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“I’m not leaving you.”
“Go.” I fill my lungs, and the room comes into sharper focus. I fill the bag again. Once. Twice. “Your father is a murderer.”
He shuffles back from me, looking shocked.
“Get out. Get. Out.”
His eyes gloss and grow even redder than they were when he turned up at my door. Before he unravelled my entire life.
“I didn’t know, Dayna. I swear I didn’t know.”
My whole world begins to fall apart. Everything I ever thought I knew. Everything I believed. My mother didn’t leave; she was pushed. I had the wrong parent on a pedestal. Then I climbed into bed with the son of the man who brought SP to ruin, the man who killed my father.
All my anger, all these years, has been directed at the wrong people.
Caspar Kahn and Harold Layton were in it together. Clark’s father.
A life with Clark that I’ll never have flashes before me. Every kiss, every touch, being his for eternity, having his child. I didn’t realise how much I wanted it until now.
“I hate you.”
And I hate myself for the look on your face right now.
He stands slowly and rubs a hand roughly across his face. He doesn’t speak, he just nods, and he leaves me here, on the kitchen floor.
When I hear the door close, I wail. Endless sobs come, until I’m curled into a ball on the tiled floor, crippled by pain in every part of my body.
I start to cry so hard no noise leaves my mouth. I have no idea what I’m mourning. My idyllic perception of my father, now shattered. That I’ve spent years blaming my mother for something she didn’t cause. That I have more enemies than I realised. Or that I can never be with Clark. I can never be part of that family. “I don’t know what to do.” My words aren’t heard by anyone.
The sky is darkening by the time I pick myself up from the floor. I take two painkillers for my throbbing headache, and as I’m washing them down, my eyes bore holes in my laptop. I sit down in front of the email I saved hours ago. My alternative bid. My offer to get into bed with Bahrain, to have Caspar out to kill me, because I need that well, because I want revenge.
A shadow seems to settle over me as I read the words on the screen. Getting back at Caspar wouldn’t put an end to this now. I’d risk my life, and for what? This started with an affair. This started with my father. He’s not the man I thought he was.
I close the lid of my laptop without sending the bid.
I HAVEN’T CHANGED or washed my face as I drive towards Arthur’s home. I haven’t got my head around any of this. But Arthur should know the truth. He’s the one person who would understand.
A horn honks, pulling me from my trance, and I realise I’m drifting out of my lane. I straighten the car, not bothering to hold up a hand in apology to the other driver.
Why did Clark tell me? Why did his father tell him the truth? Why now?
I pull up at the driveway of Arthur’s town house. If someone were to ask me how I got here, I’d have to say I don’t know.
Exhaustion washes over me. I kill the engine and lean forwards onto the steering wheel, my head in my arms.
I have no idea how long I sit here, concentrating on keeping my mind blank. Eventually, I knock on Arthur’s front door. Evelyn answers, beaming at first, but her expression quickly turns to one of concern.
“Dayna, sweetheart, what’s wrong?” I let her pull me into her chest and I rest my head on her shoulder, breathing in the coconut scent of her short black hair that I recognise so well. I cling to the back of her blouse.
“Dayna?”
I look up to see Arthur stepping out of the lounge, in chinos and a lounge jumper, looking every year of his age. There must be a thousand things I could say, but when I pull back from Evelyn and look at my father’s best friend, there’s only one thing that comes to mind.
“Did you know he had an affair?”
He needs no more explanation. It registers on his face. I look at Evelyn and realise that she knows too.
“Everyone knew except me, right?”
