The Hidden Life (10 page)

“What? What’s wrong? Is Monroe in trouble?”

There was no good way to say it, so I adopted the “band-aid method” and blurted it out all at once. “Photos of Monroe and Oliver together were leaked overnight. They’re on the cover of every newspaper I’ve seen this morning, and it’s all over the internet and TV. A mass of reporters is set up out on the front lawn waiting for either you to come home or her to go out, and I don’t know what you want me to do.”

“TOGETHER?!? Like how
together
are we talking?” he seethed. Wide-fucking-awake.

“Colin,” I warned, not giving a shit what my place was in his life anymore. I wasn’t going to allow him to punish her for this. “Calm down and think rationally about this. Please. I’m here with Monroe now. It’s safe to say she’s more than a little shaken up and what she doesn’t need is for you to be an asshole.”

More angry shouting. “I’m acting like an ASSHOLE?!? The only damn asshole in this situation is the piece of shit who’s sleeping with my wife! Where is the little pencil dick? Is he there? In my fucking house?”

I cringed at the sound of curse words coming from his mouth. That wasn’t the Colin I knew. But he was understandably upset. In the matter of three sentences, I had effectively dropped an atomic bomb on his life, the image he’d worked so hard to build shattering into a million pieces around him.

“No, I took Oliver to the airport earlier this morning,” I explained calmly. “They know his name and about their connection through Mending Hearts. I thought it was best he got out of town and went home to do damage control there. Now, we need to focus on what we can do here.”

I went on to explain to him that the photos had been taken in the backyard and how we had already contacted their security firm to have the monitoring feeds reviewed to see if there was anything unusual on them at all. He refused to speak to Monroe, asserting that he was still too angry and didn’t want to say something he regretted later. By the time we hung up, the hurt and anger were still there, but he’d managed to get a handle on his outbursts, sounding a bit more composed and collected.

The plan was for me and Monroe to hold tight in the house, waiting for Colin to return. Meanwhile, he would work with his PR team and determine how the organization wanted to handle things as he caught an early flight home. The next few hours were brutal. Watching a woman who I loved like a sister suffer in a way I could do little help soothe. It nearly killed me.

Standing at the stove, I prepared grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup for Monroe and I while we waited. Despite her insistence that she wasn’t hungry, I wouldn’t be deterred. She needed to eat. Shit, I needed to eat. Colin was due home at any minute, he’d texted about an hour before to let me know he had landed in Boston and was on his way, and once he arrived, I doubted food would be a part of the equation.

“You still haven’t heard back from the security company?” I asked, peering over my shoulder at Monroe where she sat at the kitchen island.

She glanced down at the counter to where the replacement phone I’d picked up for her when I took Oliver to the airport earlier, then shook her head. “No, not yet.”

I frowned at the length of time it was taking them to review the footage. Surely, it wasn’t that difficult to fast-forward until you saw something out of the ordinary.

“What about Oliver? Any update from him?” I followed up.

“The last message he sent was that he was at the airport on standby for the next flight to St. Louis to go talk to his parents,” she replied with a heavy sigh. “He said the security officer did a double-take when he checked his ID, but he wasn’t sure if it was because he recognized his name, or how different he looks without a beard and with his hair pulled up in a hat. Other than that, he hasn’t been recognized.”

I nodded, pleased he had listened to my advice. “Good, though I’m sure it won’t take the vultures long to find him, if they’re not waiting on him already.”

“I can’t believe this is happening. What have I done?” Monroe whispered, not for the first time that morning, as she massaged her temples.

Plating up the food, I carefully carried it over to where she sat and placed it in front of her, then straddled the bar stool next to her. “You gotta stop with the blame thing, Roe. What’s done is done. There’s no changing it. Plus, you didn’t do anything wrong, nothing that Colin hasn’t done. You were inside your own home. Now, we need to focus on what we can do to move forward.”

“There’s nothing we can do!” she exclaimed, frustrated and hopeless. “I’m a prisoner inside this house. There are now over ten uniformed police officers staked out around the property to keep the thousands of reporters and photographers from nearly sieging the place. I’m scared to death to turn on the television or get online to see what other pictures are floating around out there. Whoever took these didn’t just get one shot while they were there. And Lord knows they’re all ready to burn me at the stake with a scarlet A around my neck. At least not until Colin comes home or we hear something from the surveillance people. And meanwhile, I just have to sit here and worry if Oliver and his family are safe. Oh, and let’s not forget there’s a thirteen-year-old girl lying in a coma, fighting for her life at Boston Children’s, who needs me more than anything right now!”

I didn’t get a chance to reply before the sound of an uproar out front caught our attention. Together, we stood and hurried to the living room, where we’d closed all of the shutters and drapes, to hear better through the walls. A chaotic chorus of voices permeated through the walls, growing louder and louder until an extremely pissed-off Colin stormed through the front door, slamming it behind him.

With nostrils flared and green eyes blazing, he glared at the two of us. “Do you have any idea what I just went through to get home?” he thundered as he released his grip on his bag, dropping it on the floor, then prowling toward us. “A police escort! I’ve had a police escort from the moment I left my hotel room this morning because of all of this. This is insanity. My phone has rung nonstop since I woke up, and they’re not calling to congratulate me about the game yesterday. My parents are freaking out, and the team…” Coming to a stop right in front of us, he narrowed his furious stare at Monroe me with his furious gaze and crossed his arms over his chest. “I’ve finally reached my ultimate goal of being a starting quarterback in a Super Bowl, and now, instead of being able to enjoy any of it, I’m gonna spend the next two weeks fielding questions about you sleeping around behind my back. Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”

Protectiveness swelled inside me. I wanted to wedge myself between them, shielding her from his wrath, but surprisingly, Monroe squared her shoulders and held her ground.

“Look, I know you’re mad
—
” she began.

But he wouldn’t let her finish before he exploded again. “
Mad?!”
he roared. “Monroe,
mad
is only the tip of the iceberg of what I’m feeling right now. If I was just
mad
about something, I’d yell about it for a few minutes, we’d make up, and then we’d go on about our normal lives. But this… what you’ve done… it’s devastating in the most literal sense of the word. Not only did you lie to me for who knows how long about Oliver, but with your carelessness and irresponsible behavior, you’ve ruined everything we’ve worked for. It’s all gone! Poof! Just like that! And for what? Some guy who is going back to Chicago next month?”

“I did it because I love him!” she contended as her hands tightened into small, angry fists at her sides. “I tried to tell you, but you got hurt and went to Miami, and then everything got crazy when you came back. But dammit, I love him so much, and he loves me!”

“
Love?!
Are you serious?
”
Theatrically spinning around to take in the main level of the house, he threw his hands up in the air when he came up empty on his search. “If he loves you so much, then where is he now? Let me guess — he loved you enough to get you naked and take you to bed, but not to stick around when the shit hit the fan, huh?”

And I had enough. He knew exactly why Oliver wasn’t there cause I had told him. His purpose was only to hurt her, make her doubt her declaration of love. “Colin, that’s enough,” I cautioned.

“This has absolutely nothing to do with you!” he screamed as he turned his fiery rage to me. “It’s between me and Monroe. You made the decision to not be a part of this when you stormed out of here a few months ago and wrote me off like I meant nothing.”

“Are you delusional?! Do you even hear the words coming out of your mouth?” I moved toward him and he puffed out his chest, as if that would intimidate me. Maybe he had become delusional. “Since the minute you walked through the door, the entire conversation has revolved around how this fiasco affects
you
. How awful
your
morning has been. How
your
parents are reacting. How it’s ruined
your
goals. That’s always the problem with you, Colin. It’s always about you first and everyone else second. Years and years of being told you’re the best thing since sliced bread has warped your mind, and I don’t even think you realize what a selfish prick you’ve become.”

His jaw ticked with fury. “I am
not
a selfish prick.”

“Have you stopped even once to think about what Monroe must be going through right now?” I poked my finger in his chest and got right up in his face. The time had come for someone to stand up to Colin Cassidy, and since he was no longer mine to lose, I had no problem assuming the role. “People are saying terrible, nasty things about her, calling her demeaning names and ridiculing her. Doesn’t knowing she’s not any of those horrible things make you want to defend her honor? This could just as easily have been you and me! Those pictures were taken right here in this house. She wasn’t out in public, taking unnecessary chances with your marriage. She was doing the same thing you and I did for years! And then, knowing her past, knowing how big of a deal being intimate with someone must have been for her in the first place, for that private moment she shared with the one person she’s fallen in love with to be broadcasted to the entire world? Do you have any fucking idea how humiliated and violated she must feel again? I’m guessing not, because if you had, when you walked through the door, you would’ve set your own shit aside for at least half a second and checked on her mental wellbeing.”

Glancing over at Monroe’s wet, blotchy face, he opened his mouth to speak, but she stopped him with a hand in the air and a swift shake of her head. “Not now. Not after you were shamed into it. Plus, we need to focus on what happens next. Has Barry put out a press release yet? Allison is waiting for direction from me on what Mending Hearts’ is going to say, and at some point, I need to make sure Oliver has safely made it to his parents’ and check on JoJo. Have you—”

She wasn’t able to complete her thought before a phone ringing interrupted her, and without hesitation, I hurried to grab it, leaving the two of them alone. A few minutes later, I reappeared in the kitchen with a little bit of good news, if you could call it that.

“That was the security firm. They found footage of someone in the backyard earlier in the day yesterday, kneeling down at the back line of shrubbery and apparently cutting out a small opening, which they’re assuming was for the camera lens to stick through. They’re emailing the clips to us now so we can review them and see if we can identify who it was,” I relayed the information back to them that I’d just heard.

Temporarily putting the argument behind us, we all rushed to the second-floor office and Colin hastily powered up his computer and opened the email. Finding out who was responsible for the nightmare surrounding two of my closest friends, which Colin still was regardless of our recent history, wouldn’t make it all disappear, or even help figure out the best way to move forward, but at least we would know who was responsible for starting this shit storm and could hopefully press charges.

Five seconds into the footage, my stomach dropped as the blood in my veins turned to ice as I watched my sister, my own flesh and blood, wearing Monroe’s Patriot’s jersey that she had offered her, saunter out of their house and toward the bushes in the backyard. I was going to kill her.