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“Oh, my God,” I said, astonished. “Why wouldn’t she want you there? It’s a special moment most women would want to share with the father of their child.”
“She was adamant. At first, I refused to take no for an answer. She got so upset that I finally decided to let her go. She was pregnant, and she was already angry because I’d been so insistent. Giving up was the biggest mistake I ever made,” he said hoarsely. “She stepped right in front of that bus because she was so eager to get away from me.”
I choked back a sob as I visualized how broken Dylan must have been, standing on the curb, as Charlotte died right in front of him, from an impulsive action. “It was not your fault,” I repeated. “Did you eventually tell your family about the baby?”
“No. I couldn’t talk about it. I could hardly put two words together. They didn’t even know I was there when the accident happened. Mum went to the funeral because she was acquainted with the family, but all I could do was sit next to her and try to keep my sanity. I couldn’t get my thoughts straight or my head together. A few days later, I told Damian I had to disappear for a while because I had to pull myself together, and he made that happen. I still couldn’t talk about it. All I wanted to do was escape,” he finished in a raw, husky voice.
“I think that’s probably a normal reaction,” I told him gently. “I’m sure you were still in shock.”
“I was completely broken,” he confessed. “I tried to find anything that would stop those same five or ten seconds from running over and over in my mind. I rarely slept because of the nightmares, and when I was awake, alcohol was the only thing that erased those memories for a short time. The doctors at the treatment center said it was post-traumatic stress, but I honestly thought I was a lunatic because I felt so detached from everything and everyone. I didn’t care about anything. They said that was a coping mechanism, and all of the other symptoms, like feeling paralyzed by fear sometimes, and reliving the moment over and over, were classic symptoms.”
“So because it was untreated, it just got worse?” I questioned.
“It became my own personal hell,” he said. “But after almost a year of that, I wanted to tell Damian and the rest of my family. I wanted help. I wanted my fucking life back. That’s when this probably should have ended and the point when I should have gotten help. I was having some moments of clarity. Instead, before I could reach out to my family, I found out some other things that sent me over the edge again.”
A shiver ran down my spine, and I already knew whatever he was going to say wasn’t good. “What?”
“I went back to my flat because I knew I had to pack up Charlotte’s personal belongings and send them to her parents. While I was packing, I found her journals, and I decided to read the most recent one because I really wanted to know why she was so upset that day. I found out the child she was carrying wasn’t mine. The results of a paternity test were tucked in her journal, and I wasn’t the father. I also discovered that she was having a long-running affair with one of her professors that she met while she was at university. He was twenty years older than her, and he was never going to leave his wife and children. So she’d decided that marrying me would allow her to keep seeing him, and have a father for her child, too. She didn’t want me at the ultrasound because she was further along than she told me. She conceived before we even met up again, so her due date wouldn’t match. That journal solved the mystery of why she didn’t want me with her that day but opened the door to questions I’ll never get answered.”
“Oh, my God,” I said, my voice horrified. “How could she do something like that?”
“Looking back now, I’m sure she was desperate because she didn’t want to be a single mother. Her parents definitely wouldn’t have approved, and she was still dependent on them financially. She was obsessed with this guy. It was obvious when I read her journal. I don’t think she cared how her actions affected anyone else, as long as she found a father for that child, and a husband. Our reunion was pretty damn convenient. The due date wouldn’t be too far off. Only about three weeks or so different, so I guess she thought she could pull it off, and maybe she would have if I’d never asked many questions during her pregnancy. Me wanting to be completely involved in her pregnancy, and with the child I thought was mine, didn’t suit her plans well at all,” he said, his tone a little bitter.
I was speechless for a minute before I said, “That’s completely insane and totally selfish.”
How could any woman use a guy like that? God, Dylan had been embracing fatherhood, and she’d been lying to him the entire time.
Dylan had gone through hell not once, but twice.
“I have to admit that I felt like an idiot because I’d fallen for the whole story without asking very many questions in the beginning,” he admitted. “Probably because she was an old family friend. It never occurred to me to even ask for a paternity test myself. I guess I wasn’t as smart as the real father.”
“Really, why would you?” I asked. “I know you’re a great catch and all, but if she socialized in your same circles, her family obviously had money. There was no reason it ever would have crossed your mind that she might be trying to trap you into marriage and attempting to pass off another man’s child as yours.”
“I was confused. Fuck! I didn’t want to tell anyone because she was already dead, and everyone was still grieving. The truth would have only hurt Charlotte’s family, and it wasn’t like the biological father was going to go and tell them the truth. I couldn’t figure out how I was supposed to feel. How was it possible to be so devastated over someone’s death and fucking hate them at the same time?” he rumbled, sounding disgusted with himself.
Tears streamed down my cheeks as I turned onto my side and stroked my fingers through his coarse hair. “For you, that child was yours, Dylan. Don’t you understand? That loss was still there, even though you eventually found out the truth. I also think it’s really hard to heal when your feelings are that conflicted. The extreme sorrow is there, but you wonder if you ever really knew that person you cared about the way you should have.”
God, and didn’t I know what that felt like?
The pain of betrayal.
The confusion.
The grief.
The way something like that screwed up a person’s head.
Dylan reached for my hand and threaded our fingers together like he needed something or someone to ground him. “All I wanted was to disappear again after that, but I found myself escaping into more alcohol and distractions instead. I wasn’t coping. I was a fucking coward.”
“No, you weren’t,” I said, needing to defend his brokenness. “You were lost, Dylan, and I completely understand. Jesus! That had to be like living in a nightmare all the time. And just when you were finally brave enough to face what had happened by trying to find professional help, closure, and by reaching out to your family so you could get through it, you got kicked down again.”
“I completely detached at that point,” he confessed. “I didn’t know how to feel, so I preferred to feel absolutely nothing. I couldn’t tell my family what had happened. I was too far down that rabbit hole by then. It was like I just drifted until what happened at the gala. When I really realized how much I’d hurt Damian, I knew I had to get help, or I’d lose my entire family.”
I choked on a sob. I’d always sensed his pain, but I’d never known the depth of his despair and hopelessness. “God, you didn’t deserve any of what happened to you, Dylan, and no one is going to blame you for not being able to cope. It would have completely crushed anyone.”
“It changed me, Kylie. I’m not the man I was before,” he admitted huskily. “I might never be that man again.”
“You’re still the same guy,” I reassured him. “Maybe you’re a little warier and not as trusting as you used to be, but you don’t change a lifetime of being one person to become another from a tragic experience. You survived, Dylan, and you are getting your life back. Don’t let this nightmare get to you. You’ve come too far for that.”
