Title: The Best Deceptions

By: Kat

Chapter Title: That Familiar Hollow Feeling

Rating: PG 13

Pairings: Lucas/Brooke, Nathan/Haley, Peyton/Jake and then some.

Timeline: Set four years after How Can You Be Sure?

Disclaimer: I own nothing of One Tree Hill.

Author's Notes: Thanks for all the reviews. If everything was peachy-fine and everyone was all lovey, then I would have nothing to write about and One Tree Hill wouldn't be what it is. And this would be fluff instead of angst. I promise a good ending but first, I got to make the characters jump rings of fire.

Duckygirl, Cole and Ben are half brothers but they are also cousins.

Starryskyangel1, you were probably asking a rhetorical question but Nathan is Ben's father because if it was another man, the effect it has on Lucas and everyone else won't be as big.

Lorelai, although I love Nathan's character, I had to admit that he is harsh. He is a jerk and his has his cruel side. That's why there's Haley. He and Brooke have an understanding.

Chapter Summary: Lucas hears a different version of the truth and comes to a wrong conclusion, Haley is just as lost and confused and Brooke reflects on her mistakes.

Tree Hill Hospital

Lucas felt his heart lodge itself in his throat the minute he saw Brooke walk out of Peyton's hospital room. His girlfriend beside him was suddenly forgotten, the hall silenced itself and all Lucas could see was Brooke Davis. He did not realize that he had stopped walking, talking and for a few seconds, breathing until Brooke was gone and he was staring at an empty hallway.

Without a second thought Lucas untangled his arm from his now confused girlfriend and ran.

"Brooke!" He yelled after her and Brooke stopped dead in her tracks just as she was about to reach the doors.

Her head whipped towards his direction and she looked at him with anger and panic in her eyes. "Brooke." He repeated more softly this time, taking several steps towards her.

Brooke, stubborn and proud, stood her ground, refusing to show Lucas how much his presence affected her. Her hands shook slightly and she balled them into tight fists and continued to look Lucas levelly, ignoring the deafening pounding of her heart.

"Lucas." Her voice sounded shaky and Brooke inwardly cursed.

Don't fall apart, Brooke. She yelled. Don't dare fall apart! You're not sixteen anymore. He doesn't mean anything.

The surprised expression on Lucas's face now gone as he took a few more steps until they were almost standing toe to toe. Still, Brooke refused to move. "Where have you been?" He demanded immediately with a slight hint of accusation in his voice.

He was suddenly very irritated at her and at himself for reasons Lucas wasn't quite sure of.

Maybe because she left you. A voice in him taunted, which wasn't altogether true. He was the one who broke up with her. He was the one who left Tree Hill first. Right? Maybe because it's been four years and every time you see someone vaguely like her, you think it's Brooke. You wonder if she's okay or if she's forgiven you for the big mistake you made when you were sixteen.

"Away." Brooke shrugged, defiant.

He frowned at her refusal to let him know where she was now. "Where?" He insisted. "I looked-" The shrill ringing of his cell phone cut him off and Lucas groaned. Brooke sighed in relief, her eyes darting between Lucas and the automatic doorway. "Hello?"

Haley's voice startled him. She was yelling, frantic and incomprehensible.

"Oh, no." Brooke gasped, realizing that it was all over. Nathan had told Haley everything and Lucas was just about to find out. Panic and fear suddenly consumed her and her chest hurt again from the wild beating of her heart while tears burned the back of her yes.

She hadn't realized everything would fall apart so quickly. She had hoped that the worse side of Nathan would take over and he would back out like the coward he said he and Brooke were.

But Nathan's no coward. Brooke thought bitterly as she took one last look at a distracted Lucas before darting into the parking lot. She had to pick up the boys and figure out what to do.

Roe Residence

When Lucas met with Haley, she was sitting outside of his house, shivering from the cold and crying uncontrollably despite her attempts to calm down.

"Haley, geez, are you okay?" He asked; rushing towards her. "What happened?" She flung herself at Lucas, hugging him tightly as she sobbed harder into his cold jacket. He ushered her into the house and sat her down. "Hales? Is it the baby? Did you-?"

"No. The baby is fine." She said, her heart wrenching at the thought of Nathan's baby. His second child. "Everything is falling apart, Luke." She confessed, tears continuing to stream down her cheeks.

She looked hurt and broken and blotchy, and Lucas suddenly pictured a six year old Haley crying because a boy had hugged her after school and labeled her his girlfriend in front of the whole grade. Haley had sucker-punched the boy and went home bawling.

Despite the funny memory invading Lucas's mind, his expression darkened. "It's Nathan, isn't it?" She nodded weakly, sniffling. Lucas automatically grabbed the Kleenex box and handed it to Haley. "What did he do?"

"He's a liar and a cheater and I hate myself for not seeing through him!" She groaned. "I hate him…and Brooke-" Haley immediately stopped; her eyes wide and hesitant as she remembered the torch that Lucas still held for his deceiving, conniving ex-girlfriend.

Lucas's frown deepened as an uneasy feeling washed over him. "What about Brooke? Hales, come on."

Haley looked away, biting her lip. "Nathan…he and Brooke…they-"

"They what?" Lucas snapped anxiously. "Haley, enough with the suspense. Tell me." When she remained silent and continued to look hurt and ashamed and betrayed, Lucas suddenly knew. "Oh. He's known all along where she was, hasn't he?"

Haley sniffled loudly. "Yeah. There's more."

"More?"

"They have a child together, Luke." Haley whispered brokenly, lowering her head as she sniffled again. Lucas's eyes widened in shock as he shook his head in disbelief. "It's true, Luke, they have a son together. He's two."

A son. Brooke and Nathan have a son together. Lucas was suddenly reeling from the plethora of information. Anger, hurt and betrayal and rage filled his blood until the room felt like it was spinning. The thought of Brooke and Nathan together made him physically ill. "He and Brooke have been together for two years?"

"No. He said it happened after I broke up with him and he went away. Then Brooke got pregnant and he just-"

"Just what?" Lucas demanded, enraged. He looked me in the eyes and said he understood. He sympathized all the while, he lied to me. He accepted me as his brother and turned around and stabbed me in the back.

"He kept going back for the birthdays. All those trips Nathan took and I didn't have a clue."

Lucas gritted his teeth. "Nathan is a good liar, isn't he? He had us all fooled." I'm going to kill him for lying to Haley, for being just like Dan and for betraying me while pretending to be my friend. My brother.

"He said he would have told me but Brooke didn't want to be found." Luke flinched at Haley's words but she continued. "And he didn't want to hurt me."

"He didn't want to hurt you? What a crock, Haley, because this…what he's doing to you isn't hurting you? He lied for two years, Haley! Probably more! Who the hell knows? He lied and he looked you in the face and told you he loved you! He deceived you and he deceived me! Everyone! He made us believe he was good and changed but the minute we turned our backs, he…they probably laughed at our expense. They used us and toyed with us-"

Haley swallowed. "It's not-"

"It is, Haley! Get this in your head: Nathan is a liar and Brooke is no better than he is. He lived two lives, Hales. One with you and another with her."

Lucas suddenly despised Brooke Davis.

"Why is this happening?" She asked, desperation and uncertainty tingeing her words. "Why are they hurting us like this?"

Lucas pulled her into his arms. "I don't know but they're not going to get away with this."

"Luke, don't do anything irrational." Haley pleaded as she pulled away from his embrace and wiped her tears with the back of her hand.

Lucas nodded, his expression dark. "I'll just give them what they're due. You have to rest now, Hales. Stress isn't good for the baby."

Haley nodded miserably. "Yeah."

Davis Residence

Brooke laid restless on her bed, her little boys sleeping quietly by her side. They were exhausted from playing over at Deb and Dan's, who had stayed together and were surprisingly quite happy after Dan's first heart attack. The boys had officially labeled them Grammy and Grandpa, and Dan Scott, despite being still a grouch and a jerk, was quite shocked and flattered that Brooke had named Cole after him.

"That's because I'm trying to change what you did. What I did. My boys, even though they don't share the same father, will love each other." Brooke had said. "They will never know the kind of treatment that you gave to Lucas and to Nathan."

Her mind immediately drifted to Lucas and Nathan and herself and the mess that was their lives.

She sighed sharply, the side of her head throbbing from the stress.

Brooke knew that she was the epitome of their parents' mistakes, namely Dan, Karen and Deb.

She was Karen because she made the mistake of trusting Lucas, of thinking that he would be there and he would love her. He wasn't and he didn't. Now, she was a single mother, all alone and lonely and still haunted by the memories of the past in the form of a son. But Brooke knew that she cheated on that a little because instead of working hard and earning everything on her own like Karen had done, Brooke lived off of her inheritance from her grandmother and lived in a fancy house.

Davis family members, no matter how cruel, unfeeling and unkind to each other, do not let other Davises rot like rats in sewers. That was the rule and like with almost everything else in her life, Brooke got away with being pregnant.

And then, when she was on the verge of convincing herself that she was happy with the life she led and that Tree Hill and the boy-who-shall-not-be-named would stay in her past forever, Brooke ran into Nathan. And she saw that like herself, he was running from Tree Hill too, running from Haley who had broken his heart.

They had found common ground. And they wallowed in their misery, laced it with champagne and tears and sex. Like Deb Scott, she cheated on the boy she loved with his brother.

And then like Dan Scott, master and genius of all colossal mistakes, Brooke pleaded and cried and argued with Nathan when he told her he was going to tell Haley and Lucas the truth after their baby was born. He had kept her secret the first time but he was not going to keep this one.

So, Brooke used his greatest fear against him. Haley.

"She is not going to understand that what happened between us a few months ago was just…comfort." Brooke declared vehemently in a fit of anger and desperation. Brooke did not want to be found. "Haley will see it as betrayal. You betrayed her and you betrayed Lucas. And the knowledge of this baby will hang around her neck like a noose and she will never get over it. Everything that you're trying to keep will be gone and you'll lose her again, Nathan, but this time it's forever. Why ruin everyone's life? I will raise this baby like I have Cole and no one will know. Lucas will move on and you will have Haley. We all win in the end."

Now, Brooke was not quite as sure anymore.

Physically exhausted and emotionally drained, Brooke held Cole closer in her arms, planting a kiss on the top of his head as she shut her eyes.

"Luke is going to find out about you very soon, Cole-a-bear. He probably already does." She whispered in the darkness. And he's going to hate me for keeping you away from him. He's going to hate me for what's happening to Haley. "But he will love you…because Luke is a good man." And he will always be your father even if he hurt me. "And Haley will love Ben." Even if Nathan lied to her about him.

Brooke hoped she wasn't wrong.

Author's Notes: I know, I'm evil for making Lucas believe Brooke played them and Nathan went along with it. All will be well. So, yeah, Nathan didn't tell Haley about Cole.

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