Page 2 of The Final Say

I raised a hand to be heard, directing my comments to Bryan. “I’m not sure you fully understand what I’m trying to tell you. Coming here was a mistake. I would ask you to explain this text message you sent Bethany, but I don’t need to hear anything from your lying mouth. This is more than enough concrete proof for me to believe nothing has changed. You still want what you can’t have.” I deflected from the fight in an attempt to keep the channels of communication open among the three of us.

Cameron used one hand to swing a very menacing looking skillet. It had been currently swinging in front of them over the island in the kitchen. It was his idea of improvising a weapon.

It smacked the knife from his opponent’s hand in one clean motion.

This infuriated Bryan and he lost his cool, tackling Cameron’s midsection with his big bulky frame and blowing the wind out of him. They stumbled together toward the back door with a newly installed frosted glass panel.

Things were spinning out of control.

Their momentum didn’t propel them through the glass, but it certainly did crack under the pressure. There was no way to know for certain which one of them got the worst end of it, but it looked to be Cameron from where I was standing.

My hand was shaking with the palm over my mouth simply stunned by this latest reversal of fortune.

They were never going to see the light until one of them was down for the count unable to defend himself against the other.

My heart was beating faster while they were pummeling each other into a bloody pulp on the floor. These two were seemingly adults, but you wouldn’t know it from the way that they were acting like overgrown teenagers.

“She will come around to my way of thinking. I should’ve made sure the job was done when I saw you fall down the stairs. I was the one to put that in front of you in the hopes that you wouldn’t see it coming until it was too late. I was pleased to see you tumble lying there helpless and not moving,” Bryan confessed without an ounce of compassion for his disruptive behavior.

I was stunned into silence.

There was no way that I could pretend to be unaffected by his words. He was not only controlling, but he was dangerous to be around.

Cameron almost died.

I had mistakenly thought it was my fault for leaving that box on top of the stairs. It was a good thing he was the bigger man and accepted my apology.

His tender arms and strong physique crippled me into believing we had a future together. In truth, Cameron was no different than Bryan, but he didn’t know the full extent of his betrayal.

These shenanigans were opening my eyes to the possibility of living alone, with regrets. Change was important for continued growth. Bryan didn’t even know the meaning of the word. He was stuck in the past in the quicksand of his deluded mind thinking that he was going to win me back with sugar-sweet words of appreciation.

There was no way I was going to surrender my independence to either of them.

The one glaring fact in all of this was that the taste of Cameron’s kiss on my lips hypnotized me into believing I was ready to forgive him. What he had done to me in high school was despicable in a way that affected my relationship going forward.

“I pity both of you. You are fighting over something that can’t possibly be either one of yours. Why would I stand here and watch this disgusting display of violence? I feel vindicated. I’m going to leave through that door,” I pointed out with my finger before turning my back on this angry outburst.

It was clear that distance was necessary in this instance. They couldn’t be trusted to have a civil conversation when the only thing they wanted was to physically dominate the other. It was wrong to give them an audience. It wasn’t easy to turn a blind eye to this train wreck.

Moving to this seemingly ideal seascape town was becoming an albatross around my neck. Storming out, I was met by a crack of thunder and a downpour that soaked through my clothes in less than ten seconds.

It was my house, yet I had decided to leave and give them the space to have it out once and for all. It wasn’t what I had signed up for. Unfortunately, this was my circus and these two were my monkeys. Walking away from them wasn’t going to be easy when they both had a special place in my heart.

One was my past and the other my future.

There was no way that I could stand idly by and watch them pummel each other into hamburger. This with their problem and I didn’t want to be in the middle of it.

It was tempting to go back when the storm came out of nowhere soaking me to the bone. My clothing was dripping, with one cold droplet running down my forehead and down the bridge of my nose.

The sound of an engine moving closer was concerning. A pair of headlights caught me, frightened. The person driving wasn’t slowing down, and I was directly in front of this vehicle about to take the full impact of the grill against my fragile body.

Chapter Two

Cameron

The fight was pretty much over when I clocked him with the skillet. He wasn’t able to mount any kind of defense and could only shield his face from possible injury. The man didn’t say uncle or cry for some kind of mercy but instead, continued to battle for the hand of a woman that didn’t want him.

It seemed unconscionable for him to have a high standing within the law enforcement community. He really was able to fool most of the people most of the time. Seeing through his disguise was easy when I had worn the same one in high school in a different way.

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