Crazy but Sweet, Sweet but Crazy

57: to hate

"I fell for your father because he is an unbelievably hopeful man. Some call him naive, and others say he's optimistic.

"I say he's the rare combination of a man who is aware of all the ugly, foul things of the world and still hasn't abandoned hope of making it a better place to live in. Even at this age."

Shaking her head, Jessica muttered, looking at Michael.

He'd been knocked unconscious by his second can of beer, his head resting next to the plate of cheese and crackers.

Maybe Elliot was saying something, maybe he wasn't. I wasn't so sure.

The only word that was filling my head, then my entire body, was that word I couldn't quite comprehend.

Murder.

"...I'm so sorry."

Like I'd suddenly emerged from underwater, and like headphones had been suddenly removed from my ears, Elliot's voice came to me abruptly.

Ian had once said, "Your father's company is incomparable to the tabloids, the trashy media companies that feed off news of celebrity break-ups, affairs and meaningless drama.

"It's different from those companies that are practically the loudspeakers of certain few people up there with money and power.

"Horan Holdings train our journalists and staff to always investigate deep, and write honestly. That's because your dad accepts nothing else."

"I don't- I don't understand." It took a while to realize the words were coming from me.

My voice sounded so strange. "What did you just...I..."

"Mr. Horan was leading a team of journalists investigating a massive corruption scandal involving a politician.

"My father had some dirt on the politician, enough that would allow a search warrant to be given by the police.

"So your father and my father made a deal. In exchange for covering up the sexual exploitation of the actresses, your father would get the evidence he needed on the politician."

There was a strange taste in my mouth.

My throat was parched, and my limbs, stiff, as if paralyzed.

"One of the three actresses got a whiff of a deal happening between our fathers and managed to hide herself in their meeting room, in a bar.

"She recorded a video of their conversation, and circulated it with her two other friends. They blackmailed our fathers, for money and for roles in movies directed by people in affiliated companies."

Elliot spoke mechanically, clearly and quickly, like he wanted to get the words out of his system as fast as possible.

There was no life in his eyes.

"My father put the three in a room and gassed them to death. Covered it up as suicide. Your father..."

The hint of a crack seeped into Elliot's voice, before it steadied again.

"Your father stood in front of that door. Isabella has a voice recording of everything. She'd had a mic on him for a couple of months."

Everything of me, seemed to weaken and soften, like solid ice cube would melt to water, like tree roots would decay under a moist ground.

My eyes, nose, mouth, ears, skin, arms, legs, bones and even my insides, seemed to weaken.

It was such an uncanny, singular, hair-raising yet amusing phenomenon.