Page 60 of Six Wishes

I walk out into the hallway, forcing Brandi to take a few steps back. I look back to grab the doorknob just in time to see Bran’s eyes going all wide in curiosity, leaning forward as if to hear better. I close the door in his face and hear his head hitting the hard wood.

“What’s going on, Brandi? Why are you really here?”

She takes a minute to take in my serious face. My arms are crossed over my chest, and my legs spread wide, blocking any attempt she may have to open the door and get inside my condo.

“I miss you,” she finally settles on a lame excuse.

“After all these years of no contact?” I am not buying any of this but am curious where she is going with it.

“I just thought that, after those pictures came out, you’d want to be with someone you already know.”

“And don’t trust?” My question seems to throw her for a loop. She really had expected me to fall into her arms, and she is not sure how to deal with this unforeseen development.

I watch in fascination as the wheels in her head are turning at an incredible speed. She wants money, I know it. I just want her to say the words.

“I found out for you who took those pictures,” she sounds more confident now, almost has a smirk on her face, like she thinks she’s got me with that.

I tell myself that I need to remain calm, but I have a bad feeling about this, and I still need her to actually say the words. I hear the door behind me being cracked open, but I don’t bother to look why. I’m sure the curiosity got the best of Bran, and he’s trying to eavesdrop. He is worse than a high school drama queen.

“What do you know about that?” I keep my voice even. I am grateful that my arms are still crossed, and she can’t see my hands squeezing into fists under my armpits.

“I found out who took pictures of you with that woman you cheated on your girlfriend with. We are really not so different, are we, Van?” Her smirk is getting more confident by the second.

I already know who is involved in photoshopping those pictures considering the woman put her face on Chloe’s body. I mean, seriously, how stupid can one be? I already got Wyatt’s office on it and she will be getting something in the mail soon, but it won’t hurt to hear confirmation of it all.

“Her name is Karla Horvath, and she has been stalking you.”

Fuckin’ Tinker Bell, man. I knew she was bad news from the second she put her hand on me that night and asked me to buy her a drink. Thank God my puck bunny chasing days had been over for quite a while, or this could’ve been so bad.

“How do you know Darla?”

“Her name is Karla,” Brandi enunciates, and I swear she sounds just like Tinker when she got pissed off about it.

“And how do you know her?”

“We went to hi…” All of a sudden, she stops talking, realizing what was about to come out of her mouth.

“High school, huh? Interesting,” I continue staring at her. She doesn’t look so confident now. “How involved were you in the whole thing, Brandi?”

“I wasn’t inv…”

“How involved?” I thunder over her, and she finally gets the message. I have no idea why in the world she’s got such a low opinion of me. I mean, how stupid did she think I was?

“I’m sorry, I just needed…”

“Money,” I clarify for her. “Once again, all these years later, it is all about money. Unreal,” I shake my head in fake amusement.

Brandi’s face is white as a sheet now. She swallows the lump in her throat and gives it one more try. “I still love you, Van…”

“Kinda ten years too late, Brandi. And you want to get back into my life with this? Putting my naked ass all over social media? Fucking up my relationship with the woman I love?”

“I didn’t know Karla would take all those pictures like that. Or that she’d post them.” She starts grasping at straws, trying to throw Tinker Bell more under the bus. They’re both under the bus together though.

“So why did you photoshop them for her then?” Brandi always loved messing around on the computer. I wouldn’t say she was great, but she could do a thing here and there. And now that we’re talking, it’s all coming back to me.

“I just…” But she realizes that she just gave herself away and stops talking.

“You’ll hear from my lawyer, Brandi,” I give her a sad smile. “Don’t even try to deny anything…”

“I got it all on tape!” Bran’s voice booms behind me, making both me and Brandi jump. I turn around and see he has the camera of his phone in the crack of the opened door. “I got your back, brother!”

“Van, I am so sorry. We’ve known each other for so long,” she tries to reach my sympathetic side. She knows I don’t have an evil bone in my body. But hurting Chloe like these girls did was completely unnecessary.

“I hope that whatever money you got out of it was worth it.”

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