“Fuuuuuuuuuck!” I sweep my arm across my desk, effectively relocating everything in one swoop and at high speed to the floor. Rage boiling my blood, all I can see is red mist. I can’t contain the violent fury inside me, I’m so fucking mad. I roar out a howl that scours my throat raw and leaves me breathless when I finally finish. My heart is hammering so hard I have to press the heel of my hand at the centre of my chest. I don’t know if I’m trying to ease the agony or contain the heartbreak. I feel I’m teetering on the edge of devastation and only the sheer sense of utter disbelief is keeping me from diving head first into the abyss.
How could she?
I cast an impassive glance around the room at the destruction. My laptops are in pieces, my phones are shot-to-shit broken, papers everywhere, my bottle of beer shattered, and the half constructed model of the Coliseum is totally fucked, and I just can’t bring myself to care.
I bend to pick up one curve of the structure that I painstakingly carved to be an exact replica. I had started this to pass time, try something new, something to distract me while Tia was elsewhere. I feel the slice of a real blade in my chest at the same time the splinters from the model cut my hand in my ever-tightening grip. When I hear the front door close, the pain in my heart finally brings me to my knees.
How could she?
The desk is now clear, with everything now at my feet, broken and in pieces. Apt.
I drag my hands through my hair as I start to feel a toxic and much more familiar emotion begin to cloak and suffocate my messed up mind.
Hatred.
It’s pure and potent, and I feel it like a noxious energy seeping into every pore, every fibre, working it’s way to my heart. It surprises me how quickly it takes hold, but I guess it’s not such a shock, discovering the ticket was the beginning. I just didn’t know it was the beginning of the end.
I couldn’t hate anyone or anything more than I hate her right now. I place my hands flat on the floor and brace my frame as tension grips my muscles and my mind races with everything. I suck in deep, steadying breaths, which do little to calm me; I doubt anything will.
That lying bitch has lived under my roof all this time. I took her in; she’d still be on the streets if it wasn’t for me. I wish I’d kicked her out that first night, but those fucking eyes drew me in from the moment we locked gazes, and now I know why. I was her fucking target.
But why?
I thought we were something, something real. I fucking felt it. Was it really all a lie? God I hate this, hate what she’s done to me and for what? I honestly thought the ticket was a stupid mistake she could easily explain, I never dreamed it was so much more. If I’d genuinely believed it would alter our lives so drastically, well fuck, I wouldn’t have made love to her like that. If I’d truly thought the discussion was going to end us, I would’ve raised the issue the moment she stepped inside my home, or maybe I wouldn’t have. Fuck, I don’t know, and it doesn’t fucking matter, she made her choice. She wouldn’t tell me the truth.
She wouldn’t tell me why, and I fucking know why.
Lilith or Ghost or whatever the fuck that psycho bitch is calling herself.
She fucking set me up, used me. They both did, but why make me fall in love? What the fuck does that achieve?
I look around at the destruction and slump into my worn and weathered leather armchair, letting my heavy head drop back. The pain fixed across my brow pales in comparison to the agony slicing my chest in two. I don’t even care how those two hooked up. It doesn’t change a thing, I feel used, betrayed…destroyed. How did I not see this? I’m so fucking careful.
I never let anyone in.
Tia’s different. I hate that this is my first thought. It flashes in my mind’s eye like a fucking beacon, swirls like a heady toxin in my veins, consuming me from the inside out. She’s broken, like me, and even now, with the debilitating sense of utter betrayal, I feel unsettled. Part of me is desperate to see through the lies.
I damn well knew she was torn when I put her on the spot like that, pain as clear as a knife to the heart, reflected in her soulful, sad emerald eyes, yet it wasn’t enough.
The anger ebbs and rages with each new thought racing across my mind. Did she even have a choice? She has her own agenda, yes, and with Ghost ‘helping’ her, she would have wanted to keep me in the dark at any cost. Ghost knows I’d kill her if I ever got the chance. How the fuck did Tia end up with that bitch as a trusted ‘friend’?
Because she was desperate for revenge, and if anyone knows about how to destroy lives, it’s my fucking twisted sister.
Fuck!
A cup of tea! I can’t believe a cup of fucking tea has changed everything, ruined everything. One minute I’m standing in Tia’s bedroom just drinking in the faint scent of her, and not for the first time either. Today though, when I inhaled deeply, dust particles tickled my nose, and I sneezed, dropping my cup and contents in a crescendo of broken crockery and boiling hot tea. The liquid scurried over the rug and trickled along the cracks in the floorboards, quickly disappearing below. I watched for a moment when the metallic sounds of large drops hitting something that shouldn’t be in the joist beneath me had me picking at the floorboards. The rest is an irreversible history.
I walk out of my office and take just two steps before I falter. Every day I’ve checked the footage from the cameras Tia had set up in Atticus’s apartment. I didn’t bother today, and as much as I don’t think I want to now, my body clearly has other ideas as it backs up of its own volition, and I find myself retrieving my laptop from the debris on the floor.
It’s chipped at the edge of the casing, and the corner of the screen is cracked, but it fires up, and as my fingers hover over the spy icon, I have to tell myself this is just because I hate loose ends. I might be wrestling inside, conflicted and probably losing my mind, but I hate not knowing everything. This now has little or nothing to do with Tia, and I hope if I repeat that enough, I just might end up believing it.
She’s gone and whatever she’s got herself into has fuck-all to do with me. Why the hell should I care when she doesn’t trust me? No, why should I care when she betrayed me?
I swallow the choking feeling in my throat and lean over to grab the half empty bottle of Jack. I unscrew the lid and suck it down until I feel the burning heat rip the length of my throat and settle in my gut. I take another gulp and replace the cap for now.
Flicking between the three cameras, I deftly scroll through the empty pictures until there is some movement. Atticus is in the kitchen and then in his office. I force myself to straighten out the unwelcome warm smile that accompanied the thought of how Tia gained access to his inner sanctum. Then I ruefully shake my head at a missed opportunity right there. I should’ve asked her at the time how she learnt to do that; maybe it would’ve triggered a few more questions, set a few alarm bells ringing.
It didn’t. After all, she did break into my home. It wasn’t a stretch to believe her talents might be a little more sophisticated than smashing a window with a brick to gain entry.
I close my eyes and try and wrack my brain, and my head feels like it’s going to explode with the mess of questions and uncertainty. I try to recall if there were any clues that Tia was more than she seemed, but I just don’t see it. Maybe there were signs and I just ignored them. I’m desolate that she could destroy me like this, with something so simple, so vital to any relationship. Trust.
When I open my eyes, Atticus has some blonde lady up against a wall, his hand gripped around her throat and her eyes bulging with terror.
What the hell did I miss?
I sit upright and scroll back to when the blonde enters the room. I can see her face now, she’s older, much older, and the family resemblance puts the Mrs Robinson theory quickly to bed. The audio quality is going to be poor so I plug my headphones in and crank the volume to full. I only intended for the cameras to provide a visual for Tia’s safety, but this looks too good not to listen in.
“Mother, this is unexpected and unwelcome. The last thing I need is Tia running into you.” His eyes narrow as his mother crosses from his office door to take a seat directly opposite. Her back is ramrod straight and she waves her hand dismissively at his comment.
“Oh pish, it was only six years, and she got out in three.”
“She was innocent back then, and I know for a fact she doesn’t view it quite so flippantly.”
“Fine, whatever you say.” She brushes imaginary hair away from her face. “So you think she took the money?” She leans forward, resting her chin on the tips of her fingers, which are lightly pressed together as if in prayer.
“She took some; the first amount that went missing matches the exact value of the bracelet you accused her of stealing, and I don’t believe in coincidences. It was a message, only I’m not a hundred percent about the rest.” His mother throws her head back with an acrid, hollow laugh and raises her pencil thin eyebrow.
“Oh she’s taken the rest. If she went to the bother of taking the first amount, why wouldn’t she go for all of it?”
“Because she’s not a greedy succubus like you. She’s after what’s rightfully hers, and I’d be surprised if she was after a penny more.”
“But it’s all rightfully hers.” Her face seems to set like stone, fixed with palpable fear at the apparent slip of her forked tongue. She shifts back in her seat as Atticus levels a glare that would make the devil himself shiver.
“What?” His voice is barely audible, filled with menace, and as his mother starts to shake her head he adds, “Don’t even think about dismissing this, Mother. I’m neck fucking deep in Kruse family shit and now you’re telling me it’s not even my shit.”
“It is yours, my darling, as well it should be. Your grandfather always wanted you to have it, even after he found out. None of this would’ve happened if he hadn’t poked his damn nose in.”
“In fucking what, Mother?!” She jumps from the deafening sound of Atticus slamming his fists on to his desk. Standing, he looms forward and casts a dark shadow in every sense of the word. His mother’s voice is tight, and the effort to speak at all is clear from the tiny muscles pulsing at her jaw. Her hand flies to her lips, and clutching a handkerchief, she soaks up the first fall of tears.
“I… I… Oh Atticus I’m so sorry. I had an affair. Ole was always travelling. I was so lonely. It was just one night, and I never told a soul but your father, sorry, I mean, Ole; he just knew. I don’t know how, I really don’t, but the instant I told him I was expecting, he knew what I’d done. I never could lie to him, even if my life depended on it. I honestly believed that day I told him about you, my life did depend on it. I told him the truth. I was lonely; it was a mistake, and I told him I loved him. I was sorry, so very sorry, Atticus, yet he never forgave me. ” She sobs into her hands, folding over onto herself. Her shoulders shake uncontrollably. Atticus is unmoved.
“Un-fucking-believable.” He runs his hand through his hair but doesn’t look so surprised at the revelation. He looks determined. The room goes silent and he glares ahead, his gaze not fixed on anything in particular, cold and distant. Several minutes pass before he speaks and his mother looks an uncomfortable mix of nervous and terrified.
“Grandfather found out Tia is my ‘father’s’, I mean, Ole Kruse’s child?” he sneers, and she gives an almost imperceptible nod.
“How?”
“I don’t know. I was so careful…” She shrinks back at his venomous tone and dabs frantically at her eyes as if embarrassed by her emotional state.
“I don’t mean how did he find out. I meant how the fuck is Tia a fucking Kraus?” he snaps.
“It was so long ago, Atticus, do we really have to do this now?”
“No time like the present, Mother. And while you’re at it, you may as well tell me who my real father is.” He spews her name like it tastes so vile on his tongue he’d prefer to spit the word onto the floor.
“It was one night. It wasn’t supposed to happen.”
“Oh, I get that I was a mistake, Mother. I’d still like to know the truth. Just pretend I am actually Ole’s son. It shouldn’t be too hard; you’ve been doing it for twenty-six years.”
“Atticus please, you were never a mistake.” She shakes her head, imploring some compassion from her son with her fragile plea.
“The extremes you have gone to in order to secure my legacy prove otherwise, don’t you think? Since you’re having trouble answering my question, why don’t you continue to pretend that I am, in fact, Ole Kraus’s real son, and like him, you are unable to lie to me either. Tell me the fucking truth.” Her throat moves with a slow bob as she swallows and seems to gather herself before she finally speaks.
“Shortly after you were born, I was pretty much banished. Anywhere your father was, I was to be elsewhere. He said he would bring you up as his own until he had another son. He would never have divorced me though. He had the Kraus name but I had half the fortune, and my indiscretion wasn’t enough to jeopardise the entire Kraus Corporation. It was a secret we both had to keep. I was happy to for my own sake, since I genuinely hoped, with time, I could win him back; after all, he needed a son.” She looks down, and I can understand her need to break eye contact, Atticus’s expression is disturbingly menacing. “For his part, Ole was ashamed of me, his pride was damaged, and he didn’t dare let his father learn the truth.
“He loved you as his own though, Atticus; I know he did. It’s just that you weren’t blood, and that isn’t just important, it’s everything to a Kruse.” She takes a steady breath, Atticus hasn’t blinked the entire time, and if I could gauge the temperature in the room, I would say it was the wrong side of freezing. Mrs Kraus continues. Her knuckles are blanched white on her lap, fear and tension fighting for dominance, and fear looks to be the clear winner. Her voice waivers. “You spent much of your free time with him, saw him very often, but if you recall, I was never there at the same time. Anyway, your father, um, Ole, he loved Tartarus Hall. One summer, I made a surprise visit. I was desperate to try and fix things. I found one of the housemaids and your father. It was pathetic.” She pauses for effect. There is none, but Atticus speaks before she does.
“Tia’s mother worked at the Hall before? I never knew that.”
“Why would you?” She shrugs and gives his observation no more discussion. “Ole ended whatever ‘it’ was, the day she told him she was expecting. He allowed her to live in the lodge, and she took that as some sort of declaration of love. She thought he would change his mind. He didn’t, and she blamed the pregnancy for ruining her chances with him. She’s always been a little delusional; he didn’t love her. He did, however, inform her that if she had a son he would officially adopt the child. She never wanted a child; she wanted to be his wife. That was never going to happen. I told her if she kept the name of the father as unknown on the child’s birth certificate, she could stay at Tartarus. I understood she had no family; however, when she had the baby, she just left. I checked the records. She did leave the father’s name blank. I was shocked and pleased. I hoped I’d never see her again, but that was never going to happen. People like her always come back.”
“People with no family and nowhere to go you mean?”
“Please, she tried to steal my husband if you think for one moment—”
“She didn’t need to steal him, Mother. You gave him away.”
“Do you want me to continue, Atticus? Because it doesn’t change anything so I would much rather—”
“Oh forgive me for stating the ugly truth, Mother. Please, do continue.” His lips flatten as a nasty bite of his jaw accompanies his accusatory tone.
“She returned when Tia was three. I don’t know where she had been. Honestly, I didn’t care, and she wasn’t forthcoming. She was clearly destitute and desperate to come knocking on my door. She was extremely grateful for my generosity, assured me that she only wanted a home and an honest job. I warned her that she and her bastard had no legal claim.” Atticus recoils as I do at his mother’s venomous insult. “I informed her that there was a covenant protecting the Kraus family fortune, and not a single penny could be entailed away to any illegitimate offspring.”
“That’s not true though.”
“Oh no! Did I tell a lie to protect what’s mine?” She holds her fingers to her mouth in mock horror, and Atticus looks unamused, his face darkens and she rushes to continue. “After a year, she came to me and she asked about you. Whether I would ever introduce you as Tia’s half-brother. I have to tell you, my blood ran cold that day.”
“That would presuppose you had a warm heart to begin with, and we both know that’s not true.”
“My heart beats for you, darling. Everything I do is for you.”
“Everything you do is for you, Mother. Please let’s not confuse this confession with anything other than me finally learning the truth. A mother’s love comes in more forms than keeping a healthy bank balance. It’s the one thing Tia and I have in common: Neither of us knows what it’s like to have a mother who makes us feel loved and only wants us to be happy and safe.” He visibly shakes off the softness in his tone with a sharp jerk of his head and snatches a tumbler of clear liquid from his desk. His mother hesitates for a moment until he replaces the glass before she speaks again. I wonder if she was expecting the glass to become a missile too. Anger, hurt and rage are palpable, and since I can feel it through the camera lens, Mrs Kraus must feel like a sitting duck.
“I told Margaret you weren’t Tia’s half brother; you didn’t share the same father. You were born in wedlock, however, and the birth certificate has Ole Kraus as your father. You were the indisputable heir.” She cups the side of her mouth conspiratorially and whispers loud enough to be heard just as clearly as in her normal voice. “Atticus, I told another lie since you seem to be keeping score. I told her that Tia would never have a claim to any part of the Kraus fortune because she was illegitimate.” She drops her hand and straightens her back. Atticus narrows his eyes, and she waves off his intense glare. “I promised Margaret that I would personally see the family right if she kept her mouth shut. She did, until the day she died. I actually found that surprising. She was strangely loyal, more so to me, I believe, than her own daughter. I never could fathom that.” She sniffs, her tone amused and astonished at the same time.
“Maybe she thought you would keep your word.” Atticus bites out each word through a tight, pulsing jaw.
“My word?”
“And see the family right. Perhaps she thought Tia would get her inheritance,” Atticus states flatly at the picture of utter confusion on his mothers face.
“I did see her right. They never starved, they had a roof over her heads, and she had a job until she died, even when Tia went to jail—” His bitter laugh interrupts.
“Yes, yes, you’re quite the saint, Mother.” His lips curl with distaste, and he sinks slowly into his high backed chair.
“And my real father?”
“Oh Atticus—”
“Real fucking father!” he booms, terror flashes across her face, and she jumps a good few inches in her chair.
“He was a family friend, a doctor. I’ve known him all my life. It was just one night, like I said, but even so, I didn’t see him at all after you were born. I avoided gatherings where he and his wife might be in attendance. I never told him about you. They didn’t have children, and I was worried he would try and claim you.”
“A name?”
“Ivan Eriksson,” she mutters, dropping her head and clasping her hands together. Atticus scrawls the name on the corner of the notepad on his desk.
He looks to be counting in his head or processing some complicated math problem, and it takes several minutes before he speaks again. “So Tia is the heiress to the Kraus ‘fortune’; she’s the heiress of Tartarus Hall?” He air quotes around the key word in his statement.
“Yes, she’s your father’s bastard.”
“Oh let’s not start with the name calling, shall we, Mother, because I think we both know who the devious, back stabbing slut is in this fucked up mess.” His litany of insults causes her to reel back and her mouth to gape in outrage.
“Atticus, how dare you… Everything I’ve done was for you!” she pleads. “I made a mistake, but I’ve spent everyday trying to secure your legacy.” She reaches across the desk to take one of his clenched fists but wisely pulls back before making contact.
“If that was the case, Mother, you wouldn’t have gambled with the company’s bottom line, and you wouldn’t have partnered an illegal deal with the Russians that will very likely destroy the company and kill both of us in the process.” He lets out an incredulous laugh, flat and humourless. “If I can’t find the missing funds, thanks to you, the only thing we have left of value is Tartarus Hall, and now you’re telling me it isn’t even ours.”
“We have the money that bitch stole. It will be enough to get them off our backs and give you time to restore the company,” she snaps.
“If she took it.”
“If she didn’t, where is it?”
“I don’t fucking know, Mother.” He roars and she freezes. Long seconds pass before she whispers.
“You know what they’ll do to us if we—” Fear pinches each word, making them tremble on her tongue.
“I’m aware of the shit-storm you’ve landed this company in, yes.”
“We’ll be ruined, Atticus. If she has anything to do with it, you must find out.” She clasps her hands together in proper prayer this time and then begins to wring them anxiously. “I should’ve gotten rid of the little whore when I had the chance.” She barely finishes her malicious musing when Atticus leaps from his seat and, in a series of terrifyingly agile movements, has lifted his mother and hauled her up against the far wall. She is poised on the tip of her fine Italian shoes and is clasping her hands at Atticus’s wrist trying to ease the chokehold he has around her neck.
“Say that again. Just whisper it, Mother, and I’ll continue to squeeze. You’re not worthy to utter her name. The lies you fed me, I will never forgive, but if you harm her now, I. Will. End. You.”
“Atticus, I was just trying to protect you and the family fortune. Your grandfather was going to give it all away. If I hadn’t found that Will—” Her voice becomes faint, her words hanging in the air as she pleads for her life, her fingers frantically trying to pick apart his hold.
“Just be thankful I have every intention of winning her back.” He releases his grip, and she has to steady herself on the wall to prevent falling to the floor. She sucks in some deep breaths and rubs at the mark already formed around her neck.
“And if she has the money, if she really knows what we’ve done?”
“What you’ve done, Mother.”
She manages to straighten herself to her full height, visibly regaining her strength and resembling her son in every way that is chilling, calculating and cruel.
“It was your signature on your grandfather’s Will, Atticus, I’m pretty sure she will see it as the same thing, darling.”
“I fucking hope not, or I’m just going to have to do the one thing I’ve never done before.”
“What?” Her mouth twists with a knowing smile, which is at odds with the question.
“Pray Mother. I’m going to have to pray she knows nothing about any of this.”
“How could she know? Your grandfather may have hated me, but even he wouldn’t have told her; he loved you above anyone. And I made damn sure nothing was in the copy of his Will you signed.” She is once more the confident, aloof, and arrogant woman who walked in a short while ago. Atticus narrows his eyes at her, and I can see undiluted hatred pouring off him only to bounce off of her, unaffected. She waves her hand dismissively and turns to leave.
“You underestimate a broken woman, Mother. She’s not the same girl, not by any stretch, and she’s after something from us.”
“She gets nothing, understand? You want to win her back, fine, but if you don’t—”
“I will do whatever needs to be done.” He cuts her off dead, his back to the camera, and even from across the room, she visibly shivers from the glare he must be fixing on her. He turns back and I freeze the image on my screen. Tia had said that woman was pure evil, but at this moment in time, I know which one of the two I happen to fear.