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“She met someone there, we were sixteen he was twenty, but seemed like a good guy. He wasn’t. He found out the truth and used it against her, held it over her head when she tried to break up with him because he’d started hitting her. He’d use his fists on her, leave bruises on her that I couldn’t see, and she was too scared to tell me because she was afraid, he’d ruin both of us. It wasn’t until he started using her claustrophobia against her that she finally admitted it. She was in the hospital from a severe panic attack, one so bad that the EMTs thought she was having a heart attack. That’s why she hates violence; she’s lived through it once and it almost cost her her life.”
“Jesus Christ,” Luke said sinking down onto a chair. “And then I…”
“Then you what Luke?” Wren questioned. “You once said you’d never laid a hand on her.”
“What I did was worse, I killed Chance.”
“We know that Luke, but it was self-defense. He broke in tried to kill Dani and you,” Joan said gently.
“That’s not technically how it happened. He was down on the ground, disarmed with a broken arm, I had the knife. He started telling me that no matter what he’d get out of jail and would come back to finish the job. He’d make Dani unrecognizable after they were finished with her, and I lost it. I wasn’t going to let him hurt her ever again and I…I picked him up throwing him into the wall. I smashed his head into it a few times and when he tried to rush at me, the knife went into his chest.”
“Luke it was still an accident, you didn’t mean to,” she attempted.
“I wanted him dead so he could never come after her again. Dani didn’t want me telling the police what I assumed she’d done, the story she’d told me or her reasons of it, but then she found out the truth because of that video…” He cut off glancing towards her, sleeping peacefully thanks to the pain medication and sedative wondering how many more she’d need because of him. “She wanted to run, to leave, but I still wanted her. I wanted to put the money behind us and have what I knew was there. She didn’t and threw that video at me, and I…”
“What did you do Luke?” Tyler asked as his hands tightened into fists.
“I backed her into a corner, until I saw the panic in her eyes flare, and I told her exactly what she was going to do. That she was going to marry me and repay the money she’d stolen one way…”
“Effing mother of god,” Angela gasped seeing the truth in his eyes.
“No, you couldn’t have Luke,” Joan said in utter disbelief. “You love her.”
“But I also hated her for lying to me, stealing every cent from my personal everyday accounts, and for wanting her ex-lover more than me.”
“Ex-lover?” Dean said stopping him. “No, Dani didn’t have any ex-lovers.”
“So, I found out about a year ago.”
“Wait, you’re telling us that you forced Dani to marry you, making her believe you’d send her to jail knowing she had claustrophobia and that it’d terrify her, or that you’d harm her physically unless she did? And she was a…god you’re a bigger bastard than I ever thought Luke,” Angela said turning away from him.
“How did you convince Dani to pretend to be the loving wife for three years Luke?” Tyler questioned.
“The same way I made her pretend to be a loving bride, threatening her with jail, only I didn’t know about the claustrophobia until her birthday last year in London. We found a connection in the bedroom, and I made sure to not let her walk away from that, then she got pregnant and if I ever wondered if she could love me, I got my answer. When she lost the baby, I lost everything about her, the things I loved, the things I hated, and I knew none of it mattered anymore,” he answered with a sigh. “When she had a panic attack and told me about the claustrophobia and that she hadn’t even had the strength to kill herself, I couldn’t let it go on. She couldn’t either and she lied again, telling me that Chance was her ex and he and Felix had wanted money to replace the drugs she’d tossed. She said that Dean was her grandfather she’d been protecting, that she’d rather have me as her jailor than be anywhere near Chance or Felix.”
“More truth than lies that time it seems,” Wren stated.
“Which is why I bought it all, I could see the pain in her eyes when she said she’d lost Dean that she couldn’t let Felix hurt him and she offered me four million back if I’d just let her go.”
“But you couldn’t, could you?” Tyler asked. “Did she try and kill herself or was that another lie she made up to protect you?”
“She really did take sleeping pills, just not in the way she made it seem. I had to bring her to the ER because she had a severe allergic reaction to it, but she didn’t know at the time she was allergic to them. Last year…at that time I’d asked her to stay until she was better, until she was back to being my Dani, the woman I found in bed, the one I could never see stealing money from me, no matter the circumstances. I didn’t care about any of that I just wanted Dani back. She agreed and I thought it meant that she was finally starting to open up, but I guess she was simply protecting Dean still. Then the news about the miscarriage came out and she was hurting, all of that felt real though, and when we went to the beach house, I swore she meant every word when she said she loved me too,” he added shaking his head.
“She did,” Bridget stated from the doorway. “I might be the only person she’s never fully lied to, and I can tell you right now that Dani has been in love with you from the moment that she started seeing me.”
“No, she couldn’t have loved me after the miscarriage.”
“Dani’s been seeing me for years Luke, not just since the miscarriage. She started coming more regularly after it but anytime things got too rough that the reports in the papers started questioning you all heavily, she’d come to see me.”
“I thought therapists couldn’t share patient information,” Angela said glaring at her brother.
“I’m not sharing anything, just telling you that she’s been my patient for years and that as a woman and friend she’s been in love with you for much longer than you know.”
“Why hide the truth for so long? Why didn’t she just tell me?” Luke asked.
“Because she thought when she did, when she showed you who she really is, you’d hate her and that you’d leave her. She’d rather have you in her life despising her than for you to leave her.”
“Because that’s what everyone who’s ever admitted to loving her has done,” Dean said getting it. “Mom, Dad, me…we all left her, and she was afraid to be happy because she knew it wouldn’t last.”
