© Carey MacLean, 2012

Chapter 22

She wasn’t quite sure what to make of the look of suspicion that presented itself on Xavier’s face.  She knew she had to tell him more about her ties with those men; more that might lead on to additional questions.  With that look of his strewn across his face, she knew she had to take the chance.

“Xav,” she began and reached for his hand which he snapped away from her, as if her touch had burned him.  “I don’t know what possessed me to confront the bastards outside of the hospital.”

She looked down at her hand that now turned to lay palm up and empty; his hands now on his lap.

“I guess it was me trying to move myself past what Carter had done to me.  It’s no excuse.  They knew me from the hospital as their wife’s doctor.  All it took was an accidental meeting one night after work,” she explained.  “I hadn’t planned on confronting the first guy; the others, yes.”

“Mr. Withers,” Xavier said quietly of the first victim.

“Yeah,” she said.  “It just happened.  I was out with the girls and he approached me.  He never recognized me because I had gotten dressed up.  Needless to say, I had a few drinks too many and next thing you know, I had begun to question him about his temperamental character.”

She looked away from Xavier.  She felt guilt overwhelming her as to what her next confession would entail.

“Carter was right,” she said somewhat above a whisper.  “I am a slut.  I slept with the man that put his woman in that hospital bed, an inch from her death.  Mark, Brian and Denton were the only exceptions.  I never played them.”

She did what?  His brain fired off.

He didn’t know what to say to that.  His eyes narrowed on her and he didn’t know what to believe anymore.  Could he trust the words of the woman he loved and proposed to or the new person that he had been watching, emerge before him?

“So let me get this straight,” he began and his tone grew progressively louder.  “My fiancée whored herself out to nearly a dozen men with the initial plan of sticking it to them with guilt as to what they had done to their wives?  Did I get it right or did I leave anything out?”

He watched her as she didn’t agree or disagree with his statement.  It seemed answer enough for him at that point.

“I don’t know you,” he got up to his feet and she jumped up to stop him.

He held his hand out to let her know not to touch him and his stance motioned that he wasn’t going anywhere.

Not yet, he told himself.

“I didn’t whore myself,” she told him with vehemence lacing her words.  “I used my body to gain more information.  I did what women have done for ages; use my body to my advantage.  I did it to make a point with them.”

“And what point was that?”  He shouted.

He watched as she jumped back and an utter look of fear crossed her eyes.  Xavier wanted so much to rush to her, apologize and hold her but his rage didn’t allow his body to move.  His emotions were running on overdrive.

“I was looking for answers in the wrong places.  I guess nothing came from it,” she told him, her gaze averted.  “I walked away feeling cheap and used.  I am no better than a common slut.”

A tear ran down her face and he watched as the strong Mika he had held with so much esteem was slowly crumpling into tiny shattered shards of herself.

“Did you sleep with all of them?”  He felt himself speak but heard a more squeaky voice exit his lips.

She was certainly making it seem that way with each and every revelation.

“No,” she said quickly and looked up at him.  “There were a few others.”

“Who?”  He pushed.

“What’s it matter?  Do you even believe me?”  She asked him in a skeptically worrisome tone.

“I believe that you have issues you needed to work out and that clearly you went about it the wrong way,” he began.  “I believe that you meddled in something you shouldn’t have, especially after what you’ve been through.  You got caught up in the thick of it and they’re all dead!  God Mik!  Are you some kind of martyr?”

She didn’t answer him.

Am I a martyr?  She asked herself.

It was a good question.  With a quick moment of introspection, she had come up with one answer – yes she was.  She was a martyr alright; a martyr that had been filled with utmost rage that bordered psychotic lunacy.

“I’m beginning to think that I am,” she told him as she wiped a few more tears that had fallen down her cheeks.

“Now you’ll answer my last question,” he told her.  “Who?”

She did him one better.  She took out the photographs that Peter had showed her from her purse and dropped them on the table in front of him.  He approached his seat and took it as he began to leaf through the photographs.

She took a look at him and she had the sentiment that everything was lost – she had resolved that she had lost Xavier.  She looked down to her left hand and reached for the beautiful band of metal and precious jewels and twisted it off.  Xavier was too enthralled in examining the photos to notice her gently depositing it on the table beside his busied hands.

“I’m sorry I lost you,” she whispered, her voice unable to maintain a steady level.

It’s all my fault anyway, she thought to herself.

She looked at his engrossed face, realizing he hadn’t heard her, turned and left for their bedroom.  It was time to pack.  Her words had made the decision for her.  As much as she didn’t want to lose Xavier, she’d rather lose him now with a chance of rekindling what they have – correction, had, instead of losing it completely with her ass landing in prison.

He hadn’t realized that Mika had left the room.  He had seen what she had meant by rather incriminating.  The woman had a few too many skeletons in her closet but something tugged at him.  The reality that he couldn’t even begin to imagine the pain and turmoil she had been put through with her previous relationship had hit him tenfold.  It was a wonder that the woman was sane.  And then to relive those memories with each and every battered patient that was brought in for her to treat?  There was no wondering as to why the woman had decided to distance herself from her post recently.  Heck, he couldn’t figure out why she hadn’t made the move earlier.

His eyes caught something that glittered on the table-top.  Looking up, his ring sat there, clearly not where it should have been the whole time.  Why had she taken it off?

Xavier felt his heart cry out in pain at the thought that the woman had left him without a simple word of goodbye.  He sighed his relief when he heard a thump upstairs.

She’s still here, he told himself.

His feet rushed to the bottom of the staircase, only for him to turn around, realizing what he had seen.  There by the front door, sat a suitcase.  Instead of rage consuming him, he felt defeat.  He had felt that he had lost her before she had even set foot outside of their home.

Xavier didn’t know what to do but he sure as hell didn’t want to see things end this way if at all.  Sure, she had a dark past; some of it much more recent than he had ever expected but it wasn’t something that could take away what the two of them had.  He hated that she had put herself in those situations of promiscuity to get her answers only to be left with voids.  What he hated more was the evident fact that she felt she had to leave him, that he had made her feel like he didn’t want her.

Mika had just finished putting the rest of her clothes in the last remaining suitcase, zipped it up and turned to head downstairs.

“Where are you going?”  She came face-to-face with a rather confused looking Xavier.

“I-I…” she stuttered.  “I thought it best that I left.”

“Why?”  He asked again which seemed like it was the only question he’d been asking her since she had walked through the front door earlier.

“Because you don’t need this.  I’m no good.  You’re better off with someone else.  I was kidding myself to think that my past wouldn’t-” she rambled onward until Xavier took three large steps to close the gap between them and grabbed the back of her neck and kissed her hard on the lips.

His kiss went from hungry and aggressive to slow, soft and filled with emotion.  She kept her eyes closed momentarily, feeling his breath on her lips as he pulled away and tilted his forehead to hers.

“Don’t go,” he whispered.

The doorbell rang.

“That’s the cab,” she told him and wrapped her free hand around his neck.

She knew she wanted to be the best woman there ever was for him and stay but she also couldn’t renege on what she had told Peter.  They had an agreement.

Why can’t you?  The thought occurred.  Xavier’s seen the pictures.  He still wants you.

“I should go,” she told him and pulled his face into hers for another sweet yet too quick of a kiss.

He felt as if his life was slipping away from him.  He knew he had to do something.

“I love you,” she said and looked him in the eyes as she did.

Xavier felt her hand slide down from his neck and rub down to his chest.  It came to a stop above where his heart lay, breaking as he noticed her determination to get out of there.

Mika had made it to the bedroom door before he finally turned and grabbed her free arm.  He turned her roughly which caused her to drop her suitcase in an effort to brace herself into his chest.

“You’re not going anywhere,” he now told her with force, both physically and with his tone as he pushed her against the wall next to the entryway.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out the ring she had left him with and held onto her left wrist.

“This,” he paused, “is to never to come off of that finger again, lest someone cuts it off.”

 She looked at him wide eyed and tears were now free-falling down her cheeks.  He slipped the ring back onto her finger and kissed the fingers to her hand.

“Please say you’ll still marry me,” he found himself saying.

He watched her attentively as her breathing seemed to slow along with her tears.

Ding.  Dong.

“Xav,” she began softly.

“Let it ring,” he told her and grabbed her face in his palms and crashed his lips to hers.

If he were being entirely honest with himself, he knew that there wasn’t a chance in hell that she was going to bolt.  But still, he held on to her for dear life.  For the fear that this was all a nightmare and when he woke, she would be gone and he would be alone.

She barely had made out the sound of the car leaving their driveway when she had realized that she wasn’t going to be going anywhere.  If the hold on her by Xavier was any inclination, the man wasn’t planning on letting her out of his clutches any time soon.

He pulled away and she watched the tenderness in his eyes shift as those orbs darkened into shades of lust while her hands rubbed his chest.

“I think I’ve missed my ride,” she smirked.

“Good,” he stated simply.  “We have loads to talk about anyway.”

She mentally groaned her displeasure at having to rehash everything they had just spoken about. 

“Good point,” she looked at him.

He gave her a chaste kiss before picking up her suitcase and laying it on the bed.

“I think you should call Connor and get him to drop by,” she added.  “He could bear witness to my testimony and who knows, he might be able to help us find a way out of this mess.”

And then, by tomorrow morning, I’ll know exactly what it is I should do, she told herself.

He couldn’t believe that she had wielded to his demands.  Peter had been floating on clouds since Mika had left him with the promise of being back by morning, at the latest.

His mind began to wonder of the possibilities that his life – their life would hold.  Was he behaving irrationally?  Was he crazy to think that she would indeed return to him by morning?

For the first time in all the years that he’d known Mika Stafford, he finally had her right where he wanted her.

Soon enough, he told himself as he felt his arousal crowd the crotch of his pants.

He chuckled as he lightly patted it down in an attempt to cool his urges and headed off to the tiny liquor cabinet in his den to pour himself a stiff one of bourbon.  Tomorrow was a new day and his new life, the life he should have had all these years was finally going to begin.

                                          *************************************

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