“Roland! What are you doing?!” Mary cried hysterically and made to lurch forward but I rapidly clamped my hand around her waist and dragged her away from the scene to allow them dress up.
“I gave him everything! Why would he do this to me? Was that why he didn’t want to accept me?” she wailed, “h-he told me his parents won’t accept us and he was trying to convince them. He lied to me, Danika.” She broke down, her body wracking with heart-wrenching sobs.
“Shhhh, it’s okay, Mary…” I hugged her to me while Nadia who was still shocked, patted her back wordlessly. Roland lied to all of us. He was our friend and yet, he did this to us. Now I know how the camera disappeared and… Shit! My eyes widened. That was why she knew about Mrs. Dolly. He freaking told her! The bastard!
“I asked him to ask Mrs. Dolly to help convince his parents after you told us she was his grandmother, but he didn’t. He said it’s complicated and that his parents don’t listen to her. He was cheating on me with her and I thought he truly loved me.” Hot tears flowed down her tears as she sobbed and my heart broke for her. This isn’t fair. Come to think of it, how come she wasn’t physically or emotionally injured anytime Roland cheated?
I peeled her away gently to ask her.
She shrugged. “I don’t know… Maybe… Maybe because I’m an Omega.” That’s not true. Omega or not, she is supposed to feel something. Un-
Our eyes skidded to the two culprits as they came out from behind his car and strode towards us. Arm to arm! The effrontery!
I pulled Mary into my arms to keep her eyes away from them and save her heart from breaking further.
“I’m sorry, Danika, Mary, Nadia, please forgive me.” He dropped Paisley’s wrist and surged forward. “I knew you wouldn’t have approved that was why I didn’t tell y’all. I’m sorry, I know that’s not enough excuse.”
I scoffed with a sad smile. “You know, I’m not shocked at all, Roland…” His eyes lowered. “Maybe I never told you before now, but I haven’t had a single friend who didn’t betray me…” I looked at Mary and Nadia with the same smile. “I just pray you two also don’t hurt me someday…”
“I swear, I wanted to tell you!” he careened.
“You wanted to tell me? Really? Do you think this is about me? You fucken have a mate, asshole! Why would you cheat on her with this, this…” I flared my hands at Paisley disgustingly and saw his jaws clench tightly in anger.
“Stop, Danika. I told her I didn’t want this but she didn’t listen! She kept pushing and pushing!”
“And so cheating on her was the best thing to do, Roland?! We were all best friends!” Mary shook her head, ripped away from me, and ran. Nadia looked at me and when I nodded, ran after her. “Are you happy now? Are you happy to have ruined her heart? She loved you more than anyone and dreams of spending the rest of her life with you and yet, you hurt her with this bitch!” My nose flared at Paisley.
“Stop shouting at her, Danika!” He advanced at me and halted as Paisley jumped forth to grab his arm. “I love her,” he finished.
I chuckled, even if I was still feeling like this was a dream. “You don’t know what love is, Roland. And I hope one day in your life you would wake up to realize you by yourself, ruined your life…”
“What do you mean?”
“What I mean is that irrespective of you lying to me by helping this bitch nearly take my mate away from me, I will make sure you do right by her, and you know why? Because this is the truth I have been seeking for, that you deprived me of but now given to me on a platter of gold!” I was at his face at once, stabbing my index finger at his chest.
He grabbed my shoulders forcefully and said, “You can’t tell the King. He would kill me and send her away…”
“So I should stand by and let her take my mate, is that what you think I’m dumb enough to do?”
He didn’t respond for a second. “W-we would run away… We will let you be but please don’t tell the King, Danika… After all, it’s the King you want isn’t it?” He pleaded with fervor.
“So you knew all that and you allowed me suffer first? How fetching… how about I tell you to go fuck yourselves! Anything that comes to you, you very much deserve!”
Paisley hurried to his side and fell on her knees, the first action she has taken since we caught them. “Please, Danika, don’t do this… for the sake of my baby.” She touched her flat belly demurely.
“You caused it yourself! I begged you, Paisley. I told you to tell me the truth and I would help you. You made my life hell! I hardly slept at night, and during the day, instead of working, I was plotting and laying diagrams on how to uncover this unknown lover of yours, while still watching over my back for other forces bent on separating my mate and me. All along, I didn’t know it was him!” I pointed furiously at Roland. “He was the answer I sought, and yet he was in our midst plotting with us, as a matter of fact, giving us ideas on how to catch him! How shrewd!” I reeled with sardonic laughter, palming my face.
“I’m sorry,” he pleaded, joining her on his knees, “we wanted to disappear. We were just waiting for this month to end, so I can take my salary to support us. Please…”
I wrenched away from them and covered my eyes which tears incessantly leaked. This is all bullshit! All messed up! Roland and Paisley? Who would have thought? And Mary is going to hang herself for this, if we weren’t careful. She loved him so much, why, oh why?
I shook my head once more, rolled my cheek into my teeth, hissed, and started walking away.
“Danika!” he called.
“Danika! Please!” Paisley wept.
They were heading toward me while I walked faster. I cornered the path leading to our car and saw my friends in the car, with Mary in Nadia’s arms still crying. I didn’t want Roland to come near her so I halted and faced them. “Look, you two should go away from me, I am never forgiving you. I have already lost one friend so I know what it feels like, in fact, I am used to being betrayed by friends as I told you earlier. Leave me alone.”
“You have the King now, why not just leave us alone?” Paisley sniffed and asked. “I heard you are pregnant, so you should understand better why I would want my child’s father with me.”
“So you agree now that he is the father of your chil-” I bunched my fingers and covered my mouth as I choked on a sob. “When did this even start, Roland?”
“Danika…”
“When?” I insisted. I needed to know when this stupidity was invented.
“The day I came to visit you at the infirmary. I saw him,” Paisley said.
I nodded. “So after you found out about your mate what happened? Why didn’t you break up with her?” I directed at Roland.
“I told you already. Because I was already in love with her.” He snagged at me.
“You do not even regret it?”
He shook his head, offsetting his shiny curls. “Sometimes mates don’t end up together, Danika. I’m sorry to tell you that. I understand that you have always believed adversely but this is the real world…”
“Was that… was that why you wanted to take the King away from me, Paisley? You also believe that bullshit?”
In response, she bounced her shoulders blandly and came forth until her red-rimmed eyes were trained solely on me. “My mate rejected me and settled for an Omega. Why do you think I hate them so much?” Her eyes flicked to my friends for a beat. “He looked me in the eyes and told me the same thing: Mates often do not end up together…” There was bitterness in her tone. “So, I believed I could bear being married to the King, that was until I met him.” She smiled at Roland and despite not wanting this to be true for the sake of my friend Mary, I couldn’t deny I saw the love in their eyes for each other. “I wanted to tell you last night, Danika, I swear it… I have always wanted to tell you, but I concluded after all we will soon disappear, what’s the use of exposing us and then having you rattle to the King?”
“If you loved Roland why then did you continue forcing yourself on the King? Why did you… you seduce me?”
She replied as she shifted away, “I-before I found out about the pregnancy, I wanted to forget Roland. I told him we can’t work. I was fighting to marry the King by all means because I didn’t want my heart to be broken again. Your heart can’t be broken if you don’t love the person, right?”
“You tricked us all!”
“The same way you tricked us into believing Lance was your mate!”
“That was different!” I screamed.
“How?” She cocked her brow snidely. “When did trickery suddenly have different definitions for different scenarios of deceit?” The weasel wasn’t accepting her wrong. And if I’m being honest, she is right.
I inhaled in deep air and looked forward at my friends.
“Just let us go, Danika,” she drawled, earning back my attention. “I will live here until the end of the month and we will be gone. Nobody has to know, I beg you. Mary would find someone else that would love her. Or will you rather want her married to a man that doesn’t?”
“Only because you are here that’s why…” I countered her.
“That’s what you think…” she said curtly, closed her eyes, and when she opened them, she said, “Fine… if you want to tell the King then go on… he would send me away and then Roland will go to the dungeon or be killed, and then what? He didn’t marry Mary and my baby remains fatherless. Is that what you truly want?” Another batch of tears found their way down her face.
What am I going to do?
…