Second Chance at Forever

by Mary Wasowski

  “What does that mean, Reese? You don’t even know Jackson. He is the best thing I have in my life.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say that about your son. Jackson seems wonderful, and Riley cares for him a great deal.”

  “Then why the snide remark about him? Will you now tell me what my father did to you, and to us?”

  “It’s complicated, and a very long story. I don’t even know where to begin.”

  “Lucky for you, I have all the time in the world and have waited long enough to hear your reason why you left me.”

  “I hate how you keep saying ‘how I left you.’ Walker, don’t you know that I not only left you, I left us? I mourned the loss of our relationship every day since I walked out of your apartment, or shall I say…was forced to leave.”

  “Reese, you don’t have to be afraid any more. I am here with you right now, please talk to me. You talk about mourning us; you have no idea what I have been through. I should hate you for leaving me, but instead I sit here forgetting all the pain I suffered. And I all I want to do is just bury myself deep inside you and fuck you until you scream my name. How sick is that? I’m back there again, Reese, our last night together at my apartment. I remember every detail about that night. I can even tell you what you were wearing when you arrived, until I removed you from your clothing.”

  chapter four continued...

  REESE SMILED AT me. She didn’t forget how I pulled her in and took her right up against the door. It had been many days since we had seen each other. Our schedules were busy with school, our work commitments, and I was traveling back and forth to California. I couldn’t help myself when my eyes met hers. I was on fire with desire for my woman. We made love throughout my apartment, never making it to the actual bed.

  “Walker, how can I begin to tell you how sorry I am for leaving you? I should have been stronger, and not let your father bully me. I remember feeling you kissing me in the early morning. I believe I even heard you say that you would be back soon. I must have drifted back to sleep, and then I heard knocking at the door. I thought you forgot your key. I wrapped myself with a sheet and ran to the door to greet you. To my shock, your father was on the other side with his lawyer, scowling back at me. Without asking if you were home, they walked right in, as if they knew I was alone. Your father ordered me to dress and meet him in the living room. I was praying you would return, so I wouldn’t have to talk with him. Your father didn’t give me a choice, so I dressed and sat down.”

  Reese continued, “He declined coffee. He wanted to get to the point for his reason for being there. I sat down and listened. His lawyer, Jacobson, retrieved two manila folders from his brief case. He handed them over to your father, and Phillip showed me what they contained. I was horrified at what I was looking at. Walker, the folder contained the very pictures that I never wanted you to know about. They were the same nude modeling pictures that your father had threatened me with on New Year’s Eve so many years ago. I thought I would never have to think about them again after you confronted your father. He obviously knew they could still hurt me, and believe me when I say that they did, in ways that I can never explain.”

  “Reese, I told you that I didn’t care about those photos. I told you repeatedly how I knew and loved the real girl, not the one in those photos. You and those other girls were victimized, and preyed upon by that sleaze of a photographer. Please tell me, baby, that you didn’t run because of those photos? You had to know that I would have never let my father hurt you that way. Reese, please talk to me?”

  TO LOOK AT Walker, after all these years hurt my heart more now than the hurt I felt the day I left him. He looked so broken at that moment, and he sat there asking me to relive the most painful time in all of my life, but this was his story too.

  “Walker, there is so much more you don’t know.” He took my trembling hands and folded them into his, willing me to talk to him.

  “Enlighten me, Reese, I must know everything,” he said.

  “Walker, when you confronted your father and declared our love for one another in front of him and all of his friends, I thought our fight with him was over, but I was so wrong. Your father hated me, and he stopped at nothing to remove me from your life. I have no explanation to why he did what he did to me, and to us, but I was a fool to believe that he would just stop.”

  I WAS REELING from what Reese was telling me, but I needed to allow her to continue with her story. She looked so drained now. She asked for some water and needed to take a few breaths to compose herself before continuing.

  “After perusing the file, I ripped up the pictures and slammed the file down onto the table. Your father laughed at my reaction, telling me that he had many copies. He threatened to show you the photos and expose me to the world. He would begin with you, and then stuff every mailbox of all my professors at NYU. He didn’t care that I had already told you about it, he said that the pictures would speak volumes about me, and the whore behind them. He told me that you would be disgusted and would never be able to move past it. I never believed that, Walker, and again I tried to argue with your father that you loved me and wanted to marry me. I even showed him my locket, and he just didn’t care. Walker, your father was ruthless. I believe that was the word you used when telling me about him, but he was so much more. He was cold, heartless, and what he showed me next completely destroyed me.”

  “What was it? My god you were twenty one years old! You didn’t have time for a past, let alone do anything that would have made you leave me. What the hell did he have on you, Reese?”

  “Mr. Jacobson handed me a check for one hundred thousand dollars and told me to take it to start a new life.”

  “Stop the car!” I screamed at Stephen. I leaped out from the back of the limo and emptied the contents of my dinner all over the sidewalk. I was retching and couldn’t catch my breath. Oh my god, my father paid off Reese to leave me. He fucking ruined my life. Reese put her hands on my shoulder, but I pulled away from her. I never felt so betrayed in all of my life. I loved this woman standing in front of me for most of my adult life. How could she do this to me?

  “Did you take the money, Reese? Please tell me that you didn’t.”

  “I didn’t take it, Walker. I would have never done that. Walker, please understand there is so much more to tell you.”

  I calmed down and stepped back into the car. Reese joined me and continued with her story.

  “Walker, after I refused his money, your father told me something that I hadn’t had the chance to tell you. I had planned the night before, but you distracted me. I was going to tell you when you returned to the apartment, but never got the chance.”

  “What, Reese? What is it that you’re not saying?”

  “I was pregnant, Walker, and carrying your child. Your father somehow knew this and told me that if I even dare try to have your bastard child, he would ruin me and make me suffer for trapping you. He told me that I was only a means to an end for you. After you had your fill of me, you would leave me and marry Elizabeth. He convinced me that this was your plan, and I was easily disposable. I wasn’t thinking clearly, Walker, so for a second I believed him, and he knew he had me. Then his lawyer handed me the other envelope. They both sat there waiting to take pleasure in seeing my reaction.”

  “What the hell did it contain, Reese?”

  “Your father had the deed to my grandparent’s properties in Georgia. He said he had the power to own them all, and once he did, he would level the properties to the ground. If you believe anything, Walker, please believe that I tried to fight back. I begged your father on my hands and knees to not hurt my family and let me stay with you. I cried, clawing my way through his thick coat of armor, but he wouldn’t listen to me, Walker. He told me that I was the one responsible for this, and it was my fault. If I didn’t want to hurt my family, then my only choice was to leave you. He had it all arranged. All I had to do was walk out the door, and out of your life. He promised not to hurt my grand
parents, and he would take care of you. Please say something, Walker.”

  I felt tired and defeated from all of these shocking revelations. I was trying to process everything. I asked, “What happened to the baby, Reese? Do I have another child out in the world that doesn’t know I exist? Is Riley my daughter?”

  “No, she’s not, and no, you don’t, Walker. Your father left me devastated and ripped open to my core. I had no choice but to leave you. I went to my apartment and packed a bag. I was on the next flight to Los Angeles, and I never looked back.”

  “Yes, I know that, Reese. I was there, remember? Answer my fucking question. What happened to the baby, Reese? Did you have an abortion? Did you give the baby up for adoption? What the fuck happened?”

  “I would never hurt our baby, Walker. I loved him from the minute I found out that I was pregnant.”

  “You loved him so much, but yet you didn’t tell me. How could you keep this from me? And my father knew this entire time, but I was kept in the dark about my baby? Wait a minute. You said…him.”

  My head was fucking spinning right now. I had a son, my first son, and I never knew he existed. I turned back to Reese and begged her to go on with her story.

  “I need to know everything, Reese. Please tell me what happened next.”

  “I can’t, Walker. Please, it’s too painful, and I’m exhausted.”

  “Exhausted? Really? How about all the nights that I went without sleep after you left? You leaving nearly destroyed me. You had to know that it would.”

  “Of course I knew! I begged your father not to do this to us, but he wouldn’t listen. When I left you that note, I had no time to really even think about my words, and that bastard of a lawyer actually checked what I had written to you. Your father read it too, and he almost laughed at me. But he gave his nod of approval, and then his lawyer handed it back to me. I was praying you would read between the lines and figure out that I would never have done this on my own. But you never came for me, and every day that passed, I was more lost than ever.”

  “It was the same for me, Reese. The unknown was the hardest to come to terms with. I did search for you. I hired private detectives, but all the leads came up empty. It was as if you just disappeared off the grid, never to be heard from again. Now after all this time wondering what the hell happened to you…you materialize right in front of me. Please tell me the rest, I need to know everything.”

  She continued, “When I left New York, I had no idea where to go. I couldn’t go back home to Georgia. I was too ashamed, and I knew if I told Nana and Granddaddy, they would have wanted to go up against your father, and I just couldn’t risk that. If anything were to happen to them and their land, I would have never forgiven myself.”

  “You had to know that Pottersville would be my first place to search for you. I took the first flight out, Reese, and when I got there, Lila was heartbroken. She said that you called her and told her to tell me not to look for you. Why? How could you ask her something like that? It broke her heart.”

  “That was another choice that I had no control of, Walker. Your father watched my every move. He knew you would search for me and he thought I would go home, but I went to California instead. I spent the next three months in a small one bedroom apartment. I owned nothing but the clothes on my back and the picture I took from your nightstand. It was my saving grace every time I looked at it. Every single day and night, I prayed on it for you to find me. I never wanted to leave you, Walker, not in a million years. I’m so sorry.”

  “Reese, I’m having a difficult time wrapping my head around this. How could you be in California and not seek me out? You knew that’s where I was moving. We were in the same city, and our paths never crossed? What the hell? Why didn’t you try to contact me? You mean to tell me that my father had you on what, twenty four/seven surveillance? Come on, Reese, if his goal was to eradicate you from my life, then why track your every move? You were gone already.”

  “Yes, I was, and he wanted me to stay gone. I was still a liability Walker, don’t you get it? I was pregnant with your child, and although he forced me out and held my grandparents over my head, he knew I was still going to try to reach you. All I wanted was to tell you the truth, but every time I tried, he stopped me. Right before I flew back to New York, I saw you on the grounds of Reed Global. You were walking the path to the entrance with your father. I saw you stop and look around. Did you feel me there Walker?”

  “Oh my god. Yes! The gravitational pull I was feeling was strong, and I instantly felt you. Why didn’t I see you then?”

  “Before I could call out to you, I was grabbed from behind. He covered my mouth and held me until your father joined us.”

  “Who was it, Reese?”

  “Your father’s bodyguard, Ralston.”

  “Motherfucker! Did he hurt you?”

  “Not physically, but mentally the two of them kicked me over and over again, until I was completely shattered, kind of like what I’m feeling now.”

  “I’m so sorry, baby, I’m so sorry. I know this hurts you to relive this, but I need to know everything. Please go on.”

  “I tried to stand up to your father, and I told him that I told my family everything, and we were willing to fight him. I threatened him with empty promises thinking it might work, but all it did was anger him more, and then I collapsed. I was on my knees again, begging him to please stop this crusade of hating me and let me go to you. I wanted to tell you so badly about our baby and beg you to forgive me, but again, Phillip wouldn’t listen. He said you moved on without me, and I was to take my bastard child and go away and never ever to return again. What could I do, Walker? He won, and I let him.”

  Reese continued, “Shortly after my confrontation with your father, I managed to return to New York, and it was Freddy who convinced me to try to find and talk to you. I was willing to do anything to see you. I was going to beg for forgiveness and ask you to take me back. If we found our way back to each other, then I would have told you everything about what your father did to me. My agent, Marsha, if you remember her, booked me into the hotel under a false name. I was going to rest a bit before calling you. I wasn’t feeling well on the plane, and I just got sicker once I checked in to my room. It was early morning, and I tried to eat some breakfast, and while going through the papers, there you were on Page Six of the newspaper. You were hand in hand with Elizabeth, looking so happy, and she clearly looked like the happiest woman in the world. She finally got her man, but it didn’t matter. I had your child, and nothing was going to stop me this time.”

  She went on, “I thought I was strong enough to leave to find you, but after seeing what I saw, the pain in my stomach intensified, and it literally brought me to my knees. Something was horribly wrong, and I was afraid I was losing the baby. I called for help, and when I woke up, I was in a New York City hospital. I’m so sorry, Walker. The baby didn’t make it. I was just beginning my second trimester of pregnancy and was told that our baby may have had abnormalities that contributed to the miscarriage, but I never believed that.”

  “So I’m clear on all of this, Reese. My father blackmailed you with something from your past. He knew you were pregnant with my child and purposely kept it from me. He fabricated lies on top of lies to make you leave me, and then when you finally decide to return to me, you lose our baby. Is that all of it? Or do you want to rip my heart out even more? …And a Page Six picture, Reese? A stupid fucking publicity photo made you so physically sick that you lost our baby over it?”

  “Walker, don’t you dare turn this around on me! It wasn’t just seeing the picture. How about me finding out I’m pregnant, and I’m scared to death and all alone. I barely had time to process what was happening, and then your father and his lawyer and bodyguard bullied me out of your life, and then put me through more months of stress and heartache. That’s what contributed to losing our son, Walker. I never stood a chance against your father, and he knew it all along. You were just as much his puppet
as I was. Only the difference is that he played you behind the scenes, without you ever knowing anything.”

  I had always known my father to be a bastard, but I never knew what he was truly capable of, until hearing Reese’s story. It was my story, too, and I was just another pawn in his chess game of controlling my life. As much as it pained me to hear this, I couldn’t lash out at her. This was not her fault.

  “Reese, can I please hold you?” I asked.

  She didn’t hesitate this time and threw herself into my arms. I needed to feel her body against mine. My sad, broken girl. Hell, I was broken too! Whispering into my chest, Reese was crying, and I could barely hear her struggling voice.

  “I’m so sorry, Walker. You can blame your father for all of this, and for a long time I did, but the blame also falls onto me. I should have been stronger and not be afraid. If I stayed and waited for you, I could have told you everything, but I ran like a coward and risked my health. If I could go back in time to change the course I was foolishly led on, I would do it, but it’s too late for us now.”

  “The hell it is, Reese. Don’t you see that this was meant to be? Even after all of these years, we are here and we can begin again. I love you, and I never stopped wanting you.”

  “Walker, how can you say that? You married Elizabeth, and you had a child with her. A son who is now falling in love with my daughter? How can you possibly see us together after everything I have told you? What about Elizabeth? Where does she fit into you wanting to be with me?”

  “Elizabeth suffered a stroke while in labor with our son. She was placed on a machine while our son was delivered by a caesarian. She never regained consciousness and was ruled brain dead. As her husband, I had to make the decision to respect her wishes and remove her from life support. I brought my son home two days later, and we buried his mother. The building that I built for your husband to perform miracles in that is my shrine to her. The building is dedicated in her honor, and it’s what brought our kids together.”