‘I’m going inside,’ Fenton muttered, attempting to push past him.
Jason didn’t budge. ‘A DNA test, is all,’ he said. ‘There isn’t anything else I want from you, Robert, trust me.’
Fenton looked at him in bemusement, and then spat out a derisory laugh. ‘Do you honestly think I wouldn’t have already taken steps to establish whether this nightmare was true?’ he asked him. ‘I’ve done thetest,’ he went on, with another despairing shake of his head. ‘As soon as I learned Karla was pregnant, I did the test.’
When Karla was…?Jason felt as if someone had just punched him. Winded, physically, he stared incredulously at him, trying to understand what would drive someone to do the despicable things he did. Failing. ‘Why the fucking hell didn’t yousaysomething?’ he yelled.
‘Say what?’ Fenton growled back. ‘When, precisely? I tried everything to dissuade her from having the baby. I begged her. She was adamant she was going to go through with it. Was I supposed to tell her after she’d given birth? When the child reached her first birthday?When?’
The child?Anger kicking ferociously inside him, Jason almost reeled where he stood.
‘She claimed she loved you. What in God’s name was I supposed to do?’ Fenton continued, actually imagining his actions weredefensible? The man was inhuman. Jason squinted hard at him.
‘Of course, assuming you had any traits that were worthwhile, I considered you might at least provide for the child.’ Fenton’s laugh this time was a derogatory sneer. ‘You soon dispelled that hope, didn’t you?’
‘You’re talking about yourgrandchild,’ Jason could barely get the words out. ‘Yourdaughter.’
Fenton said nothing, merely held his gaze for a long, cold moment. Then, ‘I have the paperwork. I’ll email you a copy,’ he said, adjusting his shirt cuffs, and then continuing on past him.
Jason didn’t try to stop him. He didn’t dare touch him. If he did, he would kill him.
‘Oh.’ Fenton turned back from a safe distance off. ‘Note I said, ‘loved’. Not present tense, Jason.’ He smiled again, a gloating smile. ‘I couldn’t help overhearing Karla and her mother talking in the kitchen one evening. Karla was upset, as she often is lately. It was most telling, I thought, that when Diana asked her if she loved you, Karla said, she did… once.’
Pulling his gaze away, he walked on. ‘They were discussing the merits of the young man Karla was dancing with at Diana’s party versus yours afterwards,’ he imparted, over his shoulder. ‘I didn’t interrupt. Girl-talk. More than I dare do.’
Swallowing back the bile rising in his throat, Jason watched him swagger on towards the golf club entrance. Tried to assimilate. Breathing hard, he stayed where he was for several seconds, acrid grief crashing through him as he felt his world crumbling around him.
He felt hollow inside as he walked back to his car, numb from the inside out. He barely flinched as his passenger wing hit one of the bollards at the exit as he trod on the accelerator and screeched out of the car park.
Arriving at his office a couple of hours later, Jason placed the bottle of whisky he’d purchased on the desk, plunged his hands into his pockets and stared down at his laptop. It was still in the same position as when he’d walked out, yanked around to face the doorway. It was strange how, despite his whole life being turned upside down, his innards being ripped out, everything looked exactly the same as it had yesterday and the day before that. He felt almost as if he could simply push the hands of the clock back and make all the shit go away. But he couldn’t, could he? It just kept on coming.
He’d always wondered about his roots. And now he knew. He’d been spawned by an abomination of a man. Born to a woman he could only suppose had been on the receiving end of Fenton’s abusive behaviour. He should never have happened. Karla and him, they should never have happened.
His kids…
Jesus.Swaying slightly on his feet, Jason pressed a hand against the back of his neck and glanced up at the ceiling. No point looking up there, he supposed. He must have done something beyond abhorrent in another life. He looked back to the whisky. After downing several beers with whisky chasers at the pub, he’d splashed out and bought a bottle of the good stuff: 18 year old Glenfiddich. If he was going to drink himself to death, he was going to do it in style.
Might as well live up to his reputation, he’d decided, and be the loser he obviously was – a cheating, lying failure and obviously a complete bastard. He hadn’t needed Karla to confirm that. Smiling cynically, Jason picked up the bottle, twirled his computer around, negotiated his way unsteadily to his chair and dropped heavily down into it.
So, what sites had he been browsing, he wondered? And had he found anyone worth dating? Maybe he had. Unscrewing the cap, he tipped his head back and drank straight from the bottle. Maybe he’d been sleep-dating, fucking any and all available women he could find, which was obviously why he didn’t remember doing it.
Perhaps he should remind himself? He took another large gulp of whisky and swallowed it back, getting no comfort from it as it burned its way down his oesophagus.Why not go out with a bang, hey?He had nothing to lose, after all.
Wiping the back of his hand against his mouth, he fired up the laptop and… voila! Up came his internet history, as accessed by Karla behind his back. He had no doubt her father had put her up to that. And he was sure that Robert had accessed his laptop while he and Karla had been in the kitchen. Why, Jason had no clue. Because he’d still been debating the wisdom of delivering the news he had, and this was his fallback plan? Because he’d wanted to make sure Karla would want nothing to do with him, whether or not he delivered the news? Whatever his reasoning, he’d succeeded in his aim. As far as Fenton was concerned, it was mission accomplished.
Karla had clearly already grown disillusioned with him. According to Fenton, he reminded himself. Did he believe it? Had he really been mistaking what he thought he saw in Karla’s eyes? Jason wasn’t sure. It didn’t much matter whether she loved him or not now, though, did it, he also reminded himself.
His heart feeling as if it was turning inside out inside him, he reached for his keyboard and scrolled down through the history. ‘Shit.’ He drew in a breath as he noted the sites listed there: Match.com, Zoosk, Flirt, FlirtEasy, QuickFlirt and more. It was no wonder Karla had been so upset. Taking another slug of his whisky, he nearly choked when he came to the BeNaughty and LocalNaughties sites. Sobering up, briefly, he almost closed his laptop down – and then thought, stuff it. If he was going to be accused of the deed, he might as well take a look. After all, he was going to have to stop thinking of himself as a married man now, wasn’t he? Although, actually, it probably hadn’t ever been legal anyway.
Swallowing back an overwhelming sense of loss, Jason opened up one of the sites. He wasn’t certain how good an idea it was when he read the overview, which stated that everyone on the site had the same goal: to find people with similar interests who were looking for casual and erotic relationships. He wasn’t sure that fit his preferred criteria. He would need either a lot less whisky or a hell of a lot more to go there, no matter how frustrated and lonely he was feeling.
The next site offered much the same: casual dating and hook-ups. Jason supposed ‘hook-ups’ were what he had in mind. But then again, maybe not. Though he definitely wasn’t looking for what some of the other sites claimed he would find: a relationship or his ‘special someone’. He’d already found her. He was probably more up for something in between a one-night stand and a relationship, conversation definitely being one of his ‘search criteria’.
Christ, he needed someone to talk to.
Sipping steadily from his bottle, he browsed a few more sites, finally clicking on one that made him want to continue reading – or rather squinting at. It offered email and IM chatting, and also had a facility to switch between searching for ‘love’ or ‘flirting’, which might allow him to tread the middle ground.
Did he want to tread the middle ground? Jason had no idea… Right now, he felt as if the ground had dropped from underneath him, leaving him freefalling into a very dark pit. Hesitating, he took another long drink and continued on to the sign-up page. The site promised the application process took only minutes – basic details, a username, password and email address being all that was needed before he was ‘in and free to browse’.
