Author Note: I know a few of you all are wishing this will become an ultimate Trory – but it won't. I'm not saying there wont be any Trory action in it whatsoever, because obviously at the moment it's a Trory, but in the end, it will be a PDLD. Finn & Rory. I'm not entirely sure yet how far this will go, but I can tell you that it's a Lorelai & Luke fanfic also, so --- it'll be a while until the ending.

I'd stayed tuned – I have a lot of things that will be going on.

Chapter Three: Three Strikes, You're Out

Rory Gilmore had never succeeded in pissing her father off more. Not only had he found out from his Business Nemesis, Tristan Herrick DuGray Sr., that his daughter was having some sort of twisted love affair with the DuGray heir, but the affair had been happening for months.

Since the party he strictly told her not to attend.

Rory Gilmore had changed over the years since his marriage to her mother. She'd become cold, distant, and different. She wasn't as talkative as she used to be, and he could only assume the worst when she refused to take his last name.

Hell, even his own wife refused to take on his name. "It's to keep the Gilmore legacy going." She'd told him. Lorelei Gilmore didn't want the Gilmore's to die out. His daughter hardly even talked to him anymore, and that's what angered him most.

He didn't know what he did wrong. Well, he did. But Rory shouldn't know what was going on. She would never know what was going on.

"Lorelei Leigh Gilmore!" he yelled from the door of his office, "Get in here, now!"

Christopher Hayden had gotten home the previous night, and found his wife tucked away safely in bed, and his daughter nowhere to be found. No note, and not a word left with any of the staff. She had disappeared, and Christopher only expected the worse.

And that's when the funny thing happened. He had checked his answering machine in his office, to come across a very interesting memo. His daughter, his life's blood, had made one of the best impressions on the DuGray family's heir.

Strike one.

"What?" Rory asked, peaking her head into her father's office.

"Where were you last night?"

"Out."

"Rory."

"Yes?"

"Where were you really?" Christopher asked, opening a bottle of aspirin and putting two into the palm of his hands, only to pop them into his mouth, drowning them with a swig of Scotch.

"You don't take aspirin with alcohol." Rory warned, leaning against the doorframe of her father's office, "And I was really out."

"Don't lie to me, Rory."

"Why do you care where I was anyway?"

Strike two.

"Because you weren't here!"

"I'm almost twenty! God, you act like you're some holy, Bible figure! Well here's a news flash! You're not!"

Strike three.

"I'm your father! I'm allowed to be pissed off my nineteen year old daughter is off screwing the DuGray heir!"

"Oh, go to hell. You don't care! This only makes you look bad! It's not hurting the rest of us!"

"What happened to you, Rory? You were so nice before!"

"You want to know what's wrong with me, Christopher?" Rory snapped, walking forward, and lifting a vase off the table, pulling a key into her hand. "This is what's wrong!" She yelled, walking to a wooden filing cabinet on the other side of his room next to his Brandy cabinet. She slid the key into the slot, and opened it, pulling the drawer out. "So how's Sherry, dad?" She asked, tilting her head, "Or better yet… How's Georgia? Or wait," Rory laughed bitterly, "your marriage to Sherry? How's that Christopher Lyon?"

She picked up the files, and held them to her chest, "You're not even my dad, as far as I'm concerned. Who needs blood relation?" She crossed her arms, soaking in the horrified look on her father's face, before turning on her heels, "I'm telling mom."

Rory slammed the door closed, and quickly hurried down the stairs, thankful for having crammed her keys into her sweater pocket before she went into her father's office. She opened the front door, and slammed it closed behind her, shaking it on its hinges.

Her mother would know the secrets that her beloved Christopher had kept from her.

You're out.

---&---

"I'm leaving for Yale earlier," Rory declared after she broke the news to her mother about her father's infidelity, "I don't want to be around him, mom."

Lorelei Gilmore held her stomach, fearing that she would empty its contents from the shock of the entire thing. She sat in the big red chair in her office at the Dragonfly Inn, shaking her head, letting silent, but hurtful tears flow over her apple cheeks and seep into the corners of her mouth. She sighed, and straightened the papers in her hands, shaking her head.

"I should have known better, Rory," she said, sniffling, "I should have known better!"

Rory stood up, and walked around the desk, enveloping her mother into a hug. Kissing her mother's forehead, she sighed, "I'm sorry."

"Yeah," Lorelei said, nodding her head, "Me too."

"Come to Yale with me, mom," Rory said, tilting her head, and crossing her arms over her chest, "We can have a girl's night."

"Rory, I can't," Lorelei sighed, rubbing her forehead with her hand. "I need to go to the lawyer's office and get divorce papers." Biting her lip, she watched her daughters face fall. "I'll see you tomorrow, though. I'll even get Luke to come with me."

Rory nodded, hugging her mother again, "I'll see you tomorrow."

---&---

"Luke," Lorelei called, walking into the diner that she had once spent entire days in, begging and pleading for coffee, "Luke?"

"Lorelai?" Luke asked, coming down from the stairs behind the curtain at the opposite side of the diner, "what are you doing here?"

Lorelai plopped down onto one of the stools at the counter, staring at the specials board that she'd memorized by heart years ago. He'd never changed it. He'd never changed. "I'm divorcing Chris." She said, dropping the bomb as quickly as it had been dropped upon her.

Luke frowned, crossing the diner and plucking a coffee cup off of a shelf, before pouring hot, black coffee into it, placing it in front of her. "I'm sorry," he set the coffee pot down on the counter, and took another cup off the shelf and pour hot water into it, before getting a tea bag and sitting next to her. "What happened?"

Lorelai laid her head on his shoulder, and started to cry, her hands grasping a hold of the coffee cup, "He… he cheated on me, Luke…" she whimpered, biting her lip, "He has another wife… another daughter… and, Rory told me… she showed me proof… Oh god, Luke," she sniffled, rubbing her eyes dry, before more tears flooded down her face.

"Stupid son of a bitch," he growled, slamming his tea cup down on the counter, splashing freshly made tea over everything within a two foot radius, "I'll kill him, Lore, I'll kill him with my own bare hands."

Lorelai sniffled, and shook her head, "He's not even worth it, Luke."

"He cheated on you, Lorelai! Jesus Christ, he has another wife and kid! He's going to hell – and I'm gonna make sure it's my foot that fu-- you know what? Diner's closed! Everyone out."

Luke stood and ushered every patron of the diner out of the door that had the bell over the top, flipping the sign closed when Kirk, always the last to leave, was out. Luke locked it, and turned back to Lorelai, shoving his hands in his pockets, unsure of what to do or say next. He watched her shoulders shudder while she cried, and he felt his entire heart that broke when she walked through that door only moments ago, break again.

"Lore?" he asked quietly, coming up behind her, and rubbing her back soothingly, "It'll be okay. If it was meant to be, it will be," he paused for a moment, taking in a deep breath, praying to the Gods that this was some sort of sign, "and evidently that wasn't supposed to be. Chris wasn't supposed to be with you."

Lorelai gave out a blubbering, and watery laugh, rubbing her eyes as dry as they possibly could go. "I'm a failure, Luke," she sniffled, "my marriage was supposed to work. I wasn't supposed to be the girl who married guy after guy. My first marriage was supposed to work!"

Luke grunted, and crossed his arms over his chest, kicking at the diner floor with his feet, "Think of Chris as a trial marriage."

Lorelai turned around and gave him a disbelieving look, "He's Rory's father. He was the first man I ever slept with. Jesus Christ, Luke, he was not a trial marriage! Ugh!" Standing up quickly, Lorelai swung her bag over her shoulder, "Forget I even came by, Luke." She snapped, striding across the diner in less then confident strides. Unlocking the door, she looked back at him, "And I thought you would be the one person who would understand… I mean, after all, didn't your marriage fail?"

Shaking her head, Lorelai bit back another sob. She opened the door, and stepped out into the Stars Hollow daylight, letting the bell jingle as she slammed the door closed behind her.