Brooke awoke early the next morning, as soon as she opened her eyes the horrible reality of what had happened at her wedding came crashing in on her.
She turned her head and saw Eric sleeping peacefully beside her, her hand went to her mouth to stifle a sob as she gazed at the man she'd married, but didn't want, all to spite the one man she did want– Ridge.
How could this have happened? How could all her carefully laid plans end so badly, so humiliatingly? She had been so sure that both Ridge and Hope would turn to her and her world would be perfect again. She got out of bed quietly and went to her room to get dressed, once dressed she headed straight for the kitchen, and after pouring herself a cup of coffee she sat down to ruminate on what went wrong, and to plan a way out of her troubles, it was then that she decided to check her phone for messages, just in case Ridge or Hope had reached out to her.
To her surprise and confusion, her inbox was full, and the first message was from the online edition of Eye on Fashion asking for a comment on this morning's video's taken from her wedding, confused, but with a growing sense of dread she quickly brought up Eye on Fashions page and started to watch.
By her third – unbelieving and shocked - run-through of the footage, she finally started to realise what must have happened, they had filmed her! Hope and Deacon, or Taylor, had filmed everything! Tears coursed down her cheeks as she thought about how her daughter had set her up by demanding beforehand the rights to any and all live recordings of the day, but why would she do this? Brooke knew she was angry with her, but Hope knew how much she regretted her dreadful alcohol infused mistake with Liam, surely Hope knew how much she loved her, how much she'd sacrificed for he! No, she would never do this to her of her own accord, never!
It was then Brooke knew, in her heart, exactly who must have used her sweet daughter to set her up to do this to her. She knew who was ultimately to blame for all her woes, from losing Ridge, to losing her daughter, and now this, this . . . public humiliation, it was horrifyingly obvious.
The more she thought the more enraged she became until finally she slammed her coffee cup down, picked up her phone, and with-out a second thought headed for the door, grabbing her keys as she went, "we'll see about this," she muttered angrily.
Taylor walked into her home and threw her purse and keys onto the table as she cradled her cup of takeaway coffee. She took a sip as she vaguely wondered how Ridge was holding up. If she were being honest with herself, a part of her had wanted to follow him down to the beach to comfort him, whilst yet another part of her wanted to head straight over to Deacons to thank him, yet again, for his chivalry. She smiled as she thought of the way he'd leapt to her defence, he'd looked so, so . . .
"How could you!" came a strident voice from the doorway, interrupting Taylors reminiscing.
"Brooke? What the hell are you doing here? How dare you barge into my home, get out right now, I have nothing to say to you!"
"Oh, you'd like that wouldn't you! well guess what? I'm going nowhere until you explain to me why you did this to Eric and I! I always knew how much you hated me, but I never thought you'd sink this low. Then again, after what your vicious, daughter did to Hope, I shouldn't be surprised. You're disgusting, and that goes for your whole family! You, your mentally deranged son, and your vindictive, spiteful shrew of a daughter, and most especially you!"
Taylors eyes narrowed in rage, "I'm gathering that you're screeching about the video's of your wedding day, where you deliberately threw Eric under the bus to make a desperate play for Ridge? And you're actually trying to blame me for them being leaked? Well think again Brooke, I just came from a meeting with the entire family, including Ridge, and NONE OF THEM HAD ANYTHING TO DO WITH IT! SO TAKE YOUR TIRED OLD ACCUSATIONS AND YOUR TIRED OLD ASS AND GET THE HELL OUT OF MY HOME!" She yelled.
"Oh please," sneered Brooke, "you don't honestly expect me to believe that! This has your hands all over it, yours, Steffy's, and Thomas's, you've all been plotting against Hope and I for months now, ever since you got back into town and set your sites on my husband again! You and your horrible kids have been working tirelessly against Hope and I ever since."
She walked closer to Taylor to stand before her she spat out "Perfect princess Taylor -HUH – more like a scheming jealous BITCH!" she ended on a scream, before her hand flashed out and she slapped Taylor as hard as she could.
Taylors head flew sideways and slightly down at the force of the blow, and without even thinking about it, Taylor curled her hand into a fist and using the extra momentum her stance gave her, she swung around and punched Brooke as hard as she could, right in the mouth.
Brooke staggered backwards, her hands automatically clutching her mouth as Taylor advanced on her. "I'll repeat this to you one more time you deluded old cow, none of this had anything to do WITH ANY OF US! DO . YOU . UNDERSTAND?" She screamed in undiluted rage.
"It was all of Hopes idea, everything! Hope is the one that suggested we tape proceedings to show Eric in the first place. Why? because in her words she thought you were up to something, and Eric would need proof if you were because you had him so far under your thumb, he'd likely never believe what any of us told him. When we couldn't show the footage to Eric and we were all preparing to leave, it was Hope that had the recordings and, right before we drove away, said; she can't get away with this, not this time! None of us, NONE. OF. US, had ANY idea of what she meant until this morning when she rang Thomas and told him what she'd done, and the only reason she did that was so neither he nor Douglas were surprised, and that was when Thomas rang all of us and we arranged to meet at Steffy's to discuss what she had done."
Taylor took a deep breath and stared at a now cringing Brooke who was now clutching at her now bleeding lips, her face set in lines of anger and disbelief.
"All this time," she went on more quietly, a smile spreading slowly across her face. "All this time you've done whatever you wanted to whoever you wanted, and you've gotten away with it." She shook her head ruefully, "All it seemed to ever take was a few tears and some contrite words and they all believed you, everyone except Stephanie, she knew the real you, you could never fool her, and you despised her for it. But you finally went one step to far, didn't you? You just couldn't help yourself, when push came to shove and you got into trouble again, you resorted to your true self; your basic fallback position, the one you've employed a hundred times or more throughout your life, you went straight after the nearest man available for sex to sooth your pathetic ego, and in doing so you betrayed your own daughter, for the second time!"
Taylor shook her head as she looked at Brooke with a mixture of disbelief and amusement. But this time; well, this time your daughter wasn't going to take your crap anymore. You, YOU, were responsible for her losing her baby, so Hope did the only thing left open to her, she fought back. You thought you'd won yet again, didn't you? Because you've always gotten away with your disgusting behaviour in the past, because everyone has always made excuses for you. I bet you thought you had it all worked out, that it was all in the bag."
She snorted contemptuously, "well guess what? Not this time Brooke. Hope hasn't forgiven you, and I seriously doubt she ever will, not after your latest stunt. And although I know this latest indiscretion of yours will all die down in two or three weeks, the damage is done now with those that know you; those you care about, Hope has made sure of that."
She snorted in contempt, "by the way, how did Eric take the news, Brooke? Did you do as Hope said you would and marry him out of spite to get back at Ridge for turning you down? I wonder if any of your dear "friends" and all of R.E.B." buyers will stick by you during this latest humiliation, or whether they might finally have had enough now that there's no one left to protect you, will they be dumping you like your own family has? Frankly I don't even care what happens to you. Now, get the hell out of my house and don't you ever come back or I'll have you charged with trespassing!
Brooke slunk to the door, tears of anger, and the pain from her now rapidly swelling lip accosting her, as she reached the door she turned back one last time, her eyes filled with utter hatred.
"I don't believe you for a second, no matter what you say I know my daughter loves me, she would never have done this of her own volition. I know both you and Deacon have influenced her and turned her against me. It all makes perfect sense now, it's the only reason you dated Deacon, you obviously targeted him to have access to my daughter, and now that Ridge is free, I see you've conveniently dumped him to go after my husband again. You are truly pathetic Taylor! Ridge will always love me, no matter how many times you throw yourself at him he'll always be wishing it was me he was with, never you! And there's one other thing I want you to know Taylor, if it's the last thing I do, I swear I'll get you back. I don't care how long I have to wait; when you least expect it, I'll be there, and I'm going to make damn sure you pay for what you've done! You and your stinking kids!"
And with that last vengeful swipe at her nemesis, she turned and fled back to her car.
Taylor walked back to her couch and sunk down, she was trembling with rage and her hand hurt. She looked down at it, flexing it absently, and smiled, it was worth it, she thought as she remembered the feeling of finally giving Brooke what she deserved.
She started to giggle softly, it felt like she'd been holding onto all that anger for an eternity, to finally do something, even if it was something physical, she usually abhorred physical violence, but this, this felt totally freeing. Still smiling she headed out to the kitchen to get some ice for her hand.
Brooke headed straight back for her house, her top lip was split but had finally stopped bleeding, and her bottom lip, although not split, looked a little puffy.
She was enraged, enraged at being physically assaulted by Taylor, and enraged at the thought that maybe, just maybe, Taylor had been telling the truth. But surely Hope, her sweet precious girl, her saviour, surely, she wouldn't have betrayed her mother on her own volition?
NO, that's just Taylor getting in my head, Hope would never have thought of this by herself, never!
She turned into her driveway, disgusted to see a couple of reporters there already, she quickly put a hand over her lips and drove straight through, after opening the gates before she drove up, by the time she went inside she was shaking and worrying over a new, more urgent problem, how on earth was she going to tell Eric, he'd never understand, he'd be distraught!
She walked into the house to see Eric sitting on the settee staring at his phone, from the sound of it she knew exactly what he was watching.
He looked up, the tears in his eyes finally starting to fall as he said sadly, "I trusted you. I gave up everything for you, my company, my children, my grandchildren, and it was all a lie. It was all a ruse to get Ridge back. So why did you still marry me Brooke? Is this still part of some cruel game you're playing? Do I mean so little to you? Am I just a means to an end for you, a joke husband until the real man you want comes back to you? Why Brooke, Why!"
Brooke took her hand a way from her mouth, "It wasn't like that Eric, I do love you, you must know that. It's just when Ridge walked in, and I was in the gown he designed, all of these memories of the two of us came flooding back and for a moment I lost myself and made one last plea to him. I swear I never meant to hurt you Eric, please, PLEASE BELIEVE ME." She begged, a single tear sliding down her face.
Eric shook his head, even the sight of her swollen lips couldn't break through the wall of misery he found himself in. "I need some time to think, I'm going to the office, I'll stay at a hotel for a few nights, I don't want to deal with the press so keeping away from here will be a good thing."
"Eric, no!" pleaded Brooke as Eric stood, but he walked straight past her and out the door while Brooke continued to call to him.
She heard his car start up as she sank to the floor in tears, as she heard it drive away she slowly realised that Eric was right about one thing. The press would be like vultures for a couple of weeks, she needed to get away. She thought about it for the moment, before realising Forresters cabin at Big Bear would be empty, no-one ever went there at this time of year, and she knew the passcode to get in. Nodding to herself she stood up and went to pack.
