Page 22 of The Homewrecker's Fate

“This woman is everything,” I shouted at him. “She put up with your ass, took care of you, gave birth to your children, and took care of them. She made your house into a home and gave you every comfort when you were home to receive it. The way you repaid her for all that was to have an affair and then stand in her home and tell her son in front of her that you’re in love with another woman?” I bared my teeth at him like a feral animal. “You are about the lowest form of human pond scum I have ever met. I am not in love with you. I haven’t been in a long while now, since about a week after you took off out of my life without a word.

“You didn’t even give me the courtesy of a goodbye. You cleared out of my life like a thief in the night and ruined me. I couldn’t even tell you that I was pregnant. You knew we weren’t careful when we were together but left me no way to contact you. That reminds me – you were putting both Mel and me at risk for more than just pregnancies by doing what you did. You ruined the chance of this baby having a happy, stable family life like the one I grew up knowing. You ruined that for your other children and your wife, too. You are incapable of love and being loved. Someone who loves people doesn’t do this to them. They don’t lie. Not about the important things!” I threw the life lessons he was supposed to teach his son back in his face.

Rich winced as tears continued to fall down his face. “We still need to be able to communicate for the sake of our child.”

“No, we don’t.”

“We also work together,” he reminded me.

“That can be remedied, too. Considering the fact that you ruined my workplace for me and now everyone there calls me “homewrecking whore” even to my face, it’s a little difficult to get work done.

“Why didn’t you tell me? I would have set everyone straight.”

“Why didn’t you already do that? Why didn’t you do that from day one after our meeting in the office with the boss?”

“I didn’t think…”

“You never do, apparently. And your inability to do so cost me everything.”

“It cost me everything, too!” He shouted at me.

“You made the choices that cost you. I did not. If I’d known from the beginning that you were married, or even in a serious relationship, I would have never spoken to you about anything other than work, let alone started a relationship with you. I’m suffering for an innocent decision I made to trust a man who did not fucking deserve it! You are suffering by designs of your own making.”

“You’re right. I will set everyone straight at the office. You shouldn’t have to leave a job you love because of me.”

“That’s funny coming from you,” I huffed. “Weren’t you the one trying to convince me to take a demotion to go work at your old office, so you could move on up and not have your affair discovered?” His face flamed red, though I wasn’t sure if that was from humiliation or embarrassment at the fact that I remembered his stupid ploy. “You would have had me pack up my life, leave my job, go to a town where the only person I knew was you, and leave my sick mother behind to do it… And you didn’t even plan to be there! It was all some sick ruse to get me out of here, so your wife would never know. You need to stop lying to everyone, Rich. You lied to your son just a few minutes ago when you told him you were in love with me. No person who loved me would ever isolate me and rip my family apart just to spare the one he supposedly no longer wanted.”

“I think it’s time for you to go,” Braxton said from behind Rich.

“This is my house,” Rich sputtered at him.

“No,” Brax said casually. “This is Mel’s house, and she doesn’t need you here right now. Your kids don’t need you here either. They don’t need to hear anything more about this situation by accident. Avi doesn’t need this stress either.” He pointed at where I still stood with my arm locked around Mel’s waist. “You see those two pregnant women over there who look destroyed and have tears running down their faces?” Rich gulped and Brax pushed him back a step. “They don’t need this shit. You’re going to leave, or I’m going to escort you out the hard way.”

Rich didn’t say another word. He gave a slight nod of his head and turned to go. He took two steps, stopped, and then seemed to think better of whatever he’d been about to do or say because he finally left without another word.

Chapter 11

I had a two-day reprieve before it was time to suck it up and head back to work. As much as I wanted to give my notice or burn through my vacation days while I looked for another job, that wasn’t possible. I had a nice nest egg saved up but with a new baby on the way, that wouldn’t last long. I had to be practical because not many professional positions would hire an obviously pregnant woman. Plus, if word got out that I was pregnant with a married colleague’s baby, the only people who would hire me would be the unscrupulous bastards who wanted to take advantage, thinking I’d put out easily.

Looking at my office building from the outside made me want to vomit. That didn’t bode well.

“Oh look, it’s the office's homewrecking whore,” a woman who worked the front desk said as she and another lady passed by me. The second woman gave me a pained look and I couldn’t tell if it was because she felt bad for me or worried that I might go after her man next. Either way, it sucked.

I had adopted a policy not to say anything. It was becoming harder and harder to keep biting my tongue. As luck would have it, I had to ride the elevator up with the bitch and her cowardly cohort, who was definitely giving me sympathetic faces whenever her friend wasn’t paying attention. I’d bet money that the silent friend was seeing a married man and she only now realized how that would play out if anyone found out. Why else would she have sympathy for me?

Still, I refused to judge her. Maybe she fell in love with him before she knew he was involved with someone. Maybe I was way off base and she was just a nice person who didn’t judge. There was really no way of knowing because I didn’t plan on talking to either of them long enough to find out. When the elevator doors dinged open, I moved forward at a quick clip, but not quick enough. The bitch with the mouth tried to push past me by throwing a shoulder into my back. It caused me to stumble. I would have fallen flat on my face if a man hadn’t rushed over to catch me before I landed.

“What in the hell was that?” He growled at the woman. It was then, I knew my day was about to get infinitely worse. The man who caught me was none other than my baby’s father. The man standing beside him, Jameson Porter, was the owner of the company we worked for. Fan-freaking-tastic.

“What was what?” Mouthy bitch asked snidely. She had a name, and I knew it, but I refused to pretend she was a human being any longer, since she couldn’t be bothered to treat me like one. It was clear from her attitude that she didn’t know who she was speaking with, since Mr. Porter rarely made visits to our office.

“We watched you push Aviva,” he accused.

“I did no such thing.” She turned to the other woman who had been on the elevator with us and smirked. “Did I?”

“She’s pregnant,” the woman hissed at her. “What is wrong with you that you would push a pregnant woman down?”

“She’s pregnant with a married man’s baby. She is a homewrecker, if she tripped, maybe it was karma coming to bite her in the ass.”

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