“It’s not like you need to worry about money anymore, honey, you could easily go and buy something instead of spending the time making it.”
“Like I said, I enjoy it,” she returned sternly. “And besides, something handmade is more personal than just going to the store and buying something premade. It shows thought, it shows that you care enough to put in the effort and energy, it shows how much they mean to you,” she said stiffly. “Some people value that more than a designer label.”
“Like you?” he scoffed, and she tensed at that.
“Yes. Like me,” she said back at him and watched as he looked at her doubtfully. “Not everything is about money, Mr McCormack. Not every person in the world thinks that possessions are the most important thing that there is. Some people have better priorities than that.”
“Yeah? Like you?” he said sternly with narrowed eyes, and she tensed at his tone. “If that’s the case, honey, why’d you marry me, huh?” he said, and she pinched her lips tightly together again.
“You know full well why I married you. I didn’t exactly have a choice, now did I?” she gritted out at him and watched as his icy gray eyes bored into hers.
“Didn’t you?” he asked, and she found her temper spiking again. Leaping up off the bed, she made to march towards her bedroom doors but found that he’d beaten her to them and was blocking the way.
“What do you want from me?” she challenged angrily. “Huh?! What the heck else do you need?! I’ve done everything asked of me. Everything! Now you want to rehash our farce of a marriage? Why?!”
“Why’d you marry me, Ellie?” he asked, and she gritted her teeth at him. “You say you’re not interested in material goods, but we both know what a lie that is.”
“What? You think that because you believe you can buy anything that everyone else wants that same power? Is that what you’ve told yourself? You think that because you value money and position so highly that everyone else must be the same?”
“You’re claiming you’re not?”
“No! I’m not! I couldn’t care less about how much money you’ve got, or how big your house is, or how much power you wield! In fact, if anything, I hate it. I hate it all!”
“So why did you marry me?” he asked again, and she glared at him.
“Why do we need to go over this again? Why are you doing this to me? You want to lord it over me? You want to make me feel pitiful and useless again? You want to remind me of how manipulated I was in all of this?! Fine. Fine! Belittle me! Insult me! Degrade me if you must!
“Why’d I marry you, Mr McCormack?! Because you demanded it of me! Because my dad made one stupid mistake, one pitifully ridiculous idiotic decision that he’ll never be able to undo! Because a man who had spent over thirty years of his life working harder than you could ever possibly imagine felt desperate enough to try something as colossally stupid as trying to blackmail one of the most powerful men in the business world!” she yelled.
“And when he failed I was the price, wasn’t I?” she gritted out with fierce eyes boring into his. “I was your vengeance against him. Instead of just letting him go, knowing what a fool he’d been, you took what little was left from him. You took the only thing he had left. You took me! Because all of a sudden I fit that little hole left in your complete world! Because I fit into that space marked ‘wife’! All because the great Zachary McCormack decided that he needed a new possession, a new plaything!
“You didn’t just let him leave with his head hung low. You blackmailed him into agreeing to your terms and conditions, you forced him to trade his freedom for his daughter. I didn’t get a say in the matter, did I? It’s not like I’m a person, after all. It’s not like it would matter to me what happened in my life! No! I didn’t bear consideration at all! I was just a way to complete your picture perfect world and also destroy a man who’d tried to hurt you!
“Yes, my dad did something monumentally stupid. Yes, he did something illegal. And yes, I was furious at him, but he didn’t deserve for you to utterly ruin him. He didn’t deserve for you to take the only thing that he cared about away from him! He didn’t deserve such a harsh punishment for a stupid attempt at providing for his family!” she railed at him, finally letting her opinion on the matter out for the first time.
“You know full well why I married you,” she gritted out at his stony face, “because I loved my father enough to trade my freedom for his.”
Standing there locked together in a staring match, Ellie felt herself on the verge of tears and abruptly looked away before reaching for the door handle again. When the man didn’t move out of the way she found herself struggling to keep her tears in check and instead transferred the pain into anger directed at him.
“Get out of my way. I’m not staying in here with you anymore,” she declared firmly as she tried to swallow her tears.
“You’re not leaving this room in this state, honey,” he said sternly at her.
“I don’t care about your reputation!” she yelled out fiercely.
“Yeah, well I do.”
“MOVE!”
“That was my plan,” he added angrily. “Just not so that you can go running through the house like the wronged woman.” As Ellie looked up at him in confusion he said, “I’ll leave.”
With that he turned and pulled open the door before storming through, and Ellie couldn’t help but slam it with as much force as she could. He wanted to keep the farce up, well good luck with that. She was tired of playing his games and doing everything he said. From now on she had just as much say in this whole thing as him.
Now that her father was dead the worst that he could do was take it out on her, and she had nothing left to lose anymore. He had nothing left to threaten her with.
Zach flinched at the loud slam behind him but couldn’t deny her the childish show of anger and frustration. Not if he believed her. Which he did. He’d thought throughout this whole thing that something wasn’t adding up, and suddenly that started to make sense.
He hadn’t believed Ellie when she’d declared that she didn’t care about money. When he’d asked her why she’d married him it was meant as a taunt, to prove a point that clearly she did. Except she’d been so incensed by the question that he’d started to wonder if there was more behind it all.
So the question had instead taken on a serious tone, had made him truly wonder why. If she was as impervious to fortune why would she marry him? And if she hadn’t done it for the money then none of his suppositions about her actions had been correct.
He’d been left coming up short with a plausible explanation, until she’d finally let it all pour forth. Let all the accusations fly. When she had he’d suddenly had the sinking realization that he wasn’t the only victim in all of this; Ellie was as well.
She was under the impression that he’d forced the union, that it had all been his idea. Payment, retribution for her father’s actions. The only reason why she’d believe that would be if her father had lied to her, lied to and deceived her about it all.
Zach had always wondered why Ellie seemed so naïve and untainted while at the same time being able to pull off such a devious plan with her father, and now he knew why. She hadn’t. She hadn’t pulled anything off. She’d been blackmailed into it all just as much as he had. Blackmailed emotionally by her father. The man who claimed to love her.
Malcolm Kincaid had a lot to answer for. He’d thrust the pair of them into this marriage with pre-conceived ideas about each other, both resenting and both hating each other from the start. The man had thrown them together under the worst possible circumstances, and without any care for their feelings and lives in it all.
Ellie thought that Zach was angry, he knew that his wife thought him mad, and he was. He was furious. Furious with the man who’d played them both, who’d forced them both into this situation with faulty information, faulty viewpoints of each other. How the man could do such a thing to his own daughter Zach didn’t know. Hadn’t Malcolm even though
t of her in it all?
Why had he done it as well? Why had he subjected Ellie to a life that made her so miserable, and had her so isolated? She was right, she had given up her freedom. Zach had always felt chained by the conditions of the contract, but Ellie was even more so. And she’d done it because she’d loved her father so much that she would do whatever it took to prevent harm from coming to him.
Malcolm had played on Ellie’s sweet, caring, and loving nature to get her to agree to whatever lies he’d told her. And she’d fallen for it, trusting her father implicitly. And why not? What reason would she have for doubting the man who’d always looked after and protected her?
Until tonight Zach would have sworn that Malcolm Kincaid had loved his daughter above anything in this world, but now that seemed unlikely. Why would a man who loved his daughter so much treat her so appallingly? Force her to marry a man who she didn’t know and who would never treat her well?
At that thought Zach had another. It had been Malcolm’s idea for the majority of the clauses in the pre-nup. He’d stipulated most of the behavior, and certainly all of the behavior that Zach was bound to display. Why? There was something more in that document. Some clue as to what the meaning behind this whole thing was.
The man had said something at their initial meeting. Something that Zach couldn’t quite remember. When Zach had threatened to mistreat the man’s daughter he’d said it would never happen, or something like that. What was it? What had the man said? It was frustrating that he couldn’t remember, but perhaps looking over the paperwork would help clarify the matter to him, or at least jog his memory on it all.
Too impatient to wait to uncover the mystery that surrounded this whole debacle, Zach marched down to his study to search out the copy of his prenuptial agreement there. Then he’d contact the man himself, either on the phone or better yet in person, and demand some answers from him. Demand an explanation as to why he’d done what he’d done, and what the real reason behind it all was.
First he’d find his marriage contract though and see what information he could glean from it, see it all from Ellie’s perspective, or at least with eyes that understood that Ellie was blameless in it all.
“Thought I’d find you here,” a voice said from his doorway just as Zach placed his hand on the file that he’d been searching for. Looking up, he glanced briefly at Josh before getting back to his mission at hand.
Without saying anything, Zach just sat himself down at his desk and spread the pieces of paper out in front of him, searching through all of the legalese there.
“It’s nearly ten, Zach, don’t you ever quit?” Josh asked in slight amusement before settling himself into a chair opposite Zach’s desk, but Zach just continued to scan through the document in front of him. “What are you doing?” his friend asked, and Zach glanced up briefly to glare at the man’s repeated interruptions.
“Trying to figure out a problem,” he mumbled before focusing on the words in front of him again.
“About what?” his friend asked, and Zach inhaled deeply in irritation. “Can’t it wait until tomorrow?”
“No,” he snapped. “It can’t.”
“What’s so important?” Josh asked and leaned forward in an attempt to see what Zach was reading. Snapping the folder closed so that his friend couldn’t see the document, Zach cast him another withering glare.
“Why are you here so late?” he asked bluntly, and Josh shrugged.
“Pauline said that she’d put some food aside for me. And I kind of thought that maybe you and I had left things unsettled earlier. I take it that you’re still mad at me,” he hazarded, and Zach sighed before shaking his head.
“I’m not mad at you, Josh.”
“You are mad though. Is it Ellie?”
“No. I’m not mad at Ellie.”
“It’s someone though.”
“Her dad. I’m really mad at her dad,” he confessed and watched as the man looked at him in wide-eyed surprise. With Josh falling back in his seat to study Zach, Zach took the opportunity to resume his perusal of the papers in front of him.
There was a clue in it all, some sort of explanation that was tickling the corners of his brain. There was something that he seemed to be missing, a piece to make it all fit. With a heavy sigh, he closed the folder again and rubbed his eyes.
“I need to talk to him,” he mumbled to himself.
“Who?” Josh asked in confusion.
“Ellie’s dad. I need to speak to him. Nothing’s making sense, and I think if I speak to him I’ll have the answer to it all,” he explained and looked up to see Josh staring at him with a puzzled look on his face. “What?”
“Good luck with that, buddy,” his friend just said.
“What do you mean?” he asked with a furrowed brow.
“Zach, there isn’t any chance of you talking to Ellie’s dad.”
“Why not?”
“Because he’s gone,” Josh said slowly with that same bemused look on his face.
“Gone where? The man’s on vacation?” Zach asked in confusion. “How’d he afford that?”
“No, Zach, he’s not on vacation. Buddy, he’s gone.”
“Moved?”
“Geez. Zach, he’s dead,” Josh finally said, and Zach’s eyes widened as he sat bolt upright.
“What?! When?”
“When I asked you earlier if you ever spoke to your wife I didn’t for one minute believe that you really didn’t. But heck, clearly I wasn’t too far off the mark,” Josh said with bewildered disappointment. “How the heck did you not know that your father-in-law had died?” Josh asked, and Zach shook his head.
“Ellie never told me,” he said quietly as he tried to absorb the implications of this new development and what it meant for them as a married couple.
“Why the heck not?” Josh said with an almost accusatory note in his voice. “I know I’ve never been married, buddy, but that seems like one of those things that a wife should, and would, share with her husband.”
“I … I don’t know,” he just said again.
“I know she said you and he didn’t get on, but geez,” Josh said with a heavy exhale.
“What happened?” Zach asked the man, and his friend just shrugged.
“I don’t really know. All she said was that her dad had died. On Thanksgiving.”
“Thanksgiving? That was almost a week ago. How? Why? When did she find out?”
“I don’t know, Zach. All she said was that her dad had died, she felt alone, and she felt guilty that he didn’t have anyone around him when it happened. She said she’d wanted him to come over for the day but that he didn’t want to intrude on your day together. Told her that he was spending it with friends, told them he was spending it with her or something. Then the cops got called out when his TV was still on late that night and they found him dead.”
“That’s all you know?” Zach asked with a puckered brow, and Josh shrugged.
“I think I was lucky to get that much. She wasn’t really telling me as opposed to voicing it all out loud I think. Then she kind of burst into tears and fell asleep on me,” he concluded, and Zach just nodded at the man’s words.
“Which is when I found you,” he surmised, and Josh nodded in agreement.
“Oh, though she did say something kinda strange. Something about how the cops hadn’t told her any more yet. And … well, and she did say something along the lines of how if she’d been there he would have been stronger, wouldn’t have, then she drifted off without completing the thought.”
“You think he killed himself?” Zach asked in surprise. He might have only met his father-in-law four times in total but the man didn’t seem the type.
“I honestly don’t know, Zach, but it seems to me that they wouldn’t still be investigating if it was a simple matter, now would they?”
“It has been the holidays,” he said warily.
“Still …,” Josh said, and Zach sighed.
“Hell,” he groaned. �
�Ellie loved her dad. So much. She’d have done anything for him. This has gotta be killing her. He’s all that she had left as well.”
“Well, she has got you, you know,” Josh pointed out, and Zach looked up at his friend as the meaning of his words suddenly hit home. It was the missing piece. Throwing open the folder again, he scanned through the contents with a new perspective in place. What would a father do for the most important person in his life if he knew that he wouldn’t be around for much longer?
Zach didn’t know if Malcolm had planned to kill himself, if he was depressed and suicidal and couldn’t cope anymore, or if he was sick, but the man clearly knew that he wasn’t going to be around for much longer, Zach would bet everything he had on that fact.
So if a man knew that he wasn’t long for this world he’d want to make sure that his family was provided for, especially the daughter who was everything to him. What would he do? He’d make sure that there was somebody to care for her, to give her everything he’d think that she’d need. The clauses, all the conditions, everything that the man had demanded of Zach, they were all in there to ensure that Ellie was taken care of and cared for. Malcolm had been trying to make sure that she wouldn’t be neglected.
He’d settled the issue of her financial security but all of the extra conditions were to ensure that she was taken care of emotionally as well. He was forcing Zach to spend time with her, to get to know her. He was making sure that there was enough time for the two of them together for Zach to see how wonderful his wife was. The man was giving her a secure future, and he was making sure that Zach came to the realization that his wife was innocent.
He’d done it all for her. Everything that Malcolm had done was to give Ellie the life that she deserved. He wasn’t manipulating and hurting her, he was just trying to give her the fairy-tale life. He’d misled her and Zach, yes, but he’d done it because he loved his daughter, because he wanted the best for her.
Bonds of Matrimony Page 19