His chambers were the only place he could have this conversation in complete privacy. Iris looked around the space as she entered, taking it all in wordlessly. Toby gestured to one of the chairs on the other side of his desk, sitting himself down beside her instead of placing the desk between them. As much as she infuriated him, he loved her, and he did not want to make this any harder than it needed to be.
She assessed him curiously. "What's this all about? Does it have anything to do with your little bombshell over the phone a couple of weeks ago?"
They had barely seen each other since then, an entirely deliberate move on his part. "Sort of," he replied, evasively, taking a deep breath as he attempted to sort his scrambled thoughts. How to go about this? Toby put his hand to his forehead, squeezing gently, the tension building. He could hear his clock ticking on the wall behind him, a menacing countdown to this pivotal moment.
"What's wrong?" Iris's voice was gentler now, as was her hand as she rested it onto his shoulder.
He looked at her, releasing the breath he had been holding. "I found Royce."
Her face changed, rapidly, running a gamut of emotions. Her hand fell away from his shoulder to land listlessly onto her lap. She paled significantly. "When?" A whisper only, as though any more volume would be just too much of an effort.
"Not very long ago. When I went to Mount Isa for work. That's where he is. I saw him, while I was out having dinner."
Iris looked stunned. "Did you speak to him?"
Toby nodded.
"What did he say?"
"Not much. I met up with him in private the next day."
Iris stared at him, seeming to want so much more. She wanted tales of regret, pleas for forgiveness; Toby knew this by the eager look on her face, but she was going to be greatly disappointed. He wished more than anything else that he could give that to her, she deserved it, she really did. "Iris," he began, his voice shaking with the force of his emotion. "He has married another woman. He has two small children; twin boys."
Iris stared at him, her eyes wide, her head now shaking from side to side. She opened her mouth, but no sound came out. Toby waited for her to say something, anything, but she never did. She simply fell out of her seat in a dead faint, slipping to the floor with a thud.
Charlotte knocked on the bedroom door softly, waiting for a reply that never came. Speaking through the door, she addressed Jake. "I'm going now. I put that chicken you bought into the oven for your dinner and made you a salad."
He opened the door, his face a ravaged mess of tears and pain. Charlotte wrapped her arms around him as he collapsed against her, sobs exploding out of him. She stroked his hair and let him cry, squeezing her eyes shut against her own threatening tears.
Iris opened her eyes, her gaze connecting with Toby's. Cradling her head with one hand, he guided her upright with the other. He watched her carefully. "How do you feel? You want some water?"
She shook her head. "Help me back up into the chair. I feel like an idiot on the floor here."
He helped her stand, holding her tightly in case she was not as steady on her feet as she believed herself to be. He hovered as she sat, watching for any further signs of faintness.
"Stop hovering. I'm fine now. It was just a shock. Sit down." She glared at him, gesturing to the seat beside her. He obeyed her and waited her out, preferring to respond to her lead, rather than initiate any questions she might have.
"He told you about Jenna, didn't he?"
Toby nodded.
"The whole story?" Iris probed.
"The whole story," Toby replied. "It was all very enlightening." The bitterness was vile, the reminder of how close to his father he really was. He had no desire to get into that with her though. He had no desire to get into it at all, not ever.
"I'm sorry."
"What for?"
She shrugged. "I expect finding out about my relationship with your father would have been a shock. I'm sorry you found out. It wasn't necessary."
Toby looked at her carefully, not quite following her. "It wasn't necessary he tell me, or that I ever find out?"
"Both." She shook her head then, a bitter smile twisting her face. "So typical of him, to try and distract you with that rather than give you the opportunity to talk to him about his own actions."
"He didn't distract me from anything. I still questioned him on his actions. We need to address one issue here at a time though. I need to tell Charlotte about Jenna. I want Jenna to know. This is a ridiculous secret to have and I'm not sitting on it." He had thought about this a lot. And all of his thoughts pointed to one thing only: Jenna deserved more than this lie. "I refuse to lie about this," he reiterated firmly.
Iris sighed deeply, emitting a shaky laugh. "So righteous," she said, with no small measure of sarcasm thrown in to the comment.
"Don't give me that shit." He stood up and paced to the window, pressing his head against the glass, taking comfort from the cool pane against his building agitation. Whirling to face her, he pointed angrily. "This is eating me up! Knowing this shit and keeping it to myself. I can't sleep! I can hardly eat. I feel sick all the time. I'm telling you first as a courtesy, but I'm not keeping a lid on it for you."
Iris regarded him coolly, that lofty expression of hers that he had come to know so well, firmly in place now. "Then tell them both yourself. You tell Jenna. Because I'm not."
"You think I'm not serious?" Toby advanced on her. "You can't bluff me. I will tell her if you don't. You should know better than to try this shit out on me."
"Is she young?"
Toby looked at Iris in confusion. "Who?"
"The new wife."
He sighed with weariness then, slumping back down into his seat beside her. It was so typical of Iris, to brush Jenna aside in favour of her own concerns. "Yes," he replied. "About Charlotte's age."
Iris said nothing, but her cheeks coloured, a flush that spread rapidly down her throat and across her chest.
"The boys are a bit younger than Ashley."
"And he's definitely married to her?"
Toby nodded. "He told me has a second identity."
"Yes, I know he has."
"What?"
"It's complicated. His second identity is the one he used to marry me. He'll be using his birth name now."
Toby just stared at Iris, his suspicions growing. After a long silence, he leaned forward. "Is your marriage to him legal?"
"Yes."
"You can't have two legal identities, Iris. One of them has to be false."
"He changed his birth name legally. Before we got married. His marriage to her is the one that is false, not mine."
Toby nodded then. "Alright. Did you suspect he might be using his other name?"
"What do you think?" Iris laughed again, shaking her head at the same time.
"You haven't asked me if I found out why he left," Toby pointed out.
"Why would I ask you something I already know the answer to?"
It was Toby who shook his head this time. He glared at her then, anger coursing through him at the duplicity of it all. They were both as bad as each other. "You led me to believe you came to get me because of my mother."
"I did."
"Not entirely."
"It was part of the reason. You are my godson. She chose that for us. I would have honoured that no matter who your father was."
"I don't believe anything you say anymore."
Iris looked at him sadly, tears shining in her eyes. "That makes me very sorry." She paused, as though composing herself, collecting her thoughts for greater articulation. "Toby, no matter what Royce has told you, I took you in because you needed a home and I loved your mother. I won't deny that I was infatuated with your father at one point in my life. But that's all it was, an infatuation, and it passed. Royce was the one who couldn't get over it. I don't understand him. I tried and tried, but I could never make him see it was nothing. You reminded me of your father, but I think you reminded Royce more."
Toby looked at her, a thickness settling into his throat. "What he did to you…what he asked you to do. It's just the same as what I expected of Charlotte. I hate that. I hate knowing it and wearing it within me. It makes it all so much worse, to know he did the same thing to you. I'm no different. I am him, just scratch the surface, and I'm driven by the same motivations."
Iris reached out, cupping his face tenderly. "You are nothing like him. You are more. So much more." She stroked his face with her thumb, catching a rogue tear.
"I am still so ashamed of having done that to her." He leaned into her hand, seeking her assurance, her comfort, her unquestioning support of him.
"Surely you see how that differentiates you? He never gave me another thought. He never cared. You are nothing like him!" Iris dropped her hand from his cheek, leaning forward to kiss him on the forehead.
Toby closed his eyes briefly, willing himself to calm down. When he opened them, Iris was sitting back in her seat, her hands folded neatly on her lap, her face controlled.
"I wish you wouldn't tell Jenna. My parents were good to her. She doesn't need to know anything different."
"I have to."
Iris nodded. "Fair enough."
"What are you going to do about Royce?"
She smiled then, a self-satisfied smirk that set Toby on edge. "Make him answer for what he's done."
"He may go to prison," Toby pointed out, trying to discourage her, for Charlotte's sake. "He could get the maximum penalty. That's a year, Iris. He knowingly committed bigamy, he has no defence. Is that really what you want?"
"Maybe it's what I need. Why should he get to live his life out there all over again? I was his wife! I am his wife! Me!" She pounded on her chest with her fist, her face furious now, her eyes shining fiercely. "I am his wife. He does not get to walk away from that!"
"What about Charlotte?"
Iris stood and looked down at him. "She has you. And her children. She'll get over it." She turned away from him then, walking briskly to the door.
Toby buried his head in his hands.
As soon as Toby got home, Charlotte advanced on him. "I need to show you something." She pulled out her phone, opening to the photo gallery.
He walked past her, tossing his bag and jacket down onto one of the dining room chairs. "Can you wait a minute? I need to talk to you about something really important and I don't want any distractions."
Charlotte looked up at him, phone poised in her hand. She frowned at his tone, taking in his dishevelled appearance. "What's wrong?"
He stared at her, seemingly lost for words now that he had her undivided attention. Her phone rang. She looked down at the display, her mother's face flashing at her. "It's Mum. Can I just get this first?"
"No!" He lunged towards her, pulling the phone out of her hand and turning it off, burying it deep into his pocket. "I don't want you to talk to her right now. You need to listen to me." He took a deep breath, and when he spoke next, Charlotte was certain she had not heard him correctly.
"What did you say?"
"I found your father."
She smiled, tears welling and falling down her cheeks. "I can't believe this! Where is he? Is he alright?"
Toby's face look devastated. "Charlotte, stop."
She looked at him, confused at his expression. He should be happy about his, after all this time, her father was okay, they knew where he was, she would get to see him again, introduce him to their children. They could be a family once more.
Toby approached her, his hands coming to rest on her shoulders, his face now close to hers. "Charlotte, I can see what you're thinking, and you need to stop. He hasn't been freed from some hostage situation. I found him accidently. In the place he had chosen to hide himself. He has no intention of coming back."
She shook her head, not wanting to hear this, not wanting to accept it, even though she knew deep down that what he was saying was the truth. A truth she had always known. "How did you find him?" she whispered, rubbing at her chest involuntarily. There was a pain invading her middle, taking her over.
"I saw him when I was in Mount Isa for work."
Charlotte sucked in a sharp breath. "That was ages ago! You've known all this time and you're only telling me now?"
"Charlotte, it was complicated-"
"Complicated?" She pulled out of his grasp, backing up, needing to put some distance between them. "What's complicated about telling me you found my father?! It should have been the very first thing you said to me when you walked in the door! I can't believe it wasn't! How could you do this to me?"
"It's not that simple."
"Yes it is!"
"You don't understand!"
"No, I don't. I don't understand at all how you could keep something like this from me! I can't even begin to fathom your motivations. It's ridiculous, how you do this. You just make all these decisions for me, all the time! I am so sick and tired of doing this with you!" She turned away from him, furious, hurt, devastated, all at once. Betrayed.
"I wanted to protect you," Toby pleaded.
"From my own father?" she spat out, keeping her back to him.
"He married someone out there. Started a new family. He has a new name. A whole new life."
Charlotte spun around, disbelief moving through her, sickness rising. She gripped the back of the couch nearby to steady herself, and looked over at Toby, seeing the truth, and how much it hurt him to say it, all over his face.
"I'm sorry. I only wanted to protect you. I only ever take over like that when I want to protect you. I don't do it to control you. I just want to look after you. I didn't know how to tell you, I swear, I wasn't trying to lie to you. I just couldn't tell you straight away, and then it was too late, the timing was wrong with everything else that was happening." He held his hands out in front of him, pleading with her.
"He replaced us?" Charlotte looked at Toby, tears now obscuring her vision.
He walked up to her, reaching out to cup her face, pressing his lips hard to her forehead. "He's an idiot."
She crumpled against him, burying her face into his shirt. "Have you told Mum?"
"Yeah. This afternoon. I needed to tell her first, because there's something else you need to know, and I wanted to make sure she understood that I was going to tell you everything."
"What? What more could there be?" Charlotte looked up at Toby, still clinging to his shirt, now wet from her tears.
"This isn't bad, but it's significant." He paused and looked down into her eyes. "Jenna is your sister."
Charlotte frowned, her mind going immediately to the calculations, measuring the age difference between her mother and Jenna, then Jenna and herself. "Wow, that's young. Okay. I guess I understand why she gave her to Grandma and Grandpa. But, Jenna? She doesn't know?"
Toby shook his head. "Iris doesn't want her to know. I told her I was going to tell her anyway. Charlotte, Jenna's father," he paused again then, a frown creasing his face once more. "She is my sister also."
Charlotte stared at him. "What?"
"Turns out everybody knew everyone back in the day. And your father and my father grew up together. Anyway, long story short, my dad knocked up your mum when she was only fourteen, gave her a heap of cash and sent her on her way to get an abortion, your dad didn't like that so he kept in touch. You can see where I'm headed." He looked at her then, his eyes wide, his flippant tone not matching his expression.
She pulled him against her, pressing her lips to his throat. "I see where you're headed. Or rather, where you've already arrived. It's not the same, Toby. You are not the same."
He scoffed at that. "You think?"
Charlotte tightened her grip on him. "Yeah. I more than think. I know. So get your head out of that space. You have to try and stop talking yourself into thinking that you're so much like him. You aren't him. You stuffed up with Ashley at the beginning, that's true enough, but that doesn't make you the same as him."
"That's pretty much what you
r mum said."
"Good. She knows better than me about this, given that it happened to her. So believe her." She paused then, considering all that he had told her since walking in the door. "Is Jenna's parentage a reason why my dad left?"
Toby sighed then, limping over to the couch. "He used me as an excuse. Some bullshit story about your mother pining over my father and losing it when I moved out to go to uni."
She went over to sit down beside him. Curling up against his body, she pressed her face against his chest. "That sounds ridiculous."
"It sounded a lot more convincing when he said it."
"I'm sorry about that. It's not right, for him to blame you."
"Maybe he believed it at the time. Maybe it's something he's thought up since, a story he could pull out of his arse if he ever got found. I don't know. Iris tells a different story. I don't care, to be honest, I really don't care. They're as bad as each other with their finger pointing. I only care about you and how this makes you feel. That's all I care about." He wrapped his arms around her, sinking down further into the couch, stretching his bad leg out to rest on the coffee table.
She lay against him, listening to his heartbeat against her face, a need taking shape within her. A need to reclaim their own existence. Toby was the one shining constant in her life. The only person who consistently put her first. She sat up and looked at him, intensely focused on the idea she wanted to put forward to him. "We need to get married."
"We will."
"No, I mean, we need to get married now," Charlotte insisted, a note of urgency creeping into her voice. She needed to make him understand, have him agree. She had no intention of backing down now that the idea had taken hold within her.
"It's eight o'clock at night." Toby laughed. "We can't. And what's the rush?"
"We've waited too long. Why have we waited so long? How soon can we do it?"
"You want to elope?" he clarified, a bemused expression upon his face.
Selling the Drama Page 34