MASON AND SAGE

Chapter 10 ~ Mason

After I'd shattered my phone, I'd grabbed my work phone and my bike key and raced out to follow Sage home. I knew she was crying and needed to know she'd made it to her apartment safely. She was just turning the corner at the end of my street, and when I caught up to her -- staying far enough back to keep her in my sight but off her visual radar -- I was relieved to see she was driving carefully.

I'd followed her up to her apartment and stood outside the door, listening to make sure everything was OK inside her place.

But it wasn't; not really. She was crying loud enough that I could hear her and I wasn't sure who I wanted to tear apart more: Eva, for pulling all of her shit, or me for not having cut off all contact with the viperous bitch long ago -- and of course, the motherfucking kiss in the alley that ruined Sage's and my relationship.

This was my own fault, and hearing the evidence of my girl's heart breaking broke me in a way that nothing ever had before. My gut was churning, my muscles were tensing and I had to talk myself out of busting into her apartment and forcing her to listen until she believed me.

But how many people would think a legal paternity test -- witnessed, transacted perfectly according to protocols -- could be tampered with? Even knowing Eva was a nasty bitch, it was a huge leap from nasty to playing with lives by falsifying information. Especially given that we were already dealing with Sage not trusting me because of the alley kiss. Believing I was guilty of fucking Eva made a helluva lot more sense than someone tampering with the results of a legal paternity test.

I stood there until she stopped crying, feeling like I needed to stand guard for some reason -- and the irony was, I was the one she needed guarding from since I'd been the one to cause this insanity. So it was about two hours later that I reluctantly headed home where I let out Cashew, fed him his (very late) dinner, then grabbed my bottle of Glenlivet and threw myself on the couch.  

Where I proceeded to fucking obliterate myself until I passed out. I needed to not think, to not remember that look on Sage's face when she processed what those results were telling her -- a look of utter betrayal mixed with anger and loathing and heartbreak. It killed me to think she believed Eva's doctored test results. She knew I'd never lied to her -- knew it. And I knew that she knew it. I'd needed her to believe me last night, but trust was a fragile thing and I'd shattered hers as surely as I'd shattered my phone. Just as I was starting to think about different and creative ways to make Eva suffer for what her lies had done to Sage, the nine shots of whiskey began to take effect and I blacked out.

When I woke up in the morning, Cashew was poking his long nose in my face, watching me with that terminally-soulful expression greyhounds had. I know the feeling, buddy.

I tried not to move because my head was pounding like a bitch and I felt like I was going to get sick for the first time since my college drinking days. Breathing in through my nose, I willed my stomach to stop rolling and churning, all while wondering how Sage was doing this morning. My heart hurt probably worse than my head at this point. How do you end up hurting the one person you would never want to hurt? By being a fucking careless idiot.

My thoughts then turned to Eva. How in the hell did she do it? How in the fucking hell did she do it?

I sat up carefully, thinking it through despite my pounding head. She'd arrived at the lab as we were leaving, so that was one possible place for her to fuck with the results, but since she'd had her lawyer with her, I didn't think it was likely -- unless her lawyer was in on her scheme. Not out of the realm of possibility with this crazy bitch, but that didn't seem like the most logical place to start.

That left the lab that the results were mailed to for testing. That also seemed like a stretch, but I felt strongly it was the most obvious place to start looking into this fucking disaster. Still moving carefully, I brewed myself a cup of coffee, then while it cooled down, I showered and dressed for the day. After the aspirin I downed took effect, I grabbed Cashew's leash and we went for a slow walk, giving him plenty of time to sniff and do his business.