Kade (NSC Industries) (27 page)

I nodded in agreement then frowned at myself. What the
hell! I shook my head to clear my thoughts. “Why if you named Will as Marcus’s
Father, didn’t you tell Will that Marcus was his?”

This was the part I was struggling with. To live a lie
you have to carry it through in all areas. Her eyebrows rose and she tutted
loudly, “Because Will was a fool where children were concerned. Look how he was
with you. If he thought for one second that Marcus was his then all our plans
would have changed to include him. I couldn’t have that; it took us bloody
years to get closer to the chip. Speaking of which, you can hand it over now.”

I remained seated and stared in amazement at her. “You
really are utterly insane.”

She shrugged and pursed her lips, “Insane or clever, take
your pick.”

I barked out a laugh and shook my head in exasperation,
“Bloody hell!”

She smirked at me, “I was clever where Marcus was
concerned though. The stupid little boy really thought it was his Mummy getting
beaten to death outside the closet door. His story to the police helped no end,
even though we had already bribed the coroner to falsify the records. But
Marcus, he was more useful than I could have ever imagined.”

The wrath that had been smouldering now erupted into a
fire of the greatest degree and I flung for her, pinning her back in the chair
as I brought the tip of my knife to her neck just below her right ear.

“Do you even realise what you did to him you heartless
bitch? He suffered more than any of us.”

She didn’t relent, the stupid cow just wouldn’t back down
and my heart clenched when she smirked at me. “Something you don’t know Grace,
is that I have followed you and Marcus through your entire lives. I know what
you did for him. I know he didn’t need me. Why would he when you were there for
him, spreading your legs like a little whore just to save your brother’s sorry
ass.”

I closed my eyes and relished in the calm that enveloped
me as she continued. “You would do anything to save him wouldn’t you, Grace?
Including sleeping with his dealer to pay off his drug debt, a debt that was
chasing his tail and threatening his life. And you look at me like I am a whore
because I slept with Will. You slept with someone to pay a debt, Grace. I’d say
that makes you a first class whore.”

The rhythm of the pulsing in my veins took control and
settled my turmoil as the tranquil aura descended around me and soothed all the
anarchy my mind was struggling with. My stomach warmed, feeding me with a sense
of inner solace as my breathing levelled out and my heartbeat slowed.

She had a death wish and I knew she was awaiting death as
she kept goading me.

“And just like me, you got pregnant, didn’t you. I knew
you terminated but really Grace, a backstreet baby bin? Even I wouldn’t stoop
that low.”

“You bitch!” I hissed at her and pressed the blade deeper
against her throat.

“Do it! End it Grace.”

My hand shook violently as I compressed the knife deeper,
her eyes widening slightly but then she laughed at me. “You are pathetic, you
can’t do it can you!”

I stared at her, willing my hand to push that bit extra
and finish the nightmare I had lived in.

“Do it,” she goaded further as her eyes glinted
manically. “You need to spend your days in a cell, rotting and festering. END
IT!”

My chest was heaving as my whole body strummed with the
need to kill her but my heart beat savagely against it, arguing and wrangling
against the hatred that ran through my soul. It was too intense and the clash
was bringing me to my knees, swallowing me whole as I fought against each
conflicting emotion and demand.

“No” I whispered finally but as I started to move away
the knife she wrapped her hand around mine and smirked at me forcing me to
close my eyes so I didn’t witness the corruption and depravity inside her.

“Oh, and one more thing before I join Will, Grace.” She laughed
with an evil malevolence and cocked her head. “Robert wasn’t your Father.”

I opened my eyes and fixed them on hers as she uttered
the statement that became her final words and my whole world collapsed.

“Grant Baxter is.”

She tipped her head, smiled and then plunged the knife so
far into her own neck there was no coming back from it.

“Noooo….” I cried as my heart stuttered and I fell back,
my eyes just staring at her lifeless ones as the shock took me and strangled my
windpipe.

My head was still shaking from side to side as my life
dimmed and petered out before me.

Why couldn’t she have died and remained dead eighteen
years ago? Where had all the cruelty in her stemmed from? Were people born that
way, was I born that way?

Her last words swam through my daze as Mason’s face
blurred before me and I felt arms surround me.

Grant Baxter is your Father.

Grace was quiet when they returned and I pulled Mason to
one side. “What happened?”

He shrugged and exhaled deeply, “I dunno. She went in; we
followed when I heard a funny noise. Grace was on the floor and her knife was
in the side of her Mother’s neck and she hasn’t uttered a word since.”

I nodded when he patted my shoulder and left me alone
with her.

“Grace.” I whispered as I crouched before her, “What
happened, sweetheart?”

She lifted her eyes to mine and the devastation in them
bore through my soul and twisted my heart unbearably.

“She made fun of me.” Her voice was blunt and level and I
cocked my head in confusion.

“Why?” I asked softly, urging her onwards with the
tenderness I knew she needed right now.

“Because I slept with Marcus’s drug dealer to save his
life, and then I got pregnant and I terminated it and they made a mess and now
I can never have a baby.”

It all came out as a jumbled mass and I stared at her. Of
all the things I expected her to be upset over, including killing her own
mother, it was this she decided to indulge me with.

“Okay,” I sighed heavily and took hold of her hand. “Well
at the moment I’m not sure how to feel about it or even how to help you deal
with it because it’s obviously something you need to take in hand and deal with
but Grace, after everything that has happened tonight, I think you should be
taking care of how you feel about…”

“The death of my own Mother?” she asked as she tipped her
head and narrowed her eyes on me. “You can say it Kade. Both she and I knew
that’s where it would end tonight. We had both accepted it and she got what she
wanted in the end.”

“And what was that?”

“To hurt me” she answered frankly.

I nodded and grasped her chin in my finger and thumb so I
could tilt her face towards me and look in her eyes directly, “How did she hurt
you, Grace.”

Her eyes narrowed slightly as they flicked rapidly over
my face and she leaned closer to me. “She… she told me something,” she
whispered as though it was a secret.

I nodded in encouragement for her to carry on but I
released a faint growl when I heard the door open behind me.

I watched in shock as Grace slowly lifted her eyes to
view our intruder then launched from the sofa, knocking me over in her mission
to get to whoever had entered.

“YOU FUCKING BASTARD” She screamed as she leapt at Grant
and took them both down.

I couldn’t move as I watched with a shocked reverence as
she began to beat him to a pulp. Her fist crashed into his face over and over
and my eyes traced the splatters of blood spray across the room.

“Whoa!” Mason shouted as he burst in and yanked her back.
She kicked and screamed as she struggled to get back to her object of
infuriation. “Grace!” Mason snarled as he struggled to hold her.

Grant scrambled to his feet and looked at her sadly, “I
am so sorry, Grace. You have no idea how sorry I am.”

“Tell that to my
Father
when you meet him!” she
spat, emphasising on the Father part.

Grant gave her a pained expression and I watched him as
he swallowed heavily. “It was a mistake Grace, a drunken stupid mistake. It was
once, a moment of weakness that has haunted me ever since.”

“Did she tell you?” she asked him and I grew dizzy with
all the cryptic words between them.

“Yes, but she swore me to secrecy. She said it would kill
Robert and we never spoke of it again but I demanded that I would be your
Godparent. I was actually surprised when she agreed. I wanted so much to be a
Father to you Grace, but she wouldn’t allow it.”

My jaw dropped when the latest revelation hit my brain
and frazzled it even more. Where the hell would all this end?
When
would
it end for Grace?

She seemed to calm in Mason’s hold but her face was still
full of both anger and hurt. “You should have told me, Grant.”

He nodded briskly, “I know, I know but when your parents
died, I was in prison and then it seemed to get harder and harder as time went
on. I’m already a terrible Father to Elizabeth, I’m sure she hates me and who
would want a Father like me, Grace? Who’d want a fucking villain and a murderer
as a Dad?”

“Someone who needed one,” Grace said quietly. “A daughter
who just wants to be loved.”

Grant screwed his eyes shut and opened his arms. We all
waited with bated breath until Grace took a timid step closer then another
until she fell into him and he enclosed her tightly in his arms, holding her so
close I thought he was going to break more of her ribs.

“Oh my God, Grace” he breathed into her hair as they both
began to cry. We all went to leave but as we approached the door, it opened and
Liam walked in.

He looked sadly over at Grace then nodded dolefully as he
held out an envelope containing passports, fake ID’s and cash, “It’s time to
go.”

She drew in a breath and nodded as she turned to me,
“Ready?”

I nodded in return and smiled as I left her and Grant to
say their goodbye’s as I said mine to someone who I knew I would never see
again.

I watched her as a tear trickled down her face but she
smiled happily at me. I opened my arms and she walked into them and hugged me
back hard. “You promise me that you’ll be happy, Kade.”

“I promise, Ava.”

“I know Grace can give you that. I know she can give you
what I took away.”

I smiled and shook my head, “You never took anything from
me, Ava. You always gave so much of yourself and for that, I’ll always love you
but Grace owns both my heart and my soul.”

“I know and I’m so happy that you have found what Mason
and I have. Don’t ever stop loving her, she needs you and you need her.”

She drew back and blew out a determined breath as she
glanced at Grace behind me. “Please…”

“I promise to take care of him.” Grace finished for her
as I held out my hand and she slipped hers into it. “Thank you for keeping him
going until I got to him.”

Ava flung her head back and laughed but then shook her
head rapidly as her tears started to stream her face. “Goodbye” she choked out
before Mason slipped his arm around her and led her out.

Grace looked up at me and grinned, “Let’s get this show
off the ground.”

I winked but as she opened the door to leave, Liam
shouted after her. “Beaumont!”

She turned and gazed at him as he smiled tenderly at her,
“Job well done. Thank you, Grace.”

A sob erupted from her but she nodded and then saluted
him, “Thank you, sir.”

They gave each other a respectful nod, then we turned and
left.

The peace was amazing, after a hectic day of chasing the
damn bloody puppy round the yard, it was so nice to hang and be me.

I reflected on the previous two years and smiled at what
we had actually achieved in such a short period of time.

We had settled in Italy, not too far for when I wanted to
return and see Liam. My Father had retired and joined us, bringing along Nicola
to finally make an honest woman of her. She had blessed us with a beautiful
little boy whom I doted on and he filled my days with joy as Nicola helped Kade
manage his IT Company whilst he studied to be a nurse.

We had buried the chip and had never spoken of it again.
It was cursed and it didn’t belong in my new family.

I looked down and prised my eyes open as I savoured the
sight of the wedding band on my finger. I was forever staring at it and it made
my heart skip every time I read the words around the edge.

‘Fuck, I love you’

I had laughed happily when he had presented it to me in
the tiny chapel where Kade made me his. He had looked bloody hot in his suit
and I had been desperate for the ceremony to be over so I could ‘fuck’ my
husband. There weren’t many that could say ‘I fucked my husband last night’!

“Are you ready?” Kade asked and I looked down from my
hanging rope cage and sighed happily.

“I am.”

He grinned up at me as he took the rope from the bracket
and lowered me down, “Good, you’ve been up there over two hours.” He tipped his
head at me and his eyes softened as he smiled tenderly, “You are so fucking
beautiful Grace Hamilton.”

“I know!” I grinned back.

He laughed as he undid my enclosure, then grabbed the
hemp holding my body in a tight pose and pulled me towards him, “Any requests?”

I nodded and he brushed a stray strand of hair from my
face. “I want you to love me.”

He closed his eyes, shivered then reopened them and gazed
intently at me, “I’ll always love you Grace, always. Death won’t even cease the
love I have for you. You’re my breath, the energy that courses my veins and the
food that fuels my body.”