Valencia

I saw the people hustling around the house preparing for the party. I had called in for an event planner to help me up in setting everything up. I had invited everyone around us and all those we have ever known. It was very easy and mind it I had engraved the words on the card that the new owners of the house have invited them to the party.

My entire family was sulking somewhere in their room beside my brother Karl he was back to work. Well, whatever he had left of it. Even the evil duo hadn't shown up their faces. Neither anywhere in the corridor or anywhere near the dining table. I had asked Nana about them who only told me that everyone had taken breakfast up in their rooms.

Everyone was in their places but just not Claire and today was the time for it.

Picking my phone I went outside in the garden. Nodding to one of the guards to follow me to an isolated place.

"Make sure no one comes near until it's your boss," I ordered him before looking around once again and placing the call.

"Hello, Richard this is Valencia, Claire's friend," I told him as soon as he picked up.

"Valencia, how are you?" I knew he was in a hotel nearby and had checked in. I had made all the necessary arrangements for everyone. In the same hotel where he was staying there was another man who he was going to meet for the first time but he shared a very special bond with him. Even he hadn't known about it yet. It was going to be interesting as Claire would try both of them to explain things to them with Alexandro not too far behind demanding explanations

"I'm good. How is everyone settling in the hotel? Everything's fine I hope," this man wasn't a danger to me.

"We are good. Thanks for everything." I could hear the giggles of children in the background. I heard him moving outside.

"I have got the payment as you had told. Thanks for it I really needed it." There was desperation in his voice. I sympathized with him understanding his condition.

"No problem. I would be giving you more under our arrangement."

"I know you won't back down from your promise." This man was smart. He had clearly seen through my lie. He knew it I wasn't Claire's friend. He had demanded from me to know who I was. I had cut the call then but digging deeper into this man's present conditions I had realized that he was a desperate man and I should say a loving one too.

"I won't, as I had promised, you will get to meet to meet the boy's father soon enough and I would make sure that the mother also complies too." I heard him sigh on the other line.

"You don't know what this all could mean to me." I could feel myself looking up in the sky as I heard him say this. I wanted to tell him that I knew what it felt like this. How did it feel like to be desperate enough to do anything?

"It could mean you saving a child whom you have thought to be yours for years." I couldn't even comprehend how devastated he would have been knowing that his child was suffering from cancer and on the other hand coming to know that he wasn't even his. It was easy for him to love him but it wasn't to hate him.

"He will always be my son. I don't care who is biological parents might be. I and my wife are the only parents he had." I could hear the emotions of anger in that voice. He hated Claire. It was a mutual feeling that we both had for her. She had deceived him and the worst part he had been once again deceived when he came to know that he wasn't his father even. I knew his wife already loved that child and she was expecting. He was a working man, using every penny he had to save his family and his son.

"You won't have to worry about that, Richard. Your wife will never come to know about what you had done. No one will until I want to and I have no desire to do so not now or ever." I had nothing but sympathy for this man. I hated to hurt this man but I knew the truth behind everything will actually break him. Claire had done some heinous things and it hurt to know that this man had been dragged into this whole mess just because he looked like Alexandro, which was something hard to digest.

"Be here alone at nine sharp. I have arranged a car for you to bring you here alone." I ordered him looking around to see that no one was here. The guard stood on duty making sure that no one was here.

"I will be. Thank you once again." He said before cutting the call. I was paying for his medical expenses. It was the least I could do for a child. I wanted to hate the child with my everything but I knew I couldn't. It wasn't there in my heart. He was an innocent child who was hardly two years old and was suffering. This child might have been a nail to my coffin for my love for Alexandro but who was I to blame an innocent soul when I myself had loved the wrong man. If it wasn't for Claire's actions then the child might have got the treatment before but that woman was nothing but a scared cat who had changed her number as soon as he had tried to contact her two months back.

Richard had told me in depth that bone marrow was needed for one of the parents. It was a shock for him to know that he wasn't the father but he knew if he wasn't the father but Claire would still be his mother. However, that woman had denied knowing him at first, and only when he had threatened her she had changed her number. He was at a loss until |I had called him. though desperate that man had made a bargain for his child.

Placing another call I saw Zach coming my way.

"Hello." I smiled at hearing his voice. Evan was here too. It was really hard to get him here in time but I had paid for expensive medicines and doctors to have his father recover faster.

"Hey, Evan this is Hilda." Zach had dismissed my guard and now stood where he was watching me. I gave him a not so friendly smile.

"Hey, Is Claire fine?" All this man worried was about her while all that woman has ever done was use him.

"Yes she is excited to see you but I needed to tell you this before you came here tonight." Evan was a very gullible man but what no one knew was once he got angry it won't end up great. Moreover the fact that the knowledge of what Claire had done won't settle well with him. Maybe I wanted him to blast at Claire and what she had been hiding for years. One man had loved Claire and the other had been used for her. Sadly both were victims of her.

"What is it?" If love made a person blind then I was sure that this man was blind for sure, in every sense I might add.

"Claire has been threatened by her husband and she has been scared. I had told her you are coming for her but she is so fearful of her husband that she might deny it when she sees you. I mean I can understand where this is coming from. He has guards everywhere and it won't be easy for her to exactly say that she knows you." Claire was going to deny that she knew him or even Richard but someone had to make sure that both of the men didn't give up. Richard wasn't going to give up because he needed both of them but Evan might.

"She doesn't need to be scared of that man. Tell her that I'm going to be there and no one would be able to hurt her." He insisted and all I wanted was to laugh at this lovesick man. I did feel bad for him from the deepest of my heart but someone had to show him the real mirror. Claire had loved only one man whom she had got through scheming things that even Hilda didn't know of.

"I know but she is but I can bet if you insist and see that you won't give up on her, she would definitely leave him and go with you. All I wanted to tell you was to not give up even if she denies if you show that how much you love her. After all, love is the only thing that Claire has been deprived of." The last words were really true. Claire was always going to be deprived of love not I was done with her.

"Thanks for letting me know. I won't give her up that easily. When I will come out of there it would be with her and only. I will see you there tonight." I laughed as he cut the call. He was going to walk out of here with a lot of pain and a broken heart. But I had to give up on the optimism of this man he didn't give up too easily.

"What you laughing about?" Zack asked making me look at him.

"Nothing but thinking how I'm going to enjoy tonight's party. What are you doing here?" I asked as he stood there casually.

"Can you ask Natalia to pick my calls?" I just rolled my eyes at his request.

"No," I walked off from there while he jogged up to stay with me.

"Why not?" I really wasn't going to forgive what he did do to my friend. He had used her love for him in order to have it coax out of her about my whereabouts. If he could do that now then what could he do in the future.

"Well, first of all, you used her, and second you don't love her, Zack," I said turning around halting.

"How can you say that?" He asked stepping up to me. Did he really think that I would be scared?

"I can that is why. If you had loved her then you wouldn't have used her but then I can say you never did because then you would owe up to her brother and say you love her?" I saw him not meeting my eyes over it.

"You could owe up like a man rather than asking her to keep your relationship secret. You are scared and a fucking coward when it comes to telling about Natalia." I didn't care that he might hurt me because I know he wouldn't. Zack wasn't Demyan's right-hand man because of muscle strength, he observed, understood, and then attacked. He was a man to be feared off just like Demyan was.

"I will do so in my own time, Valencia. I know what I did was wrong but did you know if he wouldn't have known about your location he would have sold off a whole consignment of new technology arms to the wrong people. You make him crazy and that is why I had to know where he was." I looked at him a bit shocked. I knew all the money Demyan had wasn't clean, but it was still hard to digest when I had to hear about it.

"So don't judge until you know," he told me. I just rolled my eyes at him.

"You could have," I couldn't speak because we were interrupted by a guard running our way.

"Sir, we have a problem," he stared at him with a glare.

"What is it?" I saw the guard gulp down in fear. We both stared at him.

"Sir, Ms. Natalia has arrived here. She is at the airport now. She had traveled through the economy." I actually laughed at his last words. Natalia and economy class didn't go hand to hand together. I could imagine her making complaints all through the flight.

May the flight crew and passengers be alive.

Writer's NoteWhat do you think will happen now? What will happen when it will be Valencia and Natalia v/s Hilda and Claire? The two best friends v/s another? Is everything going according to the plan? What worse could have Claire done? any ideas. Until next time... Love you all.