by: MacSas

“William” Shawna breathed.

A jagged smile appeared on the face of Kane’s brother. He’d never liked Shawna, she was below his brother’s standards. Nothing more than a hard luck cause that Kane couldn’t help feeling sorry for. It had made William sick to see how easily she had lured him in. And it made him sicker to see how happy she was to move on as long as her beloved Sergeant was available.

“Who?” Luke asked, unsure of everything but the gun in Williams’s hand.

William turned his attention to the Sergeant whose nameless face had haunted Kane. William knew how bad Kane had wanted Shawna to love him. As long as the mysterious love of her life was in the background, however, Kane had known that her heart would never be his. And the fool had accepted that, William fumed to himself as he eyed the man in front of him.

This was the man who had robbed his dear brother of his greatest dream, to have a wife that loved him. And now William’s suspicions about Kieran’s parentage had been confirmed. Thank God Kane wasn’t here. He had believed he was Kieran’s father, and had been in every way. Why couldn’t Shawna have let Kane rest, believing he had at least had Kieran. No, William didn’t like Shawna at all.

“Luke” Shawna waved a hand between the two men in way of introduction. “This is Kane’s little brother, Billy”

“WILLIAM!”

The sudden yell from William had Shawna jumping in shock. She’d never known William to be louder than a church mouse. Then again, the attention had always been on Kane, so it was easy for William to lurk in the background.

Why was he here?

Luke voiced that thought. “Why are you here?”

William smiled coldly. “To catch up on old times” he waved the gun at Shawna. “You remember old times don’t you, Shawna? Remember how Kane used to bring you to the family lake house every weekend, so my mother could fawn all over you in the glow of pregnancy? Remember how Kane would sit there like he just discovered the answer to the world’s issues, like he’d done something no other man could?” he paused to look scornfully at Luke. “Guess another man could do it though”

“Bill … William” Shawna drew the younger man’s attention. “You can’t blame Luke for this. He didn’t know about Kieran until just now. I didn’t even tell Kane about her real father”

William scoffed. “Oh Kane knew alright”

“What!”

“Oh come on Shawna” William mocked her. “There hasn’t been a dark haired baby in the Hardy family for nearly 3 generations. Your daughter was obviously an impostor, I just had to prove it to Kane”

“Wait,” Luke held up a hand to stop the conversation. “You investigated the birth of Kieran? You actually did that?”

“Of course” William shrugged. “ I knew she wasn’t my niece, that’s what made me so sick every time I saw Mother fawning all over Kane and his little family, like they were priceless gems.  I had to convince Kane that Shawna had come to him already pregnant. So I looked into her background and discovered that she had dated you before she met Kane. In fact, she married Kane before the bed had time to cool down from you being in it”

Shawna made a disgusted noise while Luke commented, “That’s a sick thing to say, William”

“Oh but it gets better” William assured him. “Your little lady love here practically guaranteed that Kane wouldn’t come home from Vietnam…”

“Your sick and crazy!” Shawna exploded, while thinking to herself, ‘Please don’t tell him’

William, obviously enjoying the shock of his captive audience, carried on with great flair. “She and Kane had a huge fight right before he went on that last mission. Kane had managed to get a phone call home so he could check on his wife, who was grieving the death of their daughter. Only, when he called her all she talked about was how she wanted out of the marriage because she loved someone else. Her parting words to him were “It would be so much easier if you were dead”

Luke glanced at Shawna as William continued.

“Can you imagine what that did to him? He’s about to go out on a dangerous mission and all he wants to do is hear his wife’s voice, make sure she’s okay. Instead he gets issued with a divorce request and told to drop dead!”

Shawna shook her head, shock evident on her face. “That’s not the way that call happened, William. Yes, we fought, but those things were said in grief and anger. I wanted Kane home with me; I needed him there to help me get through Kieran’s funeral. He wouldn’t even consider leaving his unit. The mission was too important. And when he let slip that he had turned down his superiors offer of leave, I hit out at him the only way I knew.”

She looked to Luke, imploring him to understand.

“I was so upset at losing Kieran, I couldn’t stand the thought of losing Kane as well. So I told him that if he was going to take on these missions, I’d be better off if he was dead. That way I wouldn’t always be worried about him” Shawna out her face in her hands. “It wasn’t the way you say it was, William” She looked at him, anger etched on her face. “It wasn’t like that!”

William smiled. “Likely story. Shame it won’t save your life” He aimed the gun.

“Wait a second…” Luke interrupted.

“No” William said, his teeth clenched. “I was never as good as Kane, always in his shadow. I was just getting things in my life together and getting some recognition from my family. Then along comes Miss Black Widow here. Pregnant with your child, desperate for a father for her baby. Kane was only too willing to do whatever she needed, all she had to do was spin him her hard luck story and he was gone. The attention that should have been mine went to her. Her and a child that wasn’t even Kane’s!”

“That’s why you dug into Shawna’s past?” Luke asked, trying to distract William long enough to find an opening.

“Of course” William smiled smugly. “I had to make Kane see that his darling bride wasn’t what she seemed. I had to make them all see that”

“ And by doing so, you would be the hero of the family” Luke guessed.

“Sure. I would finally get my day in the sun.”

“Only that didn’t happen because Kane died” Luke finished.

“And she will pay for it” William seethed.

“Well,” Luke sighed. “I guess you better take me out first”

“What?” William frowned.

“I was there not only the day your brother died, I was there the day he got captured. I was on the Huey that left him behind”

William started shaking his head in denial.

“Oh, it’s true” Luke continued. “When I was captured, I meet up with your brother again. Only I didn’t recognise him at first. He was covered in his own fesses and had a rampaging fungus infection. It’s kind of ironic that I was the one ordered to clean him up and feed him”

Luke waited a beat while that sunk into William, then added, “He died in my arms asking that Shawna never know the pain he’d gone through. So despite your efforts, even at the end your brother loved Shawna. She was the last thing on his mind when he died. Not you or any one else. Just her.”

William heard Shawna’s sob and gritted his teeth in fury.

“He loved you, and you used him” he said to her.

Shawna shook her head in denial. “I did love him, Billy”

“WILLIAM! I told you my name is William. I’m a man now, not a snivelling little boy begging for a scrap of the attention that his older brother has handed out to him at the drop of a hat.”

“Then be a man and put the gun down” Luke said softly.

William spun towards him.

“You have been a thorn in my side for longer than I care. You messed up my plans to have Shawna suffer a little accident on the road here…”

“You messed with the brakes?” Shawna asked, dumbfounded.

“I’ve been following you since you left home. Who do you think put that note in your letterbox? Why do you think I moved in next door to you? I had to keep an eye on you, monitor your moves. See if you were the same conniving person you had been when Kane was around”

“Then you would have seen that I hadn’t even dated in the time he was gone!” Shawna yelled.

“Correction” William stated. “I never saw you bring a man home. But there were nights when you were gone until morning. You could have been at some guy’s home then”

“Oh my gosh” Shawna seethed. A mad man who believed her guiltier than Eve had violated her privacy. There was no reasoning with him.

William still had the gun aimed at Luke. In his fury his hand had started shaking, making the trigger a time bomb waiting to go off.

“It’s been nice catching up, Shawna. But there is one last thing I have to do”

“NO!” she screamed, throwing herself between the two men.

The sound of the gun going off filled the air. Shawna felt herself being thrown backwards. It was only when she landed on Luke that she realised she’d been shot.

Pain exploded across her chest. She couldn’t catch her breath. She could hear Luke calling her name, but couldn’t get her voice working to reply him. She lay on her back looking up at the bright summer sky, wondering what had happened. She saw Luke leaning over her, felt his hands checking her. William was saying something she couldn’t quite decipher. Whatever it was made Luke mad. She saw him get to his feet, step over her. Angry words were followed by the noises of flesh hitting flesh, grunts and groans of fighting. Then the unmistakable sound of another gunshot.

Luke!

She screamed his name in her mind.