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V A U G H N
The man before me has Jake's eyes but he isn't Jake. He is the guy from the other night who saved Claire. He is Nina Lewis's fiancé; he is Claire's friend, and he was supposed to be the good guy, not the man behind the mask.
The lights are clicked on and we hear footsteps running as they enter the hall. I look up from Noah and see the guards entering the hall with their guns ready, the cops following behind, and then, the figures of Michael and Isabelle Hill rush in.
"Mom!"
While the cops proceed towards me and Noah, Claire runs to her parents, and her father catches her in his arms, hugging her tight while her mother hugs them both. I watch them without any thought, my mind emptying of thoughts for a second and going blank as I try to figure out everything that happened.
One of the cops grabs Noah, forcing him up, and handcuffs him. Noah grunts, his jaw ticking as his rage-filled stare focuses on me. I stare back at him, blankly, not understanding anything except for the fact that my whole body is aching and my chest is burning for some reason.
I only snap out of my daze when someone gently tugs the knife away from my hand and puts it inside a small plastic bag. I let them take it from me, my sight scanning the hall until they land on my Mom and Rose.
They are hugging each other tight, their arms red with the rope they were tied with. They are the first ones I saw when I entered the house through the window, finding the front door locked, but I didn't have the time to free them first. I walk towards them, my legs aching badly. They look at me when I stop in front of them, crouching slowly, and my sister throws her arms around me, hugging me tightly.
"Vaughn, he is Jake..." she sobs, her lips grazing my neck. "He...he came here and locked the servants upstairs. He blackmailed me into calling Claire. I tried to fight him...Vaughn. I tried but I couldn't..."
"Shh..." I run a hand through her hair, whispering. "It's okay. You're safe now."
Mom sniffs and hugs us both, wrapping her arms around us as Isabelle did with her husband and daughter. It feels strange to be in their arms. It feels peaceful but I shouldn't be feeling peaceful now. Noah Striker tried to kill my wife and I don't know why.
I have to know. I must know.
I hear footsteps behind me, boots tapping loudly on the floor and I release my sister to turn and see what's happening. The cops are dragging Noah along with them. The entire hall has its eyes on them. Claire hides behind her father when Noah looks at her and Isabelle throws him a dirty glare.
No, they can't take him.
"Wait!" I shout, stopping the cops and they face me along with Noah.
I swallow a gulp as I get up and walk towards them, my eyes never leaving Noah's as I stand in front of him, directing my next words to the officer-in-charge of the case who stands beside Noah. He is a man in his late thirties, dressed in his uniform with a curved mustache, looking bored as always with his job.
"Is there a problem, Mr. Jackson?" the officer asks.
I remain silent for some time, letting all the pairs of eyes look at me in anticipation while I stare at Noah. My brain still finds it hard to believe that he was Jake all along. Claire said something about him looking familiar but I never thought that something might be off. But then again, those blue irises sparkled a little too bright — work of UV lenses.
"Why did you do it?" I ask him.
He blinks, blue eyes shining like two culprits on the villainous face. He doesn't reply to me, keeping his gaze fixed as he challenges me with a slight tilt of his lips to deride me.
"Tell me!" I yell, grabbing the collar of his T-shirt when he doesn't reply. Some of the cops try to keep me back but the officer-in-charge stops them with a gesture of his hand.
My emotions start to storm back into my body, anger the first one of them, as I shake the man hard. His smirk remains firm, unbending, and sly. It irritates me and I shove him off, annoyed by the silence.
"Why the fuck did you do it?" I ask again, taking steps back when I feel my knuckles start to itch with the need to hit him on his face, anything to take that grin off. "What was it? Tell me, you bloody bastard!"
Gasps fill the hall and even before someone can tell me, I feel the liquid on my lips. I absently rub the underpart of my nose with my hand, rubbing the blood off like it is no matter of concern.
"What did he do to you?" My question is thrown to one of the guards next and the large man looks at the floor.
"Mr. Jackson, we apologize. He distracted us by smoke in the greenhouse. We went there and he locked us in," the guard says. "It was an irresponsible mistake on my part. I take full responsibility for it."
Despicable human. I was right — I am surrounded by idiots.
Jake Gallagher — Noah used an innocent man's name to cover for his crimes. What kind of sick bastard is he? I watch the smirk on his face start to drop, replaced by clenched teeth, and a muscle ticking in his forehead, his chest rising and falling heavily.
"You don't remember, do you?" he speaks suddenly, his voice sarcastic and shaking with venom.
The quietness that follows is suffocating. Everyone in the hall stands still, frozen in place. Claire slowly comes out from behind her father's back, her eyebrows narrowed together and lips parted.
"Remember what?" I snap at Noah, fingers curling to fists.
Noah chuckles slightly, looking at the floor in a frenzied daze. When he looks back up, my lungs squeeze together as I see the tears pooling in the corners of his eyes. The pain in them is as clear as water, keeping me in a trance.
"You rich people just don't care, do you?" he spits. "You don't remember the lives you steal, the lives you destroy, or the lives you crumble even before they have bloomed. You remember nothing. You don't even remember when a man wearing blue lenses steps into your office for an interview. You have others doing your dirty work...and perhaps, that's the worst thing about your lives, isn't it? It makes you vulnerable."
He wets his bottom lip with his tongue, his jaw ticking viciously as his stare pulls me down.
"Who are you?" I ask, the pitch of my voice lowering.
"My name is Noah Striker," he says. "And I'm the man whose life you destroyed four years ago."
My mother's loud choke is the first to be heard as she covers her mouth with her palms, staring at Noah in horror. My heart starts to beat loud, my ribcage shaking as it tries to keep it in control. Heat moves up my body, alerting me to odd sensations. I feel tired, exhausted, and yet, alert beyond anything.
"That night, Jackson," Noah continues. "That night you didn't just kill your best friend. You killed the love of my life too." His voice quavers as tears stream down. "You killed my wife, my Danielle, who was in labor. You killed my wife and my baby with her...I was the only one who survived that night, Jackson. You and I — we were the only ones."
Flashes come back, memories blinding me for seconds as I recall that night. I recall the other car we hit; I recall my world spiraling around, and I recall him.
Christopher.
'It's not worth it, Vaughn. I'm not worth it.'
'She'll hate me. She'll hate me forever.'
I squeeze my eyes shut, his dead face coming into view as we lay side by side — me breathing slowly and him lying there with his face like white ash, stinking of death.
"You remember it now, do you?" I open my eyes when I hear Noah speak again. "You remember the lives you took, don't you? It took me four years to find the perfect opportunity, Jackson. I waited four years. I couldn't file a lawsuit against you because I knew it wouldn't matter. You are rich, I'm poor. I would never win justice. You would trample me anyways. So I took matters into my own hands. I waited for you to fall in love, to marry, to love someone as much as I loved my Danielle, and then...I planned to take your love away from you just like you took mine. That would have been my revenge, Jackson. That would have been my fucking revenge..."
Claire lets out a soft cry as Noah finishes speaking. Isabelle pulls her into her arms and hugs her by her side, both the parents holding their daughter close as they look at me with hatred glistening in their gazes.
The tables seem to have turned. I see the guards looking at each other with bewildered glances. The Hills look horrified at Noah's confession and my Mom and sister look shocked, ashamed.
It's like I am four years back in the past and I am being judged again. I am on the pedestal of shame. It's like the media will storm into the hall again, asking my family if this is true, if I caused the accident deliberately. It's like someone will die again, just like my father died.
My insides churn at the reminders of those days. My heart squeezes in my chest, muscles tightening as I look around the room. All eyes are on me. All eyes judging, speculating, waiting for me to speak something, something that can fuel their hate.
Not again. Not again. I can't do this anymore.
I give up.
"You're a damned bastard, Jackson. You deserve to rot in hell—"
"Enough!" My voice booms through the hall, cutting Noah's words midway. I breathe hard, lifting my hands to run my fingers through my hair in frustration. This is too much. My whole life can't be like this. No more. My eyes meet Noah's and he looks startled, that vein in his forehead still ticking. "You think I'm the villain of your story?" I rasp. "You think I destroyed your life?"
"You are the villain for everyone, Jackson."
I sigh, biting my bottom lip as I try to calm my nerves down.
"You tried to kill my wife because you thought I killed yours?" I say, chuckling to myself at the irony of the situation. "You know what? I'm done being the bad guy. I'm done with secrets and I'm done with lies." I look at Claire and see the movement of her throat as she catches a breath.
All I wanted was a life with her and it would have been just that, if it wasn't for me. I am the one who broke the connection between us. I broke her trust, I broke her heart, and, in doing so, I broke every bit of myself. The love of my life looks just as judgemental as the others today, and she is the only one who deserves to judge me. It was all me. She didn't deserve Noah's wrath, she didn't deserve those scars on her face. Those were meant for me. All of her pain was for me.
"You asked me if I would ever lie to you and I said no..." I tell her, my voice becoming hollow as I recall the moment under the shower and the morning after. "I lied to you even then. I have always lied to you. Everything you know about me is a lie...I'm not the bad guy, my Claire. I wasn't the bad guy then, I'm not one now. I didn't kill your brother. I didn't do anything. I'm not a culprit. I was just a twenty-two-year-old boy who wanted to go to a party with his best friend...My only fault was getting inside that car. The rest...it's not me."
Claire sobs but I can see that she doesn't believe me. I hear the doubt in her cries. No one here believes me. Dejected, I turn back to Noah, finding his eyes throwing daggers at me.
"I didn't kill your wife, Noah Striker. I wasn't the one behind the wheel," I finally confess the truth, for the first time in four years. "It was Christopher Hill...and it wasn't an accident. It was suicide."