More Than A Triangle

Chapter 18

"Yes I did. What happened to your face?" Rose asked, her eyebrows quirked with curiosity. "All in good time Rose. Come on all of you, let's go." Jeremy answered.

"Go? Where are we going?" Rose asked perplexed but everyone was already shuffling outside and so she followed hand in hand with Edmund.

Half an hour later they arrived at Jeremy's palatial house and everybody silently filed inside to the large living room. They quietly seated themselves and stared at each other, each one lost in their own well of confusions and unanswered questions.

"We all have a lot of things to sort out between us and I think we should all begin asking questions or answering them to each other one by one." Jeremy said, relaxing back into the sofa finally breaking the awkward silence.

"How did you know I wasn't Jeremy, Rez?" Edmund asked, gazing at Rose intently, all the while absentmindedly playing with her fingers.

"You called me princess and before you defend yourself saying that Jeremy calls me that let me tell you, I know he does but he calls me princess arrogantly with that smirk of his, not gently and softly like you did. Moreover I knew somewhere deep within me that Sophia and Felicity or for that matter the STARS could never betray me. If it was only Stephen or Olivia I might have believed it." Rose said, her eyes shining with happiness.

Stephen stiffened on hearing that Rose believed him to be capable of betraying her. "I wouldn't betray you Rose" Stephen replied stiffly, his eyes showing a myriad of emotions.

"I don't trust you Cantrell. A guy who can insult his best friend in front of the entire world can do anything." said Rose, anger replacing the happiness in her eyes.

"For God's sake Rose! I did that on purpose because I knew Sinclair loved you. I couldn't steal the girl he loved even if I loved her too." Stephen shouted, his face red with outrage.

The entire atmosphere was charged with tension after his confession. Edmund's face had become so blank you would think he had turned into stone. Rose gaped at him with disbelief meanwhile the others glared at him with contempt.

"Now that you mention him where exactly is Sinclair?" Jeremy asked, smoothly diverting everybody's attention. Rose sighed with relief, any moment now Edmund had been at the verge of tearing Stephen into pieces but Jeremy had saved the day with his question.

Everybody looked at each other with confusion all except Samantha who had begun to shake involuntarily.
"Sammy? Do you know something that we don't? Are you alright?" Rose asked, her palms turning moist with sudden panic.

" I am fine. I will be right back. I need to use the washroom....Excuse me!" she blurted out and fled from the room.
A sense of foreboding gnawed into Rose's veins, her heart made her feel like something wasn't right but she pushed the feeling to the background and concentrated on what was being said.

"Sorry but what were you saying?" Rose asked, forcing a fake smile on her face.
"Edmund was telling us how he happened to take Jeremy's place." Tammy said without taking her eyes off Edmund.

Flashback...

Edmund was driving listlessly along the highway his heart in the dumps and his head aching with all the stress and sorrow. He was so engrossed in his miseries that he didn't notice a car speed past him like a storm and then come to a halt right in front of him.

He barely missed from crashing into the vehicle. "Are you insane? Both of us could have died today you imbecile." Edmund said, leaping out of his car with fury.

He came to an abrupt halt on seeing that the imbecile was none other than Jeremy. "Jeremy? What are you doing here and why were you driving like a madman?" he asked, his anger receding a little.