Betrayal: Brianna's Secret (The Betrayal Series) (13 page)
Read Betrayal: Brianna's Secret (The Betrayal Series) Online
Authors: Sofia Velardi
“Hi. Is Abby there?” Kyle asked when he heard a female voice on the other side of the line.
“Abby? No, she isn’t. May I ask who’s calling?” The girl who had answered the phone asked.
“Was she there earlier and then left?”
“I’ve been here since the store opened, and I have not seen her. Who is this?” The girl asked again, starting to get exasperated.
A hot chill rippled in Kyle’s stomach. The realization that Abby had lied to him was suddenly making him queasy. “No one,” he stammered. “It’s not important. She ordered a book for me, and I was just calling to find out if it’d arrived.”
“I can check that for you. What’s your name?”
“Never mind. I just placed the order. It’s probably not there yet. Who am I speaking to?”
“This is Victoria. I’m the cashier on duty today.”
“Victoria?” Kyle asked incredulously, nausea building in the back of his throat. “I thought you were out sick today?”
“Who is this?” Victoria snapped, realizing she was not speaking to a customer.
Breathing heavily and staring into space, Kyle removed the phone from his ear and hit the end call button. He shook his head slowly, trying to silence the little voices in his head.
She’s cheating on you, Kyle.
Kyle managed to get on his feet even though numbness had started to besiege his legs. Without making eye contact with anyone, Kyle slowly walked past all the screaming children and half-drunk adults and made it to the back entrance of the house.
“Kyle? What’s wrong, sweetheart?” His concerned mother asked when Kyle walked past her, but Kyle did not answer or even look at her. Some of his little cousins had surrounded him and were tugging at his arms to get his attention. They wanted Kyle to go throw a football with them. “I’m sorry guys, I can’t,” Kyle mumbled, staring into space, his breathing becoming more labored.
Kyle went inside his mother’s house and made it to his old bedroom, every corner of it filled with trophies, medals and awards Kyle had received for both his athletic and academic achievements as a child. Kyle locked the door behind him and plopped on his bed. He ran a hand through his gorgeous dirty blond hair and kept shaking his head.
He wanted to pretend that the phone conversation he just had didn’t happen. He tried to desperately convince himself that it was all a misunderstanding, and Abby did not lie to him.
Maybe Abby was called to go into work that day, but after our conversation, the manager told her not to
.
When that didn’t work, Kyle began to make excuses in his head for why Abby had lied to him about having to work that day.
My birthday’s coming up. Maybe Abby is preparing a secret birthday party for me.
Denial is a very powerful thing.
Kyle needed to make those excuses and those rationalizations because the idea that Abby could possibly be cheating on him was just too painful to accept. Abby was the love of his life. The only woman Kyle had ever loved. The only person in the world he felt he could truly trust with anything and everything. The only person he was sure would never betray him.
Kyle buried his face in his hands and rubbed his eyes. He slowly raised his head up and spotted his laptop sitting on his desk. After logging off the video chat with Abby the previous night, Kyle had spent hours putting together the video and picture montage he was going to use as part of his proposal to Abby.
In a matter of a few seconds, Kyle had gone from being on top of the world about the proposal and his bright future with the woman he loved to being a man whose world was crashing down around him.
With a clenched jaw, Kyle scowled at the laptop before springing to his feet and walking towards it. He sat in front of it, got online and went straight to his airline’s website. He was not scheduled to return to New York for another nine days, but he couldn’t wait that long. The uncertainty was suffocating him. He needed to know if Abby was cheating on him. So he began to search for the next available flight back to New York.
End of Part II
DEAR READER
Thank you for taking the time to read my story. If you enjoyed it, I would really appreciate it if you recommended it to people you know and leave a review. If you write a review, let me know via email at
[email protected]
and I’ll thank you with a personal email.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Part 1 of the
Betrayal series: Abby’s Guilt
and Part 3,
Kyle’s Revenge
, available now.
Follow me on social media
Sofia Velardi on
Facebook
Sofia Velardi on
Twitter
Table of Contents
