He frowns at me.
“I was confused,” I cry. “I thought it was a sign, that she was the one.” My nostrils flare as I try to get a hold of my emotions. “The beautiful woman I had been searching for, for years, was right in front of me, but then when I looked at her . . . she wasn’t Kate.”
Christopher shakes his head in disgust.
“I told her the next morning that I’d made a mistake and was going home. I bought the remainder of her paintings and left.”
“Then where have you been for a week?”
“I believed in fate. The destiny I had dreamed about and thought I wanted wasn’t even real. It took me some time to see that what I had with Kate was real. She’s the woman for me, she’s the one that I love.”
Christopher exhales and we drive in silence for a while.
“Please, take me back to Kate’s, I have to see her.”
“You’re an idiot.”
“You think I don’t know that?” I shout. “Take me to Kate’s.”
“Shut the fuck up,” he yells as he hits the steering wheel. “You’ve fucked your relationship up with Kate, and now you’re hell-bent on getting arrested again. You’re all over the news, Elliot. Go home and sort your shit out. I am not in the mood for dealing with your mental fucking breakdown over a woman.”
“She isn’t just a woman,” I yell. “She’s the one.”
He huffs with an exaggerated roll of his eyes. “Now you discover that . . . after you’ve completely annihilated the relationship.” He shakes his head. “What a fucking idiot.”
“Shut. The. Hell. Up,” I scream.
We drive the rest of the way in silence and pull into the driveway. “Drop me off and go,” I snap.
“I wish I could,” he sneers. “I’ve got better things to do than babysit your ungrateful ass.”
“Then don’t.”
“I promised Jameson I would. That’s the only reason I’m here putting up with your tantrum. Go inside, and go to bed.”
He stops the car and I get out and slam the door hard, and march inside.
Fuck this day.
KATE
I sit on the couch with Daniel and Rebecca, horrified as we watch the news.
In breaking news, Elliot Miles, CEO of Miles Media, has been arrested and charged with assault and criminal damage after an altercation with a photographer this afternoon in Battersea Park.
Mr. Miles, who appeared to be in some kind of domestic incident with a mystery woman, turned on a bystander when he was being photographed.
He was apprehended and arrested at the scene.
The footage goes to Elliot holding me against my will and I’m screaming at him to let me go, then he turns and we see the photographer, and Elliot begins to chase him as he runs away.
I put my hand over my mouth as I watch in horror. “Oh no, who took this footage?”
I already knew it was bad . . . but it looks even worse.
Elliot catches him, breaks his camera and then the man says something to Elliot who then proceeds to beat him. I can be seen in the footage running away from the scene.
Daniel’s horrified eyes find mine.
I stay silent.
My phone buzzes on the coffee table and the name Elliot lights up the screen.
Tears fill my eyes.
“What’s going on?” Daniel demands; he reaches down and turns my phone off. “Did he hurt you?”
“No,” I snap. “It’s fine, he came back and told me he loved me, that was the fight we had.”
“He looks angry,” Daniel says.
I roll my eyes. I can’t imagine how dead Daniel would be if Elliot ever found out what happened last night between us in the darkness.
Not that I care, of course.
“He was.”
I lie on my bed in the darkness; my phone has been off all night.
He can’t be still arrested, he called me. What if I was his one phone call and I didn’t answer?
Stop it, stop thinking of him. He doesn’t think of you.
I turn my phone on.
Twenty-six missed calls . . . Elliot.
I close my eyes in regret and switch my phone back off.
“Kate,” I hear Daniel call from downstairs. “I think we’ve got another problem.”
“What?” I call.
“You better come and see this.”
I drag myself out of bed and walk downstairs to see Daniel still watching the news.
In a breaking news update, the mystery woman involved in the domestic incident today with Elliot Miles has been confirmed as Kate Landon, until recently an employee of Miles Media.
It has been alleged that Elliot Miles is involved in a sordid love triangle with Kate Landon and her partner, Daniel Stevens.
Landon, who lives with Stevens, was photographed with Miles in New York last week but has since returned to her home and partner. It is thought that Mr. Miles is upset with her returning to her partner, thus the altercation this afternoon in Battersea Park.
It flicks to photographs of me and Daniel holding hands and Daniel with his arm around me. A few of us arriving at various balls in different locations, each one strategically shot so that it looks like Daniel and I are together.