When You Were Mine (Stone Lake 2)

I.

Have.

A.

Son…

Luna

I can’t stop the gasp and almost scream as Gavin shatters my lamp. I look at it and then back at his face. This is a Gavin I don’t know and one I don’t understand.

“Kept your son from you? What are you talking about?” I ask. My voice is little more than a very soft whisper. I’m confused, and I don’t understand what is going on here.

“You had my child and you didn’t even bother telling me! That’s what I’m talking about. Who in the hell do you think you are, Luna? Who gave you the right to keep my child from me?”

“I don’t know what kind of sick game you’re playing, Gavin, but I don’t find it funny.”

“I’m not playing a damn game. Why didn’t you tell me about Joshua? I had a right to know, Luna!” he growls standing up and I can’t stop myself from taking three steps away from him. His anger is so palpable it’s taken the air out of the room.

I can’t understand what he’s thinking. Does he somehow think he can convince me that magically he wanted Joshua now and lay his past choices at my feet?

“Stop it!” I yell at him, unable to do this any longer. “You need to stop whatever sick game you’re playing right now, Gavin. I can’t handle it. I have too much on my plate. I told you about your son. I begged you to come back to Stone Lake. I was terrified I was losing our child, and I needed you. You’re the one who shut me out. You!” I point my finger at him. “So, you don’t get to stand there and scream at me.”

“I didn’t know. You never told me about my son. Never. If I had known that you were having Joshua, if I had known that you needed me and wanted me here, I would have been here, Luna. There was nothing in this world that would have kept me from you.”

His words are like heat seeking missiles. Each one combing over, finding my weakest spot and then slicing through me, leaving destruction in its path. The pain, the hurt, the confusion it’s all there and it feels like I’m drowning. My body is shaking and until I look up at Gavin, I don’t realize that I’m crying. I swipe the tears out of my eyes, angry that I’m giving him those. I’ve cried enough tears over Gavin Lodge. I never wanted to do that again. I promised myself it wouldn’t happen the moment I got the papers saying he gave up rights to our—to my—son.

That memory is like a knife. I walk away from him, only one thing on my mind. I know that it’s the only thing that will end this hoax and get Gavin out of my house.

“Where are you going?” he demands from behind me.

“Just stay there. I have something to show you,” I respond, over my shoulder.

I go straight to my room, bend down and slide the small fireproof box that I keep under my bed, then put it on the mattress. It just takes me a couple of minutes to open it, sift through and find what I’m looking for and then go back to Gavin.

“Here,” I tell him, stuffing the papers at him, forcing him to grab them and hold them against his chest to keep them from falling. “Did you think I would be so stupid that I wouldn’t keep the papers, Gavin? I don’t know what your game is, but I’m not playing it. Getting these from you nearly destroyed me, and I refuse to let you act like the injured party here.”

“What is this?” he asks looking at the papers like he has no idea what they are.

“Proof that I begged you to be a part of our child’s life and to help me and you told me no time and time again,” I respond, still unable to believe that he wants to pretend to be the injured party here.

He looks at me and there’s shock on his face. He takes the papers—and there’s quite a few of them—and then sits down in a chair. Something about his look, the way he’s moving, the change in his anger, it all alerts me that there’s more going on here than I realized. Suddenly, there’s fear moving through me that is more powerful than the pain and anger from before.

Did Gavin truly not know about Joshua?

How could that be?

Gavin

If it’s possible to separate from your body and watch as your life unravels, that’s what is happening. I feel like it’s all coming at me in slow motion. I see the papers in front of me, I recognize I’m sitting down and even though it feels like the walls are crumbling in, I feel detached. The only sound I hear is the ticking of the clock on the wall, everything else has been silenced out. Tick. Tock. Moments of my life that were stolen. Tick. Tock.