Chapter 23 He didn't…..
~Haven.
“Haven,” Harrington called behind me, his hand slightly brushing my wrist.
I halted, then turned to look at him. “I know it doesn’t matter but… whatever it was between Walter and I is over now.”
It suddenly felt like telling him would at least bring back a bit of my dignity.
I walked out of his office, completely ignoring everything else he said, when my phone rang.
Dad.
I slid the green icon and pressed the phone against my ear.
I sniffled and braced myself. I didn’t want Dad knowing I’d cried.
“Where are you?” he asked.
Oh… “um…” I stuttered.
“Meet me outside,” he ordered before the line went cold.
I stepped out of the office, clutching my bag and envelope in one hand.
My heart raced in my chest… wondering whether or not Harrington had told him what happened.
He shouldn’t be that stupid… especially with the fact that he was Harrington’s friend.
But at the same time, what if he spilled everything in the name of trying to make Walter pay for beating him up the other day at the club?
Dad’s car pulled up in front of me and my feet suddenly felt numb.
The door pushed open and Dad’s cold gaze met mine. He glared at me like he wanted to watch my heart being dug out.
I stepped in without uttering a word.
“Drive,” he ordered.
“I came with my car, I—”
“I’ll have it brought to Walter’s house,” he answered, not sparing me a glance.
The silence in the car was loud enough to deafen me… then Dad pierced it.
“Harrington called,” he started. “He told me you refused to take the job but he didn’t tell me why,” he said, then finally looked at me. “You refused because you didn’t get the spot you wanted, didn’t you?” His voice was etched with irritation.
I immediately shook my head. “No, Father, I—”
“The earlier you learn your place, Haven, the better. You really don’t have to try so hard to replace Hannah. It’s not possible…”
“Father, I’d prefer that you pull this car over and let me get off,” for the first time in a while, I looked straight into Dad’s eyes.
I was trying to make him think better of me but he kept taking me for a fool.
“What happened to being… good?” he asked.
I scoffed. “I don’t know. I should ask you. Listen, I need you to know that I’m not stupid. Being stupid is far from what I am and if anyone’s stupid here, it’s the daughter you hold with such… accord.
She’s sick. Sick enough to not be able to do anything herself, yet she’s in that house, burning with jealousy because she doesn’t want me to steal the thing she married.” Dad’s face dropped.
“Hannah is thin. So thin that I’m afraid she might vanish—and that’s the woman you think I’d be jealous of?”
“Watch what you say in front of the driver!” Dad cautioned, his eyes blazing with wrath.
“You didn’t think of that when you insulted me earlier, did you? Warning me to know my place.”
Dad’s fist tightened and his jaw clenched—usually the expression before he hits me—and I smiled.
“Hit me and you’ll see what I’ll do to Hannah. I’m not threatening you.”
“Pull over!” Dad yelled.
I smiled.
I stepped out, then leaned toward him. “Your daughter, Hannah—there’s something about her that’s like a ticking bomb, and the moment I lay my hands on what it is? She’s doomed.”
I waved, smiling warmly before walking away from the car.
The smile slowly vanished as I boarded a taxi.
I woke up excited, hoping the day would be a good one, but I was wrong.
Harrington chose to run his mouth and Dad decided to do the same.
I talked back and I knew that automatically meant the job being taken away—but who cared?
Nobody.
Not me…
Maybe… maybe not me.
……..
It was already enough that Harrington humiliated me and my own father insulted my existence… but I still managed to walk home to Walter pacing around the living room, and the moment I tried to walk past him, he grabbed my hand and fell right to his knees.
“Haven, wait,” he called, breathing heavily.
He had that same look on his face… the one he had before I left, and only then did I start to worry that something was truly wrong.
“I’ve been trying to call you,” he started.
“I blocked you,” I answered, sharp and precise.
Walter took a deep breath before getting up.
“There was no need for that. We… we both made a mistake. If that’s what it is to you.”
What?
“We?” I laughed. “We both made what? A mistake? First of all, Walter, what happened that night was not a mistake. It was a violation! You slept with me against my will!”
“I didn’t!” he yelled back, chest rising and falling. “I didn’t… it was the drink. I—I didn’t mean to have sex with you that night. I meant it when I said I just wanted you to have a drink with me but… the drink. My dad must have put something in it. He… he desperately wants Hannah and me to have a child. He must have thought we don’t have sex,” he revealed.
The thought of Walter sleeping with Hannah as well as me troubled me, but that didn’t matter.
I wasn’t supposed to be jealous.
What mattered was the fact that he was lying through his teeth.
“H—Hannah and I haven’t been having sex though, but believe me, that’s what happened,” he added.
“And you expect me to believe that?”
He must think I’m dumb.
The whole daddy story? I wasn’t buying it.
“Haven,” he called. “Can you just believe me for once? Ever since that night at the club, I swear everything I said—none of them were lies…” His voice trembled.
I ignored it.
At least I tried to.
“Do you have anything else to say?”
“Yes,” he answered, and the fear in his eyes came back. “That night, when we had sex… I—I didn’t use a condom and… and I don’t think I pulled out either. Haven, you… you might be pregnant.”