Watch What Burns (11 page)

“What’s happened?” Jane asked as she rushed over. “I was coming over and saw Diane leaving. What’s going on?”

Pulling away from her husband, she remained close by his side and looked to her mother. “We’ve got some problems with Natasha,” Austin spoke coldly, her entire body unable to react normally when she held the shredded photo in her hand. “Diane gave her a photo of us three, and I received this,” she told her mother and handed the letter over as well.

Jane took the letter from her daughter’s hand and read it. “This is to go with the others your sister was going on about this morning?” Jane asked looking up, only half reading the malicious words printed onto the page. She watched them nod. “Why now?”

“She wants my life,” Austin said, and Tyler tightened his arm around her. She knew from that one gesture he hated how this was turning out to be a battle and how doubts were becoming apparent over Natasha and her intentions.

“She’s not getting it,” Tyler affirmed, his jaw clenched tightly together. “Over my dead body will she get it. I won’t allow her to dictate our lives like this, Aus. She has absolutely no right to do it.”

“I know,” she whispered, knowing she believed him, but she needed fool hardy proof. “There’s only one thing left to do now,” Austin said and looked to her husband who stood clueless. She rolled her eyes and looked to her mother, “Can you watch Grace? I’m going to pay someone a visit.”

“Of course,” Jane stepped in, tempted to ask for the full picture.

“Baby,” Tyler stepped in. “What are you up to?”

“Like I said,” Austin began to say, her tone heated and hard. “I’m paying someone a visit. Now you can either come with me or stay here. The choice is entirely yours, but someone needs to see how things have changed in three years.”

STANDING in a room with Tyler, Austin began to pace with nervousness. With the help of Tyler’s position and badge, he was able to get them a meeting with Natasha within the hour. They were led to a room that looked into an interrogation room. The room only held a table and two chairs, another door on the opposite side of the room and the window was barred. The sight of it only jangled Austin’s nerves more.

“You don’t have to do this,” Tyler said, stepping in and placing his hands onto her arms to stop her from burning a hole in the floor with her incessant pacing. “We can do
this another day, or not at all. We don’t have to appease her by being here. We don’t need to do any of this. I can sort out a restraining order that prohibits her from even sending a letter to us and we can move on.”

Closing her eyes briefly, Austin gathered some composure before opening her eyes to look at her husband. “I know,” she whispered at him, “But I was unable to say much before. She left me feeling so weak and powerless after the fire, but I’m not that way any longer. I’m not going to be beaten or threatened by Natasha Truman. I won’t let it happen anymore.”

“I know you won’t,” Tyler said, pushing a loose piece of Austin’s hair back. “This time you will get the final say. It’s what you do best.” He gave her a wink, hoping it would loosen her up to his teasing.

“Hey,” she said, a small smile breaking through her nerves and she pushed onto his chest a little. “That wasn’t very nice.”

“Might not be, but it’s the truth,” he told her playfully, grinning at her the entire time. “Want me to go in there with you?” he asked her, quickly moving onto a new conversation.

“You don’t really want to see her,” Austin joked, knowing her husband all too well. She giggled at his facial expression; she knew how little he wanted to be face to face with Natasha.

Tyler went to reply, but the noise of a door opening alerted them that Natasha was finally brought into the room behind them. Turning to look, he gasped at her appearance and how defiant she was towards the guards. Her hair was lank, her skin almost sallow, but her eyes were alive with manifesting malevolence. He watched her being manhandled by the guard as he chained her to the table, and he gulped. He could not understand how he had ever loved her, how he devoted part of his life to her. He could no longer see the attraction, and only felt the regret multiply within him.

“I think I need to go in there alone,” Austin stated, looking through the one way glass at Natasha. Seeing the culprit to her stress she was suddenly racked with anger again. The heat of her rage obliterating her nerves in one swift shot from her body, and she no longer felt the need to run scared.

“You sure?” Tyler asked her, searching for a loop hole in her expression.

Austin nodded at him. “Yeah, I need to do this. I need to confront her alone. I know you’re here. I know you’re close.” She gave him a cunning smirk, she was beginning to feel calculating towards her action plan. “I wouldn’t say no to you coming in after a little bit, but I feel
this needs to be between Natasha and myself. I think you and I together will stir this up too quickly.”

“Okay,” Tyler relented easily and pulled her into his arms. “I love you so much.”

“I love you too,” she whispered against his hold, inhaling his scent as if it would put her battle armor on. Releasing from his firm grasp, she left him alone and went to the door where she nodded her head to tell the guard waiting that she was ready.

Stepping into the room, Austin was even more horrified by Natasha’s appearance. She looked significantly older, she barely looked her age. Her hair was uncared for, her skin tired, and she had clearly lost weight. Austin had expected change, but not this. A part of her had expected Natasha to thrive within the walls of her prison cell, but apparently Natasha was barely surviving. The thought did make a part of Austin laugh; she had half hoped that Natasha had met the bigger fish that would put her in her place. Someone that would knock her down a few notches, and really make her repent for all she had done.

“They didn’t tell me who was visiting me and I did half expect my mother to come here with some new bribe or trick,” Natasha stated coolly as Austin stood before her. “But I guess I was wrong. I never expected
you
to be here.”

“Yeah, this isn’t a pleasant visit on my behalf,” Austin responded, keeping a similar manner as Natasha. “I’m here because of this,” Austin commented as she put the letter down on the table before Natasha. “Who do you think you are?”

“Natasha Truman,” Natasha replied, folding her arms across her chest.

Austin rolled her eyes at Natasha’s pathetic nature. “Wow,” she sighed in sarcasm. “Is that all you have for me? You’ve been in prison three years and all you can use is childhood responses.”

“Are those what Gracie uses? Does she use childhood responses when she doesn’t get her own way?” Natasha asked, smiling at Austin in glee.

“Don’t you dare say her name,” Austin ground out between her clenched teeth, she was trying to keep herself from literally going crazy. She knew she had to keep calm, and retain composure. “You have no right to speak of her.”

“Can’t really stop me,” Natasha goaded the situation, immediately seeing Grace as a way to hit out at Austin. “It’s good to know Austin Pearson isn’t barren after all. You can bear a child to full term.”

“Least I managed to have a child,” Austin bit back, and regretted it immediately. Trying to attack Natasha wasn’t why she was here. She wanted answers, not another argument. “She isn’t why I am here. I want to know why all of a sudden you have struck up an interest in my family.”

“Have you ever wondered how short lived your family will be?” Natasha asked, ignoring Austin completely. “I mean, come on, Tyler can’t love you. Look at you, Austin!”

“I do look at myself every day,” Austin began to say, keeping her voice steady. “I have scars, so what? I have had them for three years; do you really think they still bother me? That I am that easily swayed with your insults about them?”

Natasha chuckled, throwing her head back a little. “You always will be! Austin, I know you almost as well as Tyler does!”

“No, you don’t!” Austin snapped bitterly. “I am not that girl you went to school with, nor am I the girl you pushed that night, and I am certainly not the girl that walked back into town nearly four years ago and
allowed you to turn my world upside down. I will never be her again.”

“Give me an opportunity and I’m sure I could make you a
sniveling mess on the floor,” Natasha giggled at Austin wickedly. “I know how to get you each and every time, Austin! Being in here hasn’t changed that. If anything I’m wiser now. I’ve learned more in here than you would believe.”

Putting her hand to her forehead, Austin could feel a headache beginning to throb alive in the front part of her head. Letting her hand drop, Austin looked to Natasha and narrowed her gaze. “Do you know I pity you?” Austin asked Natasha, and even when she snorted, Austin continued. “I do, I mean look what you made of your life and all over a man. Was he worth all of the pain and heartache, Natasha? Is Tyler worth it all these years on?”

“Is he worth you being scarred for life?” Natasha retorted back. “I mean, it is his fault too. You came back to town and suddenly he’s falling in love with you again. If you had just stayed away, he would have carried on loving me and I wouldn’t have needed to start that fire.”

“But he never loved you.” Austin repaid Natasha’s comments with one that just rendered her silent. “He
never loved you because he never stopped loving me. Even you saw that, otherwise, I wouldn’t have been a threat. If you knew he loved you without a doubt, then you wouldn’t have needed to lie to me, and hurt him, and do all the things you did.” Austin paused a moment before finishing her comment. “He will never be guilty for my scars, so don’t even try to make me feel like I should blame him. We all know where to point the finger here.”

“Oh yes, at me!” Natasha exclaimed, still finding this all highly amusing. “Anyway, how have the letters gone down?” she asked, and noticed how Austin didn’t hurry to answer. “Clearly he’s read them,” Natasha suddenly sobered up on her warped sense of truth. “So he knows I still love him.”

“Yeah, he reads them, lets me see them as well,” Austin appeased her. “Even knowing you still love him doesn’t sway him. He’s happily married to me, and all your little letters will stop when you find yourself unable to send any mail again.”

“Such an over exaggeration,” Natasha laughed at the ludicrous sounding comments.

“He doesn’t care,” Austin silenced Natasha in one swift sentence. “He doesn’t feel anything for you apart from a lot of wasted memories. Trust me; he regrets your time together, so maybe you should too. Look where that relationship got you,” Austin spoke maliciously, using Natasha’s words back on her. “Loving him got you thrown into a cell for the rest of your life. Have you faced up to that yet, Natasha?”

“I won’t be in here for life,” Natasha stated with clarity. She knew she was being arrogant, and she knew full well it might not be an easy feat to win, but she knew she would not sit and look at the same four walls for the rest of her life. She had things that still needed rectifying.

Austin laughed a little, wondering how Natasha still hadn’t faced up to her own fate. “Did you hear the judge when the jury found you guilty?” Austin asked her. “You’re in here serving a life sentence.”

“Like I said,” Natasha smirked, “I won’t be in here for life. That judge was a silly man. You’ll see me living back in Point Arena before long.”

Austin shuddered at the thought of having Natasha living so close to her daughter and family. She was unable to comprehend that ever happening, and as she saw the look on Natasha’s face, the thought vanished. “I saw how smug you looked on that stand that day,” Austin sneered in disgust.

“He will be mine,” Natasha remarked back. “When I get out, he’ll run back to me.”

Austin didn’t budge, she didn’t let that seed of doubt implement into her mentality. There was no way she could allow Natasha to work on her irrational side and play her against herself. “Tyler will never be yours.”

“What makes you so certain?” Natasha asked Austin. “I mean, knowing Tyler, he’s on the other side of that glass panel,” she moved a little to the side to look at the glass, she grinned towards it before looking at Austin again. “How about we invite him in? He can see what he is really missing out on. He can come in here and see who he really loves.”

“He doesn’t love you!” Austin literally bellowed from the bottom of her soul, her hands crashing down on to the table top as she stood up to tower over Natasha across the table. “Leave him alone, Natasha. He doesn’t care about you.”

“I love that I can still get so easily under your skin, Austin,” Natasha sneered at Austin, feeling happy with the reason she caused this volatile
behavior. “Even now, all these years on, even with the wedding ring on your finger and that baby of yours, I can still rock the very foundations your relationship with Tyler sits on.”

“That’s not true,” Austin mumbled back, the wind taken out of her sails. She knew that Natasha was right. She was the only woman that terrified Austin the most. She had played such an important role in the past why would that stop her from doing the same in the future? Looking over at the window herself, Austin imagined Tyler being here, his arms around her, keeping her sane. She drew strength from the memory, and stood up straight. “Natasha, if you loved him, like wholeheartedly loved him, like you say you do, why did you feed him so many lies? That isn’t love. Deceit doesn’t make a happily ever after. It just gets worse every single day.”

“You got forgiveness, and your lies got you a happy ever after,” Natasha sneered at her, her face full of disgust. “You ran away, hurt everyone and came back, and look at you. Probably the Austin everyone loves, goody two shoes, perfect woman.”

“I ran because I was scared,” Austin professed to Natasha. “I didn’t want to, but it felt right, and looking back it wasn’t. I hurt Tyler in so many ways, but he loved me enough to forgive me once I told him why I left. It’s in the past. We don’t throw it in one another’s faces.” Then, without thinking, Austin
sniped back and hit out at Natasha at the only way she knew would hurt her most. “He loved me after what you did. He forgave me, saved me, and then fought for me. He gave me a perfect marriage, a perfect daughter, and I got the perfect life.”

“
Well look right here,” Natasha sneered at Austin. “Once again, Austin Pearson got what she wanted.”

Giving up on this, Austin decided to reserve her energy and head home. Except she had to have the final say, she had to leave with her last words spoken. “You got it wrong,” she spoke back with a stern, cold tone and watched Natasha glare at her across the room, “Austin
Armstrong
got what she wanted.”