Thalia’s Pov
I tried as much as I could to put on a straight face but I was failing miserably. Brandon and Nestor were good at that, not me. However, there was Josh in my living room crying, the once tyrant man had fallen.
There was a time I longed to see this day and there it was delivered to me on a silver platter. But yet I was not rejoicing, Brandon took a seat and I followed suit. I knew if I looked at him, he was going to make a funny face and I was going to burst out laughing so I deterred myself.
Josh was never an emotional man, he was the type that was brought up to have thick skin. Kendra had really softened him up or was he just a cry baby from the beginning but hid it well. He said something about Jessica writing a book on our revenge but we both ignored him and just stared at him.
He looked human for the first time and I realized that when I was married to him I was only subjected to his cold emotions, it was weird seeing him tear up.
“Didn’t you hear what I said, Jessica plans to tell everything in her s*upid book for some cash,” he questioned.
“Of course, we heard you but are you okay?” Brandon asked like he cared when we all knew he was only rubbing salt into the already bleeding wounds.
“I’m fine, do you know what such a book would do to Am… The baby?” Josh inquired.
I turned and faced Brandon, who glanced at me with a sleazy smile. He was enjoying every bit of what was in front of him.
“Kendra finding out what hell transpired between us was never planned as a secret,” he replied to which I nodded, disappointing Josh. We could not believe he ran all the way here to ask us to stop his s*ank from writing a book. The fact that he even stomached seeing our faces and broke down was astonishing.
“Thalia seriously, you are just going to sit there and let Jessica write the s*upid book? Do you believe she will portray you as a hero!”
“Why ain’t you cashing on with her?” Brandon quickly interrupted him.
“I beg your pardon!”
“If I was in your shoes, I would be making notes together with Jessica. Don’t you need the money for court proceedings, law school, and expenses?” Brandon asked.
Josh breathed in hard, and I could see his shoulders tense up. “Are you two still spying on me? Do you have cameras all over my house?” he yelled but controlled himself, realizing that Kendra was in his arms.
“No, Nestor told us, I guess he is not your best after all,” Brandon chuckled.
Josh breathed in again and began pacing the room. Brandon winked at me and I just smiled. If Josh had really thought Nestor was going to turn to him then he was the most s*upid person in this universe.
Nestor was a full Brandon supporter. Even after he was chased out of the house, he distanced himself from me instead of Brandon who chased him.
He took a seat and faced us, “But you are aware that Jessica will take the will away from you and you won’t be the first one to explain what really happened?”
I turned and looked in Brandon’s direction again, “So you want us to kill Jessica?” Brandon asked.
The room became quiet as we both put on straight faces. He had no idea whether Bradon was serious; or if he was joking but I was aware he was testing him.
“No G o d, I am talking about blocking her from writing the s*upid book,”
“If you want I can kill her for you, then you wouldn’t have to deal with her,” Brandon added.
Josh chuckled, “you really think I’m that s*upid? I only came here to give you the heads up, my part in this circus is already out there.”
“Aaaaah, that’s so sweet of you, we had no idea you cared about us but on a serious note, Jessica has to get permission from us before she writes anything concerning our lives. It is a requirement by law.
Do not worry but she is free to write her own part of how she f*cked her father-in-law,” Brandon replied and we waited for Josh’s reaction. To our disappointment, Josh only stared back at us. I noted that Amber was fast asleep in his arms and all long he was rubbing her tummy.
That was the trick, singing and rubbing her tummy after a meal. I always breastfeed her before going to sleep making it difficult for her to sleep on a heavy tummy. How he knew that and I did not, was humiliating and I just looked down in shame as Brandon went on speaking.
“Have you seen the site your wife created? She is selling all the staff she wore when Victor used to f*ck her. I guess it was not a one-night stand but a full-blown affair. She is running out of the items and wants to cash in on the book,” Brandon teased.
I looked in his direction trying to hide my shock, he was still spying on them to my shock. For the past two days, he had been struggling to get out of bed but that did not stop him from his hobby.
“Did you buy anything?” Josh asked, trying to put on a fake strong face.
“No, I’m now a father and trying to be a good example to my daughter.”
I quickly got up and interrupted them before their bromance turned into an exchange of words.
“I think it’s time for Kendra to go and take a nap,” I declared and walked to where Josh was seated. He hesitated a bit and just stared at me, his eyes a little bit red from his earlier crying.
“Josh, she needs to rest on something soft,” I added until he finally decided to hand Kendra to me. He immediately got up, he had no words to say, so he simply turned, and began walking away. Brandon was very irritating, only Nestor and I understood him.
“Josh,” I called out.
He stopped but he did not turn to face me
“Thank you… for the tip on how to calm Kendra down,” I said.
The words felt heavy coming out of my mouth but it was the right thing to say. He walked out without saying anything, I did not expect him to, so I walked up to the bedroom ignoring Brandon who had raised eyebrows. I tucked the baby into sleep before heading back to Brandon.
“Are you building another machine for me?” he asked with a serious face. The question caught me off guard that I began stammering. “I thought we were going to talk about the unexpected visitor?”
“You barely sleep and I have noticed you have started reading your books with numbers again,” he replied, ignoring my statement.
“I’m trying to work on plan B,” I replied.
“Thalia, when are you going to learn to start putting yourself ahead of d*ckheads?” he asked.
I only looked at the ceiling
“You now have Kendra and she should be your main priority,”
“Hey hold on, I always put Kendra first, I’m only working on the calculations at night,” I replied.
“You should be resting at night and not wasting your time on me,” he replied as he got up and held my hands. “Thalia you have to accept that I’m supposed to die. Please can you just do that for me,” he pleaded.
I only turned my head away without saying a single word as he embraced me. It was only going to be over his dead body, that’s when I was going to quit.
“Thalia the baby needs you, you have to promise me.”
“I will only promise to stop the late nights. That’s if Kendra agrees, you know she is the one who keeps me up,” I joked.
He gritted his teeth and sighed, he knew he was not going to get through to me. He slowly let go of me and grabbed my hand, “I have a surprise for you, do you remember that dinner?” he asked. I quickly nodded my head as he led me to the backyard.
“I had one of my people set it up for me, you were right we needed our first date and today I woke up with a lot of energy,” he winked. For unknown reasons, my face became heated up and I began blushing. He chuckled and led me to beautiful scenery, a well romantic decorated table for two. “Wow Brandon this is beautiful but I’m not dressed for the occasion,” I cried out.
” No no, you look beautiful, you always look beautiful.”
“Just give me a minute, I will be right back,” I said and ran upstairs for a quick shower. It was our first date and I was not going to attend it covered in Kendra’s urine. I quickly finished up and put on a beautiful red number, a bit of makeup, and tired my hair behind. I looked into Kendra’s cradle and found it empty, my heart sank, I had just put her to sleep some minutes ago.
“Miss Thalia,” June called, forcing me to look behind. To my luck she was holding Kendra, “She was crying so I picked her up, I guess she was not asleep.”
I moved to the door relieved, I checked on her and she was very sleepy, probably just scared to be alone.
“You look beautiful Miss Thalia, are you going out?
“No, just having dinner in the gardens, afternoon dinner,” I joked.
“That’s good, then I will look after Kendra, go and have fun. You deserve it. But you have to bring her to me if she begins crying okay?”
“No problem, I will take her outside for the fresh air, she likes the air,”
“Not outside the gate,” I warned her.
“Of course, we never go outside the gate,” she said and asked me not to keep Brandon waiting. Of course, she knew the rules but people always needed to be reminded. I kissed Kendra on the forehead and headed to the gardens. As soon as I entered, Brandon got up, his eyes wide open admiring what he was seeing. “You look beautiful Thalia, you have always been beautiful.”
“Thank you, you look handsome too,” I replied not knowing what to say. He smiled and asked for my hand, “let’s dance.”
I gave him my hand and he slowly wrapped his other hand around my waist, pushing me very nearer to him. A slow jam began playing and we began moving to the rhythm. “I fulfilled my promise, Thalia, I even gave you the bonus of seeing Josh in tears,” he mentioned. “I have a surprise for you on the table,” he whispered.
I looked on the table and there was a file, I could see big words on it, Inc biotech, and I immediately froze and stopped dancing. I looked up at him confused, Inc Biotech was a dead name and most importantly a dead company.
He let go of my hands, picking up the file, “I have been talking to Dr. Wilson and he has been explaining to me how the FRASER 2021 i can treat or even cure a lot of other cancers. So why not revamp your company with such a machine? I already have a lot of investors lined up?”
Tears began dropping one by one, my own invention revamping my ruined company. I never even thought about other cancers that were not as complicated as Brandon’s or what the machine would do for such patients. I felt the machine was a failure because It was not giving me the intended results with Brandon.
“Biotech is back and it is all yours, I remember we agreed to get back what is yours, donate and go back to that bridge and jump. So what is your verdict?” he asked as he wiped my tears. I moved closer to him and embraced him into a hug.
He gave me back everything, he gave me more than he promised to give me, Mandel, Kendra, and now Biotech but somehow I felt like I failed him. I held on tightly disappointed, I wanted him, why can’t he give me himself. I wanted Kendra to grow up knowing him as her father, why couldn’t he see that was what I wanted more.
“Thalia?”
“No jumping and no donating, everything is Kendra’s now,” I replied and looked up at him. He held my cheek and dived in for a kiss, I missed his lips, they were so warm against mine. I kissed him back and held onto him so passionately like it was our goodbye.
Like I was not going to get another chance to kiss him again. We were going to probably kiss for hours but we were rudely interrupted by June who came running like a madwoman.
‘They took her, they took her,” she kept screaming.
I quickly broke off the kiss and faced her, she had no Kendra in her arms except for a feeding bottle.
“Who? What are you talking about?”
“Kendra, they took… Kendra!” she cried out.
My heart stopped for a minute, while Brandon ran outside, I had no idea where he got the energy to run. I followed suit with June following behind.
We found one of the guards on the ground rubbing his eyes while the gate was wide open. Brandon ran outside the gate searching but he found nothing. He walked back in, yelling at the guard on the floor to get up and explain what the hell happened. But the man looked to be in severe pain as he rubbed his red swollen eyes.
I turned to June, grabbing her by her dress.
“What happened! I gave you simple instructions not to go outside the f*cking gate!” I yelled at her.
