Obsessed With You (3 page)

Aaron had been up front with her
about the women he had dated. There had been quite a few over the
years, brief relationships for the most part. He told her that he
would know for certain after a few months—if it lasted that long—if
the relationship had a future. And none of them ever did have a
future until he met Cathy.

He proposed to her in the middle
of a park on a beautiful early summer day. He told her he had found
the woman he could commit to for his entire life and hoped she felt
the same way about him. He offered her a beautiful blue sapphire
ring—her birthstone—surrounded by diamonds. Cathy knew the ring
was very expensive, but she didn’t really care about that. Aaron
was wealthy, but that’s not what she loved about him. She loved
him, the essence of him. He was a good man, and as the saying went,
they were hard to find.

The memory of that day in the
park confused Cathy further. How could that man be cheating on her
now? It didn’t make sense. But her doubt screamed at her to pay
attention. If it was true that Aaron had been unfaithful and she
married him anyway, the marriage would ultimately be destroyed by it.

If she married Aaron a week from
tomorrow, she would continue to have doubts. She knew that. As it
was, she sat there in her new expensive house—purchased by Aaron—
without a job. She would be totally reliant on Aaron to give her
money and might be more inclined to look the other way at his
dalliances. Isn’t that how it was done? It would be a matter of
self-preservation.

Cathy kept trying to push her
doubt away, but it always returned. At eight, she turned on the
outside lights for Aaron and got herself another glass of wine.
That’s when the doorbell rang.

Cathy felt very vulnerable
knowing someone—a stranger, no doubt—was on her doorstep in the
dark. She didn’t go to the door and the bell didn’t ring again.
After five minutes, she crept through the hallway into the foyer and
looked out the peephole. There was no one there. Against her better
judgment, she opened the door slightly and saw a large envelope
sitting on the porch. She grabbed it and slammed the door, locking
it.

Her name was printed neatly
across the white envelope. Cathy tore it open and took out a single
photograph. A dark-haired man lay on his side in a bed. It could
definitely have been Aaron, though it was hard to tell. But that’s
not what got her attention. It was the tie that hung off the end of
the bed that caused her heart to stop.

Cathy had ordered the silk tie
from a shop in England, and it had been expensive. It was silver and
blue striped, with a thin red stripe for accent. Cathy had anguished
over it, wondering if Aaron would like it. To Cathy, it was classic
and conservative. Elegant. When Aaron opened it on his birthday in
March, he was genuinely pleased. He wore the tie frequently.

It wasn’t a tie you could get
in the States. It was a special design carried only by a British
clothier. And there it was, hanging off the bed like it had been
thrown there in a fit of passion. Thrown there by someone eager to
get his clothes off.

Cathy turned the photo over.
“Last month” it said simply, again in the neat print.

Cathy burst into tears. Her
fantasy world of a wedding, a house to work on and call her own,
children, completely slipped away. And she was left with only
confusion and a world of hurt.

Her phone pinged briefly letting
her know she had a text.

“
Did you get my text earlier?”
Aaron asked.

She thought about not responding
again, but instead she wrote, “Yes, see you when you get home.”
She didn’t want to give Aaron a warning of what awaited him.

Then she sat down on the couch
and called the only person in the world she could call. When she
heard her grandfather’s voice, she started sobbing all over again.

“
Honey, what is it?” Grandpa
asked several times before Cathy collected herself enough to speak.

She explained everything to her
grandfather, but spoke in vaguer terms about the birthmark. That was
too embarrassing to discuss with him. But he got the idea.

“
I agree, it doesn’t look
good for Aaron,” Grandpa said. “You should think long and hard
about following through with the wedding if you have any doubts about
his fidelity.”

“
How can I not have doubts?”
Cathy said.

“
I don’t know the answer to
that,” Grandpa said. “You have to follow your gut.”

“
My gut tells me that I don’t
know Aaron at all,” Cathy said. “It tells me I would be a fool to
marry him under these circumstances.”

“
I think you should talk to him
before you make that final decision,” Grandpa said.

“
I don’t have a job anymore,”
Cathy said. “I don’t even have a place to live anymore. Only this
fancy house. I have nothing.”

“
Now you know that’s not
true, honey,” Grandpa said. “You’ve got me and the cottage.
You’ll always have a place to live.”

“
I’ll call you tomorrow,”
Cathy said.

A week ago, Cathy had been
happily anticipating her wedding, her honeymoon, and her life as a
partner and wife to Aaron McMahon. Now, she was shattered. She could
have been spending the evening looking at her Pinterest and making
plans for her new house. Instead, she was pacing the floor, drinking
wine, and waiting for Aaron to come home.

Cathy heard him open the kitchen
door at 11:17. She sat and waited. He walked down the hallway and
started up the stairs.

“
I’m in here,” Cathy called
to him.

“
I’m sorry I’m so late,”
Aaron said as he came toward her. He was wearing the tie.

“
Who were you with?” Cathy
asked, hearing the accusatory tone in her voice.

Aaron sat down beside her and
looked at her.

“
I was with the Parkers, that
older couple who own all the artwork.”

“
Hmmph,” she said.

“
Who do you think I was with?”
Aaron asked, beginning to catch on that something was amiss.

“
I have no idea,” Cathy said.
“I have no idea what you do all day and all night. None
whatsoever.”

“
What’s going on?” Aaron
said.

“
I got another call from that
woman,” Cathy said flatly.

“
I thought I blocked those
calls,” Aaron said.

“
She called me at my office.
She knows where I work. Or worked.”

Aaron sighed. “What did she say
this time?”

“
She knew a lot about you. She
knew about your sister.”

Aaron winced. “A lot of people
know about that,” he said.

“
She said you have a birthmark
shaped like a strawberry,” she said.

“
So what?” Aaron said.
“Somebody could’ve seen that at the gym.”

“
And she talked about your
other birthmark,” Cathy said triumphantly, though she didn’t feel
like the winner.

“
Oh my God!” Aaron said
loudly. “Someone is trying to destroy me!”

He turned to Cathy, who was
trying to hold back her tears.

“
Cat, you know I’ve dated
women in the past,” he said softly. “They would know about those
things.”

“
Are you saying this is an old
girlfriend doing this to us?” she asked tearfully.

“
I can’t think who else could
be doing it,” he said.

She reached over to the
photograph lying on the couch beside her.

“
I got this tonight,” she
said handing it to him. “Someone rang the bell and left it on the
doorstep.”

Aaron took the photo and looked
at it.

“
That’s not me,” he said.
“That doesn’t even look like me.”

“
It could be you,” Cathy
said. “This man has dark hair like you.”

“
But it’s not me!” Aaron
said.

“
But that’s your tie! The one
I special ordered for your birthday. No one else has that tie.”

Aaron looked at the photo again.

“
I agree that’s like this
tie,” he said loosening the tie and removing it. “But that is not
me. I swear it’s not me, Cat.”

“
I don’t know what to believe
anymore,” she said.

“
Someone’s out to get me,”
Aaron said. “But I have no idea who.”

“
Do you really expect me to
believe that?” Cathy asked.

“
If you believe in us, then I
do expect you to believe that,” he retorted.

“
I did believe in us. But now
I’m starting to feel like a fool.”

“
No, Cat. Don’t say that,”
Aaron pleaded. He took her hands in his and looked her straight in
the face.

“
Cat, you’ve got to believe
in me. I’ve been faithful to you. I don’t want anyone else. I
want to marry you!”

Cathy wanted to bury her face in
his chest and cry. But she didn’t. She couldn’t.

“
This has been a long day for
me,” she said getting up. “You can sleep on the couch tonight.
I’m going to bed.”

“
I’ve got to meet David Ayers
at the golf course in the morning,” Aaron said. “He’s about to
sign on, and I don’t need to cancel on him.”

“
Fine,” Cathy said. That was
just fine. Aaron’s dedication to his work had never bothered her
before. His late hours, his erratic schedule. She understood he was
working toward a goal, one that would benefit both of them. But now,
she saw down the road of her married life with Aaron. His getting
home late many nights, meetings on weekends, on the computer at all
hours. It suddenly didn’t seem good enough for a whole life.

She stomped upstairs and pulled a
pillow off the bed. She grabbed the blanket and threw both down the
stairs where they landed in a heap. Then she went back to her lonely
bed and cried herself to sleep.

The next morning, Aaron jostled
her until she woke up. She looked at him with puffy eyes.

“
I’ll be back in a few
hours,” Aaron said softly. “We’ll work all of this out, I
promise you. I’m going to find out who’s doing this to us. Please
believe that I love you.”

Cathy didn’t say anything.
Aaron kissed her lightly before he left.

He left, in the middle of a
crisis. That’s what her life held for her if she stayed with him.
He wouldn’t be there when she needed him. And what about any
children they might have? He would be too busy with business—or
affairs—to spend time with them. Be a father to them. It was all so
crystal clear to Cathy.

She had lived in the new house
for two nights, so nothing was unpacked. It would be easy to put the
boxes of clothes in her car. That’s really all she needed. Except
for only one item she cared about.

In the kitchen, Cathy opened two
boxes before she found what she wanted. The blue ceramic bowl that
had belonged to her grandmother. Everything else—the pots and pans,
the dishes, the utensils—she had bought after she moved to Atlanta.
Those things didn’t matter to her. Nothing mattered but the old
blue bowl.

Upstairs, Cathy put on her jeans
and T-shirt. She looked in the closet. The only thing hanging there
was her wedding dress. She had searched through every shop in Atlanta
to find what she wanted, a simple dress, gathered at the waist with
capped sleeves. She had planned to wear her mother’s pearl necklace
and earrings. All so simple and elegant.

Cathy left the dress in the
closet and began to drag the boxes of clothes to the kitchen. She
dragged them into the garage and opened her car. Two of the boxes fit
neatly in the back seat, but the third box was too bulky for the
trunk. She opened the box and picked up armful after armful of
clothes and threw them in the trunk.

Back inside, Cathy took her
sapphire ring off and set it on the bathroom counter. She got her
laptop and purse. In the kitchen, she picked up the blue bowl and
glanced around. The empty house was huge and silent. She had nothing
in it she cared about. The house was never going to be hers and she
had been foolish to think it could have been. It would have been an
unhappy house, full of suspicion. There wasn’t enough expensive
furniture and decorations in the world to change that.

She was seventy-five miles down
the highway to Florida before she pulled into a gas station and sent
an email to Aaron. It was only eleven and he probably wouldn’t even
be home yet. But he would get the email soon, she was sure of that.

Cathy told Aaron that she
couldn’t marry him while she had so many doubts. It was all too
much. She asked him to contact his family members and friends to let
them know the wedding had been called off. She told him she would
take care of everyone else. She said she would cancel all of the
arrangements.

Then she called her grandfather
and said she was on her way home.

Chapter
Four

Four hours into her drive her
cell started ringing. She didn’t even have to look at it to know it
was Aaron. She decided to not answer the phone while she was driving.
She needed to keep her wits about her on the interstate.