets.

  Lost in my thoughts, I hadn’t noticed when the water stopped and the bathroom door opened.

  “Andy?”

  I opened my eyes and swung my legs over the side of the bed. Mickie stood at the foot, wearing the clothes I’d left on the counter from the night before. They hung loose over her slender figure, but to see her in my clothes again caused the memories of us to rise to the surface. We’d been so happy. I was still baffled by how we’d gone so wrong so fast. We were a dream, and then we were a nightmare. A nightmare that I couldn’t seem to wake from. One that built on top of other nightmares from my past, growing and growing until I was drowning in a sea of tragedy and horror.

  “How long have you been standing there?” I asked, patting the empty space beside me on the bed.

  McKenzie hesitated. She appeared uneasy, keeping her arms wrapped over her chest. Her eyes darted to the door, then back to me, as if struggling with her decision to stay. I half expected her to run. “Not long at all,” she answered. She dropped down on the bed, keeping a considerable amount of distance between the two of us. I didn’t blame her for being apprehensive. I’d probably be ready to bolt out the door at any moment if I was in her position.

  “Good, good,” I muttered.

  She placed her hand in the gap between us, inching it closer to me. I reached across the divide and took her hand in mine. It was so warm and inviting. I entwined our fingers, holding tight to her. A piece of me hoped that this would keep her from running, because it was likely that in a few moments I would lose her forever. I’d hidden the truth from her. A truth that I’d fought to keep hidden even from myself. That’s what the bottle was for. It kept me from remembering the monster I was.

  I turned my head, catching her expression. She showed no malice. Only confusion, concern, and a little fear.

  “It’s time, I guess,�
� I ventured to end the silence.

  She gave my hand a gentle squeeze, then released it. “Talk to me, Andy. Tell me what you meant out there.”

  I sucked down air, forcing back the tears brimming at the corners of my eyes. McKenzie leaned forward and moved one hand to cradle the side of my face. I rested my cheek against her palm, closing my eyes; letting the memories wash over me. My chest heaved with the ache of my past. All of the emotions I’d pushed away over the past seven years resurfaced the moment I let my guard down. “I don’t even know where to start.”

  McKenzie dropped her hand and scooted in a little closer to me. “The best place to start is usually at the beginning,” she instructed with a chuckle.

  “Yeah, you’re probably right.” I inhaled, searching for the courage to tell McKenzie everything. “Well, it started about ten years ago. I was in my final year at Harvard Law. My roommate and best friend, Aiden Wright and I were doing everything possible to avoid all of the stuffy Christmas parties that our parents inundated us with every year. They hoped that by subjecting us to their crowd, they’d find us what they deemed as suitable girlfriends.”

  “Anyway,” I chuckled and continued, “Aiden and I were hanging out at our apartment with his current flavor of the month. All was great until those two decided to make like rabbits. I needed to get away. Since I had season tickets, I went to see a Patriots game.”

  “Football,” McKenzie snarled.

  “How is it that you’re a Texan and don’t like football?”

  “Because football is boring with all the stopping they do before a play is even complete. I want a real sport like hockey, where you see blood splatter on a wall or a guy beaten up with a hockey stick.”

  “Football isn’t boring, sweetheart.”

  She patted my cheek and scooted up to the middle of the bed, pulling her knees to her chest. I leaned back against the headboard. One leg dangled over the side of the bed, while the other rested comfortably outstretched on the mattress.

  “Yeah, yeah. As you were saying?” She rested her chin on top of her knees.

  I tapped my lips, pretending to think. “Oh, yeah,” I said with a snap of my fingers. “Patriots game. So, anyway, I’ll never forget the stadium that day. It was alive with Christmas spirit. There was fresh powder on the ground and Christmas trees located at every entrance. It was so cold and by halftime I was nearly freezing. I went to the concession stand to get some coffee, and was just about to place my order, when I heard a woman crying and calling out someone’s name. She was beautiful and distraught. It broke my heart to see her so upset.”

  “Always the hero,” McKenzie murmured.

  “Not always,” I confessed, then added before she could dispute, “I asked her if there was something wrong. She told me that she lost her little nephew, Jack. He was four years old and had wandered off when she stopped to get them some cocoa. I reassured her that we’d find him and quickly alerted a security officer to the situation. She showed us a picture of the little boy, then we went into a mad search to find him. After about ten minutes of looking, I found him standing in front a vendor’s booth staring at a jersey.”

  “Aw, that’s so sweet,” McKenzie cooed.

  “I’ll never forget the relief in her eyes when I brought him back to her. She thanked me for my help and introduced herself. Rebecca Sloan was her name. I was smitten.”

  The thought of Rebecca and that day sickened me. Such a sweet memory would soon be tainted by other more painful ones. Just thinking about it made me want to drink, but McKenzie’s bright smile encouraged me on. “The crowd started to disperse. Halftime was over. I don’t know what possessed me, but I asked if I could call her sometime. You’d have thought I’d won the lottery when she said yes and asked for a pen. I searched my coat like a mad man to find one. I was a law student; it was imperative that I had something to write with on me at all times. When I finally located a pen, she pulled my glove off, turned it over in her palm, and wrote her number down.”

  I touched my left hand where Rebecca had scribbled her name and number all those years ago. “After she and Jack returned to their seat, I went back to the stand where I found him and bought the jersey he’d been admiring. I couldn’t resist. He was a cute kid and a Pats fan. Win-win for the kid. Plus he had a hot aunt. Brownie points for me.”

  McKenzie leaned back, her feet dangling in the air, and laughed. “Smooth move, Wise.”

  I grabbed her foot, preventing her from toppling backward. She stretched out her legs over mine and smiled. “What can I say? I enjoy spoiling pretty ladies.” My eyes cut to the dresser where the jewelry box sat. In the mirror I caught McKenzie looking in the same direction.

  A sad smile appeared on her face, as she nudged me with her fingertips. “So, I take it that you called her?”

  “Better,” I chuckled. “I found where she was sitting.”

  McKenzie covered her mouth and gasped in a girlish giggle. “No way.”

  I raised my brows up and down, giving her a mischievous grin. “Yes way. That wasn’t easy either, but I was a man on a mission. I figured she had to be close to where I was sitting. So, I walked up and down the aisles of the stadium looking for her, and eventually found her and Jack huddled under a blanket about three sections away from where I sat. When I called him by name, he looked up with the biggest brown eyes and the goofiest grin. He threw off the blanket, sprang from Rebecca’s lap and latched on to me. I managed to wiggle free from his grasp and slipped the jersey over his little head. It was far too big for him, but he loved it all the same.” I paused, hating how retelling this story made me feel. No matter how much I wanted to, I couldn’t erase my past. Rebecca and I started out so innocent, only to fall apart in complete devastation.

  “Then what happened?” McKenzie probed. She leaned back, supporting her weight with her hands.

  I picked at the threads from the comforter, pulling the strings until the material buckled. “Rebecca approached me and thanked me again for helping her. She told me how she and Jack were hiding from their family for a little while, which struck up a conversation seeing I was doing something similar. It wasn’t until much later that I discovered Jack’s parents were going through a divorce and it was practically a war zone in the Sloan house at that time.”

  McKenzie’s brow furrowed and her lips flattened. She crossed her ankles over my thighs. “That’s terrible.”

  “Yeah it was. But that night, I took her and Jack to dinner. We didn’t even finish the game. It was too cold and I found something far more interesting to hold my attention.”

  The bile in my stomach started to rise. I swallowed down the metallic tasting liquid in my mouth. What was coming next scared me. We were so relaxed together. McKenzie wasn’t trying to run away from me. I didn’t want to lose her again. But the certainty of deception is that the truth will always reveal itself.

  I willed myself to continue. “I fell for her pretty hard. Never in my life had I felt that way about a person. Before long we were living together, which infuriated my father, but not as much as when we announced we were engaged.”

  “Whoa! Wait!” McKenzie flailed her hands. “You were married?”

  I linked my fingers together, looking down at my hands. “We married right after I graduated from HLS. Father was furious. He even threatened to deny my employment at Wise and Associates for defying him. Of course, we both knew that wouldn’t happen. That firm and our legacy is his life. He’d never do anything to tarnish it.”

  McKenzie shook her head in consternation. “I can’t believe you were married and never told me.” She sat back up, pulling her legs back to her chest. Her brow furrowed as she mulled over what I told her. “So,” she started with a hint of vacillation. “I’m confused.” She scratched her head. “It’s a sweet story, but how does all of this have anything to do with why you left me, or what you said outside?”

  I sat up, and turned my body to face hers, crossing my legs Indian-style. “I’m getting there. You did t
ell me to start at the beginning.”

  The corner of her mouth twitched into a tilted grin. “True. I’m sorry for interrupting.”

  “It’s okay,” I whispered, leaning back and resting my hands on the edge of the bed as I continued, “At first we were really happy, but all of that changed after we discovered she was pregnant.” I choked back the sob that threatened to overtake me. I couldn’t escape the things I had done, no matter how hard my father tried to cover them up for me.

  I wiped away the tears that trickled down my cheek. Ashamed, I covered my face. It’s not easy facing the demons of one’s past, and mine were ever present in that hotel room. McKenzie leaned forward and pulled my hands away from my face. “What happened, Andy?” she encouraged.

  I hunched my shoulders and looked away. The tears flowed more freely. I didn’t even try to wipe them away. The dam of my soul was broken wide open and there was no stopping it. Words tumbled forth from my mouth in a flood of confession. “It was late February. Rebecca was two days overdue and completely miserable. I’d been putting a lot of hours in at the office, preparing to take some vacation time after the baby was born. My father gave me a case meant for a senior associate, and rather than tell anyone I wasn’t prepared to take on such a workload, I struggled through it. My pride got the better of me. I put far too many hours in on the case, and the strain was too much for my marriage. My father should’ve known better than to assign that case to me. Thinking back on it now, I’m sure he did know better, but he wanted to make me struggle. Giving me that case was his way of punishing me for disobeying him. What he didn’t anticipate was my desire to prove him everyone else who doubted me wrong. I had to show that I was every bit as good as the name I held.

  “I’ll never forget that night for as long as I live. I was days away from trying the case, and running on maybe three hours of sleep. Things between Rebecca and me were more strained than ever. I assumed it was because of her being overdue and my long hours. We attended Gavin’s birthday party that was held at my parent’s house. Between my dad being in rare form, unsatisfied with my quality of work, and the weird vibe I was getting between Aiden and Rebecca all night, I had a drink. Maybe two.” A cold laugh broke through my torrent of tears. “Back then I could handle my liquor. At least that’s what I thought.”