"Matt?" There was a weakness, a vulnerability, which I had never seen in Amena before in the moment she realised that her husband and I had an affair. I didn't miss the tears which were rolling down her cheeks, and neither did Callie, as she walked over to Amena and wrapped her arms around her legs.

"What's wrong Mena?" Callie's questioning eyes looked up at the woman who was a wreck.

"Nothing, sweetie."

"Those happy tears?" I was sure that Callie's inquisitive side was going to get her into trouble one day, but for now she was just an innocent child wondering why Amena was in tears.

"Callie, baby." I knelt in front of her, her blue eyes piercing my own reminding me that her father was practically breathing down my neck, probably trying to muster up an apology for his wife. "Markus is in the garden, and he's got something special to show you."

"Me?" I saw her eyes light up and I smiled, tucking a loose hair behind her ear.

"Yes. If you go and tell him that mummy sent you, and ask him to show you what he showed mummy, then he will do." I didn't want to face either Matt or Amena, but it was going to happen, and I didn't want my daughter knowing that her mother had no qualms sleeping with a married man.

"OK, mummy." She was quick to wrap her arms around my neck and give me a wet kiss on the cheek, before she turned and ran back down the stairs. I knew that, no matter what had happened between Markus and I, he would still do anything for my little girl: even if it hurt him to be around her, I knew that he could never say no to Callie.

"I looked after your daughter, Sophie. I thought of you as a friend and, all this time, you were sleeping with my husband?" I had never had a friend, other than Evva, so to know that Amena thought of me as a friend made this situation even more painful to handle.

"Amena—"

"No. I want to hear from the woman who thought it was acceptable to sleep with a married man." The tiny thread of sanity which Amena appeared to be holding onto had, evidently, snapped and I was the one who was going to get the butt of it.

It was nothing if not deserved. I would take whatever Amena threw at me and I would accept it, because there was no argument for what I had done to the woman who stood before me.

She loved her husband and would climb mountains to make her happy. He would keep other women's beds warm, tell them that he loved them, and then he would go home to his wife and do the exact same thing. She was oblivious to his ways and, while I had never wanted the truth to come out, I was almost relieved that she would see her husband for the man he truly was.

"Are you still sleeping with him?" Amena pushed when I said nothing.

"It ended three years ago. He made it perfectly clear that he could never leave you for me, so I walked away, and I never thought that I would see him again," I sighed.

"Amena. Baby. I'm sorry."

"Sorry doesn't change a fucking thing, Matthew. You slept with another woman while I was at home, mourning the loss of the only child we have ever been able to conceive." I couldn't prevent my hand from flying to mouth to mask the shock at Amena's revelation. Matthew had gotten me pregnant and I had a beautiful daughter, but Amena had never been able to experience that. "Did you know that, Sophie? I was seventeen weeks pregnant when I miscarried and I tried to call him, to tell him that he would never meet his daughter, but he didn't answer. I was left to mourn alone."

"Amena—"

"Guess he didn't answer because he was too busy fucking you." I wasn't surprised when Amena slapped me, but I was surprised when Matthew stood in front of me and tried to defend me.

If anything, it was clear to me now that he never loved Amena, and he had probably never loved me either. I was a shiny new toy until he found something better and he moved on, because the man now stood in front of me didn't know the definition of love.

"What? Nothing to say? Not even going to defend yourself?" Amena continued to scream. There was a part of me which wanted to defend myself, to blame this all on Matthew, but there was a larger, more responsible, part of me which knew that there was nothing for me to say.

"I'm not going to apologise, because that's the last thing you want me to do. Just know that I regret what happened between your husband and I, and know that it wasn't worth destroying your marriage for either." I wanted Markus to be here for me, to hold me and tell me that I had fucked up, but despite that, everything was going to be fine.

I wanted Markus to tell me that he loved me and I wanted him to assure me he would always be here, regardless of the mistakes I had made. I wanted Markus to tell Matthew he was so much better for me than he ever was. I just wanted Markus to fight for me and to prove me completely wrong.

But, perhaps, I had realised just a little too late that I had been obsessed with the wrong brother. The imperfectly perfect life I had always been looking for, mostly for Callie's sake than my own, was right under my nose and I was simply oblivious to it all.

"Why, Sophie? You were the first genuine person I had met. At least that's what I thought until now."

"I was twenty-one and naïve. I thought I was in love and I didn't care who I destroyed, because I wanted Matthew. I thought he loved me and wanted to spend the rest of his life with me." I turned my back on Amena because I couldn't stand the broken look on her face any longer. I was being coward, and I knew it. "Like I said, I was naïve and my biggest regret it falling for the bullshit your husband constantly spouted."

"Amena, baby—"

"I guess it all makes sense now. Here I was thinking that you wanted to spend the rest of your life with me when, actually, you just didn't want me to ever discover what a cheating bastard you are."

"Babe—"

"No, Matthew. I lost our baby, our daughter, and you weren't even there for me because you were in bed with another woman. How many other women have there been since Sophie, huh?" I could hear the murmurs from people who had gathered around to watch the drama unfold, and I could feel the glares which I was getting without even needing to see them.

This was supposed to be a happy weekend, a celebration of the love between two people. If I had never have turned up, that's probably what it would have been, and Amena would have been none the wiser to the promiscuous ways of her husband.

But I can't bring myself to entirely regret my decision to come. Not when it had given me the clarification I desperately needed: what I had with Matthew was never love but an infatuation with a man who had promised me the world. I had never been wanted before, or even spoilt, and I took full advantage of that with Matthew, convinced that he was the man of my dreams.

Only now do I realise what a mistake it would have been to create a life with the man who was now stood before me. A man who could not admit his wrongdoing and or even admit that he was no longer in love with the woman he was married to.

He was a coward and I now know what a lucky escape I had from his clutches.

"There has been no one, I swear. It has only been you." I knew that Matthew was lying. His eye would twitch. It was a tell which I had picked up early on in our affair, and it was how I knew that he would never risk his relationship with Amena for the sake of someone who was still a child in his eyes. "I love you, Amena. And I truly am sorry for the pain I have caused. But, since Sophie, it has only been you."

"I wish I could believe that, Matthew, I really do." Amena's voice was nothing more than a whisper and I found myself wanting to hide from the world, knowing that I was the one who broke the only woman, other than Evva, to consider me a friend.

"Sophie was a mistake. I thought that I loved her, but I came back to you, and I didn't see her until she turned up here for the wedding." I would be lying if I said that his words didn't hurt, but Matthew was a slimy asshole who would say, and do, whatever it took to ensure his relationship with Amena was not jeopardised.

"I'm pregnant. But I think that both this child and I will be better off without you in our lives." Those were the last words Amena said before she disappeared down the corridor with her head in her hands, and then there was nothing other than the silence as the crowd dispersed, leaving just Matthew and I once again.

But there was nothing more to be said. At least from me, anyway.

I knew now that there was someone out there who loved me for who I was, faults and all. He didn't want me to be perfect, neither did he want me to be anything other than happy. I would never be his dirty little secret and he would always be there for me.

I knew that Markus Barnes might have been an annoying pain in my ass who couldn't keep it in his pants, but he was also the man I saw myself spending my life and the man who could be the father Callie needed.

I could only hope that it wasn't too late for me to make amends and to admit to him what I complete fool I had been.

"Soph. Please. Don't you leave me too," Matt called when I began to make my way back down the stairs, hoping that Markus and Callie were in his hideout and that it wasn't too late for me to confess how wrong I had been.

"I'm done with waiting for you, Matthew. I never loved you and I never should have given my life to you back then. You gave me nothing in return and I am going to tell Markus what a mistake I have made."

"Soph—"

"I love Markus and nothing you say, or even do, is going to change that."

We're nearly at the end now. I hope you've enjoyed reading, just as much as I have enjoyed writing.

So, will Sophie and Markus ever get it together? Or are they simply not destined for each other?

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