Author's note: Most of the dialogue in the airport is from the show – There was lots of good snark that day.
Chapter 29
September 4, 2003 - Pine Valley, Pennsylvania
As the airplane descended into the Pine Valley airport, Kendall stared at the marriage certificate. Michael and Kendall Cambias. She touched the names with trembling fingers. She wished Boyd were with her, but they had decided he should take a separate flight. She contemplated their last conversation before she boarded the airplane.
"Kendall, do you really think anyone is going to believe that you would actually marry the man who raped your sister?"
She had gazed at him with a look of steely determination. "I'll make damn sure that every single person will at least consider it a possibility. To be honest, the only people that really need convincing are the police. Everyone else can go to hell."
Boyd knew she was bluffing. He put his hand on her shoulder. "You know that the people who do believe your story will hate your guts. Your sister, included."
She squeezed her eyes shut. Based on her most recent conversation with Bianca, she still had no memory of the night she killed Michael. Clearing her throat, Kendall responded, "I can take it, Boyd. Its only what I deserve, anyway. I brought Michael to town. If I hadn't have done that, he never would have come after Bianca. She never would have been forced to kill him. She wouldn't be in danger of going to jail. I have to protect her, and if my punishment is that the whole world hates me, so be it."
She couldn't help but be reminded of that conversation she had with Zach when he first came to town. She told him that she didn't know what lengths she would go to protect someone she loved. She'd already been put to the test once recently - when Erica wanted her to keep quiet about Greenlee's paternity. She had chosen her mother over Greenlee, and subsequently lost Greenlee's friendship. Now she was choosing between two other people she loved. Bianca and Zach. She had come to face the truth - she loved Zach. Now she would have to lie to him. She desperately hoped it would work in his favor. If he believed her lie, he would think that Michael was gone for good. And if Michael was as weasely as his word, then hopefully Alexander's new will naming Zach as the heir was in a trash heap somewhere. The old will, with Michael as heir, would make her a very wealthy woman. Cold comfort.
The airplane touched down. Kendall thought about the moment she realized she loved Zach. She and Boyd had come back to the hotel after enacting their wedding charade. They were in the lobby, and came very close to running into Ryan Lavery. It was a shock to see him. Not entirely unexpected - Zach had mentioned seeing Ryan with Alexander. The shock came because it was the first time she had seen him in the flesh since he roared out of her life the previous year. Her initial instinct was to duck out of sight, so he wouldn't see her and find out what she was up to. Once she was safely hidden, she peeked out at him and realized something momentous. She was over him. The reason she was over him was because she met someone who far surpassed him. Ryan was a good man. Zach Slater was one of a kind.
Kendall snapped out of her reverie when she saw that her fellow passengers were standing up to get their stowed items. She stood and joined the line out the door. When she entered the gate, she saw a group of people that she recognized. What the hell were they all doing here? Tad, Aidan, Anna, David, Liza, Mia and Simone. Were they all waiting for her? If so, that meant it was showtime.
Zach waited patiently as the other first class passengers crowded the aisle in their desire to deplane. His cell phone burned a hole in his jacket pocket. He wanted so much to call Kendall and tell her he was in town. He really did not expect to be back here so soon. At his father's funeral, his lawyer said that Alexander wanted his will read in Pine Valley, not New York. Zach had no idea what Alexander had been up to, but he figured it had something to do with the surprise he mentioned to someone - perhaps Ryan - over the phone. Alexander's lawyer asked him to be there on the fourth, and the will would be read in a reserved conference room at the Valley Inn.
So here he was in Pine Valley again, aching to go see Kendall. It would be a mistake. They said their good-byes. In fact, the last time he saw her, Kendall had seemed rather anxious that he go away. Boyd was with her. Maybe she was just ready to move on with her life. Their afternoon of passion, the day after Michael's preliminary hearing, had apparently been enough for her and she was ready to cut him loose. Zach told himself that was what he wanted, and he should be glad that he hadn't hurt her. Unfortunately it didn't make his pain any less. He had once again allowed himself to feel intense emotions for a woman who didn't remotely feel the same. It was rather pathetic, actually.
The other first class passengers finally shuffled off the plane, and Zach followed in their wake. He made his way past other gates towards the limousine parking. He started to circumvent a group of people and stopped short when he saw they were surrounding Kendall. He recognized most of the people in the group. He saw Anna Devane tell Kendall she wanted her to come to the station for questioning. What? Then he heard Mia Saunders ask, "Did you do something to Michael?"
Kendall held up her left hand, which was sporting a very large diamond ring. In a cocky voice, she said, "I sure did. I married him."
Zach tried to comprehend what she just said. If Kendall had performed an interpretive dance it wouldn't have made less sense. Did she just say she married Michael? She spoke into the ensuing silence. "Well, don't everyone congratulate me at once."
David tipped his head back and roared with laughter. "This is a farce! No one here believes you married that monster."
She flashed the ring and asked if everyone could see it. Simone said, "Who can miss it?"
Kendall smirked. "No one, I hope! My husband wants everyone to know I'm his."
Everyone continued to express their disbelief, and Kendall rolled her eyes. "What is it going to take to convince you guys this is real? What, do you want me to consummate my marriage right here in the terminal?"
A man that Zach believed to be Tad Martin said, "Well, if we're going to take a vote..." Kendall gave a long-suffering sigh, pulled out a piece of paper and handed it to Anna, declaring it to be her marriage certificate.
As Anna scrutinized the document, people all started talking at once. Zach kept his distance, still trying to process this. It had to be another charade, another stunt. But why? Echoing his thoughts, he heard Liza Colby ask Kendall the same thing. She responded, "My husband may not be the most popular man in town, but he sure is rich—filthy, filthy rich!"
Anna handed the certificate back to Kendall and asked the whereabouts of Michael. "I told him to stay behind in Las Vegas. He was up 4,000 bucks at the craps table."
Tad once again snarked, "I knew there was crap in this story somewhere."
Anna informed Kendall that Michael skipped out on his bail, and was now wanted by the police. She told Kendall that she needed to come down to the station for some questioning. Kendall shrugged. "What new bride doesn't love to talk about her wedding?"
The crowd of people parted so that Anna could lead Kendall towards the exit. They stopped short when they saw Zach standing there. Kendall stared at him in horror. Everyone else was frozen in place, waiting to see what would happen next.
Zach didn't know what the hell was going on. Every instinct screamed that David was right - it was a farce. If it was indeed a farce, Kendall was going to a hell of a lot of trouble to make it seem real. Zach was so shell shocked by the whole thing that he kicked into auto-pilot. Striving to maintain control over his voice, he said, "Try not to keep her at the police station too long, Chief Devane. The reading of my father's will is this afternoon, and I'm sure my new sister-in-law won't want to miss it. The Valley Inn, conference room two, at three o'clock." With that, he turned and went out to where a limousine was waiting to take him to the hotel.
Zach checked in and put his overnight bag in the room. Going back downstairs, he bypassed the dining room and went straight for the bar. He downed two scotches before he was able to think coherently. He probably should have gone to the police station, but he hadn't trusted himself. If she didn't show up for the reading of the will, he would know that he needed to go down there. Why, Kendall? Why pretend to marry Michael? She had joked to Liza that it was because of his money. Well, if that was all she wanted, she could have thrown herself at him, not his brother. He was the one that was going to inherit the Cambias billions. Michael was rich in his own right, but he wasn't the jackpot. Not that Zach believed for a second that Kendall was motivated by greed.
Just before Zach went back to New York to oversee his father's funeral, Michael had disappeared off the radar yet again. He was still missing, and apparently the cops had caught onto the fact that he skipped town. Anna had been waiting for Kendall at the airport, which meant she knew something. Had Michael really gone with Kendall? Was he really in Las Vegas as Kendall claimed? He remembered when he said goodbye to Kendall, she said she believed Michael would skip town. She told Zach that she didn't care if Michael ended up on a beach somewhere, as long as he didn't come back. Had she told him that because she was planning some scheme to lure Michael out of town? What would she use as bait?
The scotch burned a hole in Zach's stomach as he began to consider a horrible possibility. Maybe she had married Michael. If she married him, he would be able to skip town and still have access to his bank accounts through her. But would getting Michael to leave town permanently be enough of an incentive to take such drastic measures? No, it would have been easier to simply wait for Michael to go on trial for his crimes and be convicted and sent to jail. Maybe if Michael had still been in line to inherit Cambias, an extra incentive would be to get Enchantment back for her mother. But Michael wasn't going to inherit. Zach would soon have control, and he planned to sell Enchantment and Chandler back to their rightful owners.
Kendall had no strong motive to marry Michael, for real or otherwise. There was something else missing, some other piece of the puzzle. Zach went back up to his room and called his private investigator. He wanted every effort made, no expense spared, to find out two vital pieces of information: whether Kendall was really married to Michael, and where Michael was hiding.
