Sarina's hand is brushing my hair away from my ears as I look up at her on the beach, next to the Mediterranean. The salty smell and sound of the waves on the beach are soothing as I gaze up into her beautiful eyes. The cry of a gull suddenly makes a pang in my heart start. Sarina begins to talk to me.
"I would never hurt you like that Brian. I love you. You're perfect to me my love."
Suddenly, we're not at the beach but I'm frozen standing watching as some guy has her pinned against a brick wall, screwing her, and the sounds she's making... those are sounds that she would make with me. My heart feels like it's being ripped from my chest as the guy turns around and looks at me.
"This is her favorite position."
Before he begins fucking her harder. Then his face morphs into Johns and now they're sitting on a sofa, and they're making out, at least I think they are.
Johns face comes into view just to tell me, "She's like my sister now. My hot sister." Before he starts laughing and goes back to making out with her. I'm crying out, begging them to stop, trying to move to beat his ass to a pulp, to kill him, just to get him off of her.
Sarina's face appears in front of mine again. "Brian, I would never hurt you."
"But you did." I respond to her, grief overwhelming me. "YOU DID!" I shout.
I sit up and realize I'm in the hotel room. Empty bottles of booze around, a pounding headache, and no idea what day or time it is. My stomach starts to turn and I stumble to the bathroom to start throwing up my guts.
By the time I'm done, my head feels like a hydraulic press has had it's way with it, my throat is raw, my mouth tastes like shit, and my whole body feels exhausted. I rinse my mouth out, after struggling to my feet, and make my way to the bed. I lay back down on it and try to fall back asleep. I don't want to be conscious right now. I just want to go back to the beach in my dreams. Where everything was perfect and I was whole.
Sarina's POV
"Who the fuck would do this?!" I shout, not believing what I was seeing. Tori's lips were stretched thin and confused as well as John. The pictures that Tori had in her hand when Brian had suddenly picked up the rest of the envelope and abruptly left the office yesterday was all we had to go on. However, John was able to prove it was a fake. The date on the photos were when he had to go out of town on business and Tori had gone with him.
Secondly, the outfits we were both wearing in the photos, neither of us own or have owned something like that.
"You said they gave him an envelope full of these and just left?" Lirael asks, her brows furrowed in thought. Lance had shown up with Richard after finding out and left the baby with us, so he could gather up some of the guys and they'd start driving around to try and find him at places they thought he might go.
Tori nods, "Yeah. He came bursting in through the door when his secretary was trying to let him know and just gave him the envelope and left. Almost like he was being served a court order."
Lirael chews her bottom lip, "That is just weird."
"It's more than weird! It's completely fucked! I swear when I find out who did this!" I yell to the ceiling, angry tears now falling from my eyes.
"Rina. Calm down. This is a stressful enough situation as is. You don't want to cause you or your little one harm." John reminds me.
"Calm down?! Calm down?! My husband thinks I cheated on him! He's disappeared! No contact since Thursday! What if he.. ?" My voice trails off at the thought.
What if he did the same thing his brother did?
"Oh my god... oh my god... Lirael! He wouldn't.. right?" I rush to her and grab her arms.
"Sarina, NO. Stop that right now. He wouldn't dare. Come on, let's go lay down with Richard. You need some rest. You've barely slept the past two days which is not helping you think straight." She tries to direct me to the bedroom, but I pull myself from her arms.
"No. I don't feel right just staying here. I'm going out to drive and look for him." I say gathering up my purse and keys.
John stands up, "Whoa whoa. I don't think that is a good idea. You're upset and what'll happen if you get into an accident?" He stands in my way.
"John, if you don't move your ass, I will move you my damn self!" I shout.
Richard starts to cry and Lirael rushes over to pick him up and soothe him, taking him into another room.
"Let her go." Tori says firmly. "She'll know places that are special to just them. He might be at one of those places." She comes up to stand beside me, letting him know, she was on my side.
John runs a hand over his face, "If you start crying, pull over. IF anything happens to you.... David will come back and haunt my ass forever." He pulls me in for a hug. "Please be careful. We'll call if something comes up, or you call us. Okay?"
I nod and head out the door, get into the car and try to start thinking of where I could drive to that he might be.
Brian's POV
I don't know why I'm looking through these again. I wonder who did all this? These pictures even had dates and times on them. They go back to around the time we first started dating. So why now? There's no note, nothing but pictures. Something does seem odd about a few of them, but I'm not sure what exactly it is. The ones that kills me the most are the ones where I see her face so vividly. A few of them she's even wearing the earrings I bought her. That has me throwing the pictures away from me, scattering over the floor. I pick up the bottle of Jameson, drinking it back with vigor. I still don't know what day it is and I don't care.
Nothing matters right now, except how to try and alleviate this pain. I get why my brother who was so in love with this person he was going to meet, felt so alone and betrayed afterwards. He was absolutely crushed, violated, disgusted, alone....
I bury my face in my hands sobbing because I truly knew, now, how he must have felt. To be in so much pain, all you can do is pray to stop the pain. I stumbled my way into the shower, sobering up long enough to brush my teeth and get dressed again.
I turn my phone on and it's going off like crazy. The sound of so many notifications is too much and it shuts back off. I sigh and turn it back on again and while it still goes off it doesn't shut off. I want to call her I want to ask her why, but realize that's a conversation that needs to be done in person. I turn my phone back off and go to finish getting dressed.
As soon as I sat on the bed to put on shoes to drive home and confront her, I realized, I still wasn't ready yet. I don't know if my heart will ever be ready though. I feel like this is a horrible nightmare. Sarina wouldn't cheat on me! She's been through all that before, she would never! Anger starts to well up in me. She would not cheat on me, damn it!
The pictures on the floor though prove otherwise. The pain washes over, extinguishing the anger and bringing back the bitter disappointment.
I grab the bottle again, tipping it back and pull deep, finishing the bottle off. I grab the next bottle out, which is tequila.
Fuck it.
"Down we go." I tilt my head back and drink.
I don't know when I passed out, but banging on my door has me staggering to my feet, only to drop from not able to keep my balance. I'm on the cool laminate flooring that feels great and comfortable. I ignore the knocking and fall back into unconsciousness.
I feel hands on me shaking me. I groan and try to roll back over.
"Leave me alone." I mutter.
I hear the door close and start to fade back into the blackness of sleep.
Cold, wetness engulfs my face, making me force my eyes open slowly, groaning.
"What the fuck?!" I moan, trying to focus on the person standing over me.
"Brian! Are you trying to drink yourself to death?!" That's Sarina's voice.
"Great... another dream." I mumble, "So when is John and whoever that other guys is, supposed to show up and fuck you again?" I sluggishly push myself up and move slowly to lean against the wall. "Just leave me alone! Damn it! This is painful enough with out having to see it over and over again!" I yell, closing my eyes as I pant, trying to stop the room from spinning and getting sick. I cover my mouth when I feel my stomach turn.
A trash can appears right in front of me and I start vomiting up everything in my stomach. Which is mostly tequila. Fuck, that's disgusting. I wipe my mouth with my sleeve and promptly pass out, welcoming the blackness back.