Page 98 of Conviction
“I’m calling the police,” Conner says. I don’t argue. My days of worrying about Marcus are over. Our entire marriage and life together has been a complete façade. I’ve been lied to and manipulated, and I could no longer care less about the consequences he may be about to face.
Conner puts a call through to the emergency services, passing the phone to me to give the address. I end the call as Marcus comes through the bedroom door. Conner moves me behind him. He watches us for a few seconds, swinging his car keys around his fingers.
“So, what have we here? Con the Con, living up to his name. Adding, breaking and entering to your charge sheet now are you?”
Conner squeezes my hand a little tighter for a second, then lets it go. I watch the smirk leave Marcus’s face and fear take over as Conner takes two steps toward him. Without a word, Conner lands a punch that lifts Marcus off his feet. He doesn’t get up, and I move closer to make sure that Conner hasn’t killed him.
Conner leans down and pulls Marcus up by his tie, pressing their foreheads together.
“Games up you slippery little cunt. We know what you’ve done. We know everything. Now you’re going to prison while I skip off into the sunset withyourwife to raiseourbaby. Together.” He turns and looks at me, his eyes a steely grey despite the smile on his face.
“And you know why I’m gonna do that?” Marcus blinks but doesn’t answer. “Because I’m Conner fucking Reed and I can.”
He then headbutts Marcus, right between the eyes. I don’t even wince when I hear bones crunch and watch blood spray everywhere. Conner stands and holds his hand out to me.
“Meebs.”
I step toward him and take his hand, but as I step over my husband, who’s still lying in the bedroom doorway, I can’t resist affording Marcus the same favour he bestowed upon Sophie and I a couple of months ago, and I spit, right beside his head.
I hear Conner chuckle from beside me.
“Is that it, Meebs? After everything he’s done to you, to us, that all you got?”
Knowing what will hurt Marcus more than anything else, I turn to Conner, wrap my arms around his neck and say, “I love you, baby, let’s go home and fuck.” Just as the sirens sound outside.
The next few hours area blur. Despite his injuries, Marcus is arrested, and we’re also escorted by the police to the station for questioning. We take the paperwork regarding Marcus’s vasectomy with us. On the way, Conner explains that he’s had a private detective watching both Marcus and my brother for the past couple of weeks.
It’s taken a bit longer than expected to gather the evidence that Conner was after. Initially, he just wanted something to bargain with, to force Marcus into signing the divorce papers, but with what’s been uncovered, we want charges pressed.
After giving our statements regarding how I went to my old home to collect my passport when Marcus attempted to attack me, Conner then had to step in to save me, causing Marcus to break his nose in the process, we’re released.
IIt’s not entirely the truth, but with everything else that’s been uncovered, my soon to be ex-husband isn’t contradicting our statements, he’s got bigger things to worry about.
It turns out that Marcus paid someone to attack me outside the wine bar and over the next few days, we discover that he was convinced that if I thought it was fans of Conner’s, I wouldn’t feel safe and would go running back to him. Me being pregnant, he thought would help his plans by convincing me that I needed to be with someone who could keep me safe.
He thought that by threatening me with a custody battle, I would easily fold and merely move back with him. He never planned on telling me about the vasectomy. If Conner ever asked for a paternity test in the future, he assumed that I would’ve fallen back in love with him and Conner would be out of my system.
And why the vasectomy? Because he could. The one thing he knew I wanted was a family, but he wanted ultimate control over that decision, and ultimately over me and my life.
I’d married a sociopath. Marcus showed no remorse for his actions and considered it his right to make that choice for me.
But the ‘holy fuck’ moments just kept coming.
It was Marcus that had leaked the fabricated underage sex story to the press, along with the news that Conner and I were together.
It had taken Tom a while to put everything together as Marcus was using two phones. Tom was only tracking his smartphone, unaware that he also had a cheap pre-pay from which he’d arranged the assault on me.
But it gets better. Turns out that the reason that Marcus had two phones in the first place was to hide his affair. The affair he was having with my brother’s wife.
My. Brothers. Wife.
They have a child together. My brother’s only child isn’t his, he belongs to Marcus.
Marcus has not only confessed all of this to the police, but he’s also sent me a long and detailed letter explaining everything, assuming that by coming clean, I would forgive and go back to him. The letter contained not one word of apology, not a single sorry. Just the facts about what he'd done, and how he’d only ever had my best interest at heart.
I’m not sure if he’s suffering from some type of mental breakdown, but he is most definitely delusional, and I can’t help but feel just a little bit guilty. His life and his business are in pieces, along with my brother’s and my parents. But it’s the little boy involved that I feel the sorriest for. Henry’s not an attractive or likeable child, there’s nothing warm or loving about him, and I know that in the past, he’s been bullied at school. He’s just a kid, and little arsehole or not, I hope all of this doesn’t affect him long term, turning him into a replica of his father.
The scandal has been all over the newspapers, and my mother has resigned from her ministerial post. If it wasn’t for the impact this is having on Henry’s life, I’d be happy because all of it has nothing to do with me. Not that that’ll stop her from blaming me. My family wanted nothing more than for me to marry Marcus and just look at what it’s achieved. My brother and mother have lost their jobs, and Marcus is facing a conviction and will most likely be struck off.
