I was afraid to tap the second link – scared to see how else Jessy had betrayed me, but I couldn’t stop myself. A different article pulled up, with a photo at the very top of Jessy smiling, arm in arm with … Cassie.
That was when my heart really did stop beating.
PATRICK TETLOW’S MOTHER AND GIRLFRIEND BEST FRIENDS!
Cassie Fletcher, mother of These Exiles lead singer Patrick Tetlow, has spilled the details from her lunch with Jessy Donovan, girlfriend of her famous son.
‘Once I met Jessy, I knew she was the one for my Paddy. She’s helping me patch things back up with my boy, you know. I know he loves her dearly. Jessy told me he’s been showering her with gifts and jewels,’ said Cassie. ‘Not that he’s ever showered me with jewels, his own mum –’
I was going to be sick. I was actually going to be sick.
I’d trusted her – I’d never told anyone about Cassie. But I had told Jessy. I’d asked her to back off. That things between me and Cassie couldn’t be fixed. I had thought she’d listened. Thought she had understood.
All the fucking while she’d been chatting to my own mother behind my back.
I was livid.
Not that he’s ever showered me with jewels –
I stumbled out of bed, dropping my phone on to the duvet as I grabbed clean clothes. Where I was going, I didn’tknow – but I couldn’t just lie here when the memory of having Jessy in my arms just hours ago plagued me.
God, how could I have been so stupid? How had I not seen the betrayal coming? I wasn’t sure what was worse. The shit with my – with Cassie, or all the fucking men she’d apparently been seeing. I knew we weren’t officially dating, but last night had changed things. I thought –
What was it about me that made the women in my life want to betray me? What kind of fucked-up cosmic karma was this? I’d finally let my guard down, after so long keeping people out, and all that happened was that I got hurt. Again.
After tugging a T-shirt over my head, I picked up my phone, rage fuelling me to recklessness.
Paddy
Where are you?
I fired off the message to Jessy. ‘Shit,’ I muttered under my breath, chest tight and painful.
I needed to talk to her. I never wanted to talk to her again. I didn’t know what I wanted.
We had a contract. But I’d be damned if I was going to let a piece of paper force me to be with a woman who didn’t even have the integrity to tell me she was seeing other people.
Which, by the way, I thought furiously,is completely against the contract.
Fuck. I couldn’t wait around for her to reply. I needed answers and I needed them now.
It took me three attempts to find a pair of matching shoes and two minutes to remember how to lock my own front door.
Paddy
I need to see you
I’d sent the message before I started down the stairs, and by the time I’d reached the bottom of my block of flats I had a reply.
Jessy
Missed me?
Paddy
Where are you? At home still?
Had she even gone home, or was that another lie?
