Revenge

Chapter 14

After Jacob had left, Connie had allowed herself a couple more minutes to properly compose herself before heading back out to work. She had kept herself busy, trying her best to put the whole Steph thing to the back of her mind.

In the meantime, Jacob had returned and informed her that the police were taking the report seriously and were looking into it. She didn't know whether that was a relief or not. The fact that they believed there actually was a case worried her, but she was glad they were going to put an end to it.

After what seemed like an endless day, Connie headed outside to call for a taxi. That was all she needed after a long day - to sit and listen to the driver talking to her about how nice the weather has been lately or how bad the traffic was. She definitely wasn't looking forward to the ride home.

"Connie!" She rolled her eyes and turned around to see Jacob running towards her. What could he possibly want now? When he had entered her office earlier, she hadn't been thinking straight and she had let her guard down. She had let herself get close to him again for the first time since they had split up and she regretted it now.

Little things like that were enough to trigger her emotions and she couldn't risk getting too close to him because she knew that if she did, she wouldn't be strong enough to hide her true feelings and they'd end up back together again. That couldn't happen though, it just couldn't. They had broken up and got back together too many times in the past, it just wasn't meant to be. There was no point in pretending.

"I thought you might want a lift home?" He asked, having finally caught up to her. He took his keys out of his pocket and eyed his car. He knew that Connie didn't exactly like taking taxis and he wanted to make sure she got home okay.

She looked over at his Wrangler and raised her eyebrows at him. "In that thing?" She looked back at it and the corner of her lips turned up but she did her best to hide her amusement from Jacob. She pursed her lips and turned back to him. "I'd rather call a cab."

There was no point in Jacob pretending to be hurt by her words. She had made it more than clear in the past that she wouldn't be caught dead in his car. Frowning, he looked back over at it, not able to understand why Connie hated it so much.

"You sure?" He asked, "I'll let you drive." Trying to tempt her clearly wasn't going to work when it came to his car. She looked at him as though the answer to his question was obvious, which it was to her. Being a passenger in his 'car' was bad enough but being the driver? People might actually think that she had chose it!

"Thanks for the offer," she said, pulling her phone out of her pocket. Not liking his car wasn't exactly the reason she wouldn't let him drive her home - it was one of the reasons, obviously - but she couldn't have him thinking that everything was back to the way it was before. Because it wasn't. They weren't together anymore so their relationship wasn't ever going to be the same, it couldn't be, for both their sakes.

Later that night, after Connie and Grace had eaten, Connie's phone rang. Of course, it was Jacob. Since he had found out about the Simms' he had been too overprotective and although Connie knew he was only doing it for the right reasons, it was starting to get on her nerves.

She took the call into the living room, not wanting Grace to overhear anything. Obviously, as soon as Grace heard that Jacob was on the phone, she couldn't help but eavesdrop.

"Jacob, look," she said, "I don't need you to keep checking in on me all the time, I-"
"That's not why I'm calling." There was a short pause before he began to explain. There was no point in trying to hide their feelings for one another anymore. Jacob was aware that he had put an end to their relationship but he had acted in the heat of the moment and he had never regretted anything more.

Connie knew how to wind him up and she certainly pissed him off sometimes, but that didn't change the fact that he loved her and wanted nothing more than to be able to protect her from anything that could harm her.

Everything he was saying seemed like a blur to Connie. As soon as the words 'I love you' had slipped out of his mouth, she hadn't heard anything else. But despite everything, despite her feelings for him and wanting to be close to him again, she couldn't forget the way he messed her around. She wouldn't be able to forget it. And if they got back together - which they wouldn't - how could she know that he wouldn't do the same thing again?

"Have you forgotten that you broke up with me?" She asked, raising her voice slightly before remembering that Grace was in the house. She continued in a quieter tone. "Because I haven't and I can't forgive you for that."

Having said everything she wanted to say, she hung up and threw her phone at the sofa. Why couldn't he just let her get on with her life? He owed her that at least. All she wanted was to forget about him, to forget about the way he made her feel but he just wasn't have it. He wasn't going to leave it alone. She didn't know how much more she could take.

She sat down on the edge of the armchair and leaned forward slighty, running a hand through her hair.

"Mum?" Grace walked into the living room, making Connie jump. She quickly jumped to her feet, knowing how disheveled she must have looked.

"Grace," she paused for a second. "That was-"

"Jacob," Grace said. "I know... I heard." Connie watched her as she limped over to the nearest sofa with the help of her cruches. She didn't know how much she had heard and she didn't want to give anything away.

"How much-"

"All of it," she replied. Connie sat down beside her and ran a hand over her daughter's hair. Just as she was about to make something up, Grace took over.

"I'm not stupid, y-you know." Connie was about to say something but Grace continued. "I- I don't know what happened be-tween you and Jacob, but I know you l-love him." She stopped for a second. "Isn't that enough?" And then there was a deadly silence between the pair.

Connie was taken aback. She didn't know what to say. She had been so busy that she hadn't noticed how grown up her daughter had become. She wasn't even aware that Grace payed that much attention to her relationship with Jacob. She was right though, she loved him. But she wasn't sure that was enough.

"I don't want to be the reason y-you and Jacob aren't to-gether." Her words completely shocked Connie. She wasn't expecting her to say anything like that. Grace didn't know the exact reason for their break up but one thing she was quite sure of was that one way or another it was connected to her.

"Oh baby, no." She pulled her daughter close. "This isn't because of you." Connie couldn't have felt worse. How long had Grace felt that way? How long had she thought it was her fault? How could she even think that? "You know I love you don't you, sweetheart?" She placed her hands at either side of Grace's head and looked into her eyes. "Although it may not seem like it, everything I do is for you."

"Th-then give Jacob another chance."

I'm out of that writer's block stage now and I've got back into my writing routine so the next chapter will be up very shortly!

Let me know what you think and thank you again for reading!