Source: Pixabay
“So, that’s Angela,” Casey murmured in the soft darkness of their bedroom. “Your lovely, drug addict Angela I’ve heard so much about.”
Declan turned his head to stare at his wife across the gaping space in the bed between them.
He gritted his teeth. “There was never anything between us.”
She gave a brittle laugh and turned her back on him. “There was never anything between you, yet you screamed out her name on climax on our wedding night. If there had been something between you, what would have happened?”
Declan turned his face away as a rush of shame suffused him. Casey was right dammit.
“I’ve apologized for that--”
“Yes, you have. But we both know you still love her--”
“I don’t.”
Casey sat up. She leaned over him to switch on the bedside lamp. The sudden flood of light had Declan closing his eyes.
“Can you please repeat that?” She smiled. “Just for the record?”
He clenched his fists. “I don’t love her.”
Casey snorted. “Then what’s she doing here?”
Declan sat up to face his wife. “What’s with the third degree? Eh, Case, I’m the last person who should be grilled on unfaithfulness. I’m not the one caught in bed with my brother!”
Her head jerked back as if struck and she went pale. Declan shook his head. “I shouldn’t have said that."
Casey grimaced. “You should have. It’s been eating at you, hasn’t it? That you found me in bed with my brother?”
Declan glared at her, ashamed and agree that even now, years down the line, she felt no shame. “Stepbrother,” he gritted out.
She raised her eyebrows. “If that makes you feel better.”
He leaned forward. “He’s your stepbrother. And you’ve apologized and--”
She eyed him coolly. “Did I?”
Declan held on to his patience with effort. “We’ve moved past it, we have a daughter, a family--”
“Do we?”
He stared at her as a red mist rose before his eyes. “What’s this Casey?” he asked softly.
She fell back on the bed. “I will die--”
Fear clutched at his throat in a vice-like grip, and Declan caught her hand. “You won’t, the treatment--”
Casey tugged her hand off his grip and glared at him. “Jeez, can you just stop being self-righteous and grow up? You heard the doctors, we all did. I will soon die, maybe tomorrow or next. We can stop pretending.” She took a deep breath. “I never loved you.” Her eyes met his without remorse. “Esther isn’t yours.”
Declan’s fingers tingled. A cold shiver settled somewhere at the bottom of his spine and stars flew before his eyes. “I-I-I don’t believe you.” The hoarse words left his dry throat, dragging along sensitive nerve endings and he winced. “I don’t believe you. Esther is 100% mine.” He thumped his chest. “Mine, my child.”
Casey eyed him pityingly. She reached out to adjust the pillows, settled in and closed her eyes. “Your Angela is here now. I never cared about you. I married you to appease the rumors around I and Yando. I’m dying. We don’t have to pretend anymore. If you like believe or don’t. I’m leaving tomorrow.”
Declan stared at his wife. He clenched his fists to stop their trembling. Perhaps, he was dreaming. This wasn’t how it was supposed to play out. The plan was to grow old with Casey and Esther and live happily ever after.
Love didn’t come into it.
He had been determined, he still was. But he’d just had the wind knocked out of him. “Casey--”
She popped one eye open. “Get out. Please,” she added quietly.
Declan shook his head. “We should talk--”
She yawned. “About what? The lie we’ve been living to appease this shitty town and your pastoral image?” she said with a sneer.
“Casey--”
“I need my sleep for moving tomorrow. You’ve always known. We both know we never loved each other. Hell, I never wanted a child, but my parents kept going on and on about what a curse it would be to have a child with my brother--”
“So you passed her off as mine,” Declan whispered.
She opened her eyes and shrugged. “It was easy. You were easy; you wanted a child so badly, it was pathetic.”
Declan gave a bitter laugh dredged up from a dark place inside him. “And, let me guess. Yando doesn’t want a child?”
Casey had the grace to blush. “No, you know how busy he gets with his club.”
“And how do you know he wants you?”
She glared at him. “I don’t have all the answers except one: I will no longer live a lie as the local Pastor’s wife.” She shuddered. “I’ve endured this as much as I can. I’ve got only months left, let me spend it with the man I love. Please, Declan.”
The man she loved. Her brother.
Declan flung his shaky legs to the ground and rose. For a second, he stared around the bedroom they’d shared for five years. With a woman he didn’t know. He shook his head. No, he’d always known but blocked it for Esther’s sake.
Jesus, Esther.
“You aren’t taking Esther with you dammit,” he said, fury giving his words a deadly edge.
Casey yawned. “I don’t want her.”
Declan froze. Perhaps, he’d harbored a little hope that the past fifteen minutes was all a dream. Her casual, cruel words were the nail on the coffin that their marriage now occupied.
Declan turned and left without a backward glance.