Forty Six

Chapter Forty Six

After more than a week of tedious, seemingly unending office works, Jennifer finally had the time to pay a visit to her ex- husband. It was extremely clear to her what she was going there to do; to ask him about the office issues he had messed up. But despite the clarity of her intentions, Jennifer knew within her that she wanted to ask more than that. She wanted to know where everything went wrong. Why he did what he did. What he knew about Hannah, she wanted to ask him a whole lot more questions.

But Jennifer knew if she would even ask questions, she won’t ask up to a third of the ones racing through her mind, because she was scared of what his answers would be. She knew whatever answer he would give her would hurt her more and she was determined to be not hurt anymore but the same people who exposed her to the kind of pain she was experiencing.

The car came to a halt, just in front of the common prison yard for male inmates. Jennifer got down from the car and entered through the gate, returning the greetings of the men at the gate. She took a look at the environment she had just stepped into. Most of the buildings were long rectangular blocks, some of which were connected L-shape to each other. Jennifer entered the first building that was just few steps away from where she was. The room she has entered was clearly the reception. A uniformed man stood behind the reception bar, his eyes trained on the phone in his hands. Jennifer cleared her throat to get his attention.

“Oh I am sorry ma’am. Ms Lewis right?” His sand coloured hair reminded her of Mark.

“Yes. I am here to see Francis Cutler.”

“Yes, yes. I will let the chief warden know now.” He reached for the land phone and punched a number, resuming a conversation with the person on the other side of the dial. After two minutes, he dropped the phone and faced her, smiling.

“He says he will be out soon to meet you. I will walk you to the room where you will be meeting Mr Cutler. The chief warden will bring him along.”

Jennifer nodded and waited for him to walk out from behind the bar. He came out and asked her to follow him. As they walked past what seemed like offices, Jennifer’s mind went to Mark again, her body shivering for a second as she recalled his touch.

“We are here ma’am.” The man motioned to the entrance of the room she was to meet Francis. She said thank you and opened the door, walking into the somewhat small room which reminded her of Silvanus little office. As she sat down on one of the two chairs, she placed her elbows on the table in front of her, studying the room. She was pleased that the chief warden did a good job of securing a decent place to have a private conversation with Francis as she had asked of him.

She did have to pay some fine as she would be using more than the time required to see an inmate, but it was a little sacrifice for a greater cause to Jennifer. The company was at the risk of getting multiple lawsuits if she did not pull herself together to see him. The iron door opened, scarping the ground as it was opened with force. The chief warden, a stout man with a bit of pot belly and a mischievous smile playing on his lips like he knew a deadly secret entered, a cuffed Francis behind him escorted by a guard.

Jennifer gulped, immediately getting up. Francis looked like the terrible looking man she last saw at the court, only this time, he was in the signature orange jumpsuit, not a suit. His gloomy eyes stopped staring at the white tiled floor and made contact with hers. Jennifer felt her spirit crush as she saw how much suffering was written in his eyes. But she soon reminded herself why she was there. Telling herself to not get unnecessarily pitiful for the man that tried to kill her, she expressed her gratitude to the warden.

“I will leave you two now, a guard will be just right outside in case anything happens.” He nodded at Jennifer and left the room for them.

They stared awkwardly at each other, Jennifer almost entirely unsure how to start a conversation with him. She gave him a short sad smile which he returned, but more sad. She sat down and said, “You can have your seat.”

He sat and the staring continued but for just a little while. Jennifer cleared her throat and decided to start talking. “Uh… so, you have amazingly tried to ruin my company over the past month and I need answers to a lot of things in order to bring things back to order.” She looked into his eyes more squarely, the fact that she started the conversation how she wanted making her more confident.

“It will be in your best interest to answer my questions and provide honest answers to it. If you don’t you risk losing the little you are entitled to.”

“Don’t you want to know?”His low, gruff voice asked, his eyes now returning the square look she had earlier given him. Jennifer, whose words had been cut short, felt her heart skip a second as the moment she dreaded happening was about to happen. But she was going to be stiff on her decision to be hurt no more, so she continued her talk.

“The first thing I want to ask you about is the advances you got from ten companies for the projects they assigned our company. Where is the safe Francis?”

He closed his eyes for a second, exhaled loudly then opened his eyes.“Don’t you want to know why I did it?”

Jennifer sat back, opened her mouth to reply him, but nothing came out. She closed her mouth, bit her lower lip, looking away from his stare as she debated within her mind whether to reply him and what to reply him with. After she had reasoned that it was probably for the best to not ignore his question. So, she looked at him and asked, “Why you did what?”

“Why… I tried to kill you. Why I killed you.” Jennifer felt her fingers quiver in what she could only interpret as fear. “Don’t you wish to know what was going through my mind as I pushed you into the ocean?”

“Don’t you think that I maybe don’t want to know?”

He chuckled softly. “I have known you for ten years or so or more, Jennifer. I married you, I can tell when you want to know something badly.”

Silence ruled the room for few seconds before Jennifer said, “Here is one thing I want to know, did you even love me at all or it was all part of an act?”

‘Like it was with Mark.’ She thought sadly.

“Fortunately for me, I truly did love you. I…”

“How then was it easy for you to smile at me this second and try to kill me the next?” Jennifer’s voice raised a bit as she glared at her former husband. This time Francis stare fluttered. He looked away from her face, his eyes now on the white tiles. He looked like he was debating how to answer her question.

“Please answer me.” Jennifer said, this time pleadingly as his silence was killing her.

He licked his lips, still looking away. “I cheated on you…”

Jennifer’s arm dropped off the table subconsciously as his confession hit her hard in the chest. She stared hard at him, shocked. Even though she was no longer married to him, the fact that he cheated on her while they were still together made her heart feel like it was bleeding as a result of too many stabbing.

“It was this one time.” He continued, still looking away like he did not have the courage to face her.

“I …it was with Hannah. When I realized what I had done the following day, Hannah threatened to tell you what happened. She said she was even going to lie that it had been going on for a while. And I did not want to lose you, I loved you. I still love you.” Jennifer let out a low huff.

“ So I was stuck and I had to play things Hannah’s way. When she saw I was doing things her way, she promised to get me the company, all of it. I just had to trust her. I got very greedy that the thought of having the whole company to myself was delightful.”

“Francis, I have heard enough.” He looked at her, tears in his eyes.

“I am sorry, it wasn’t supposed to get to the extent where I would have needed to kill you.” He sniffed and sat up.

“But you did, didn’t you.? Let’s just forget about it, you got what you deserved, I am fine with that and I definitely don’t want you still torturing me even after getting rid of you. Let’s talk about why I am really here.”

“The safe is in your room at the mansion.” Jennifer looked up from the phone she had just removed from her pocket. He gave her a very sad, apologetic smile. “I really am sorry for everything and I want to make things right. Just ask me anything, anything you need to know.” Jennifer nodded slowly and looked back at her phone to retrieve the things she needed.

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With a heavy heart or rather, a more pained heart, Jennifer walked out of the gate. She stared into space as she walked slowly, her hands pocketed towards her ride. The truth she had dreaded to know had been finally revealed to her and it was nothing she would have never thought of.

To think that Francis had cheated on her, that too with Hannah, she never saw it coming. She sighed deeply, feeling the pain in her heart much more afterwards. Her phone’s ringtone interrupted the melodrama going on in her head. She took it out, seeing the caller’s ID as the lawyer.

She picked the call. “Hello Mr Roberts, do you have any news for me?”

‘Good day Ms Lewis. Yes I do. The PI investigating Hannah has found something.’

The sentence pricked her interest. “Do tell.”

‘A certain Mrs Davies conceived Hannah as a result of the short affair she had with Mr Lewis shortly before he married your mother. The PI was able to trace her place of birth to a hospital that confirmed her birth certificate when their records were checked. Mr Lewis is indeed her father.” Jenifer felt her head swirl that she had to reach for a pillar close by for support.

“And the DNA tests we did also confirms it.” Jennifer gave out a shaky breath. When Detective Sanders had approached her few days after the court’s last hearing, she informed her that during the four day grace given by the Judge to find something to check if Hannah’s claim was true, they had conducted a DNA test after gaining access to her father’s blood bank. The result was a match with Hannah’s, but the detective feared Hannah found a way to manipulate the result, that was why she did not mention it in the court. When Jennifer heard this, a whole part of her wished Sanders was right about the manipulation, but now that the same was done privately, giving the same result as earlier, Jenifer could not help but wonder what exactly the story was.

“Mr Roberts, thank you so much. Is that all he found?”

‘Yes.’

“Alright tell him to please try to find more. Thank you for a good job.”

‘Sure. I’ll hang up now. Good day.’

“Good day.” The dial cut from the other end and Jennifer stared at phone as its screen went black. The things she was finding out that certain day was quite a lot to take in. Her ride drove in right in front of her.

‘I wonder what more there is to discover.’ She thought as she entered the car, hoping that the revelations would be over soon as that would mean her present troubles coming to an end.