PREVIOUSLY ON HPM

Mrs. Benson marched towards Tess and demanded whilst grabbing her arm, "Leave this house before I call the police!"

"The police?" Josey chuckled, dragging Tess' trapped arm out of the woman's grip, "Don't make me laugh. We're not leaving here till everyone knows everything that's been hidden for so long."

"If you don't-"

"Mum," Jayden cut in, stealing her attention and everyone else's. "Let her speak. I want to hear her."

Josey's gaze softened. Turning to her counterpart, she gave her a nod.

All the attention shifted to Tess now who joined her hands before her. Slowly, she approached Jayden.

"Jayden," she breathed, staring into his dark blue orbs with her light blue ones, "It's about time I revealed some things that have been kept hidden for many years."

Jayden gave a nod, gracing her with permission to tell him whatever she had to say.

Sucking in a silent breath, she held his gaze, a question tumbling from her lips, "Remember the shower incident?"

How could he not? It basically was the prominent moment he remembered her by.

"Yes," he simply answered, willing to make this encounter less awkward than it already was becoming. He failed to cast a glance at his parents' disturbed facial expressions as he solely focused on the girl before him.

Lara had backed away when things had gotten intense with Tess' entrance. She now stood with the other maids a couple of feet behind Jayden, backs against the wall. However, Kira had still maintained her position inches next to Jayden.

"What you don't know is," Tess paused. She dramatically turned to her right in the direction of Jayden's parents.

Anger swirled in the eyes of Mrs. Benson, a daring glint that was meant to threaten and frighten Tess.

However, it didn't in the slightest bit. The woman had done worse to her than a mere glare in the past.

"What happened in the shower with you was not by chance," she said, "It was planned."

Gasps and murmurs escaped the lips of the maids as confusion coursed through their minds, tumbling out in bits of whispered questions.

Jayden confusedly asked, "Planned? How?"

How was it a plan for Tess to invade his shower cubicle and inappropriately touch him? Whose sick plan was that? Why on earth would someone plan the harassment of another?

Straightening up, Tess carefully informed, "It was a plan set in place by your mother. I was her pawn."

"What?" The maids chorused their shock, widened eyes and gaping mouths littering the wall they stuck to.

Josey added, "Your lovely mother instructed Tess," she threw a scornful glance at Mrs. Benson, "to invade your space as you showered and-" she paused.

"And?" Jayden didn't realise the amount of impatience his voice bore.

Josey held his gaze as she informed, "And sexually harass you."

This time, the gasps were even louder. Lara's hand had flown to her mouth as had Brie's and the twins. Kira's eyes widened and she immediately grabbed Jayden's arm to provide any necessary support.

"Dios mio," Dana gaped, holding onto Katy who couldn't tear her astonished gaze away from Mrs. Benson.

Before Jayden could even react to the preposterousness he had just heard, his mother chimed in,

"You liar. I would never do such a thing to my son!"

Tess boldly retorted, "Don't you dare deny it, Mrs. Benson. That fateful day, you told me to enter his bathroom while he was showering, harass him, and return with the feedback of his reaction."

"Is this true?" Jayden earnestly shifted his gaze to his mother who was now being held by her husband. "Did you actually instruct someone to harass me?"

"I didn't! I never used the word, 'harass'," she confessed, all in all, revealing that there was some truth to what Tess and Josey had claimed.

His mother had planned it. She had sent someone into his bathroom to test him like he was some lab rat. Like he was a mere test subject, an experiment to be worked on.

Tess went on, fueling the tension that had already painted the suddenly gloomy walls of the hall into a dull ash, "She instructed me to be handsy, and give her feedback on your reaction. To go all out. If you fed into it, then you were a lost soul to her."

"Wow," Kira muttered. Did the woman have any knowledge of how that test could have negatively affected the boy who had been trying to locate his steps in an eternal quest for freedom?

Jayden fixed his overwhelmed gaze on his mother's. He couldn't believe she had planned the shower harassment. He couldn't believe she had actually ordered someone to do exactly what had been haunting him since he was seven. "So you did this without even considering that you could be triggering very painful and disturbing memories?"

He asked again when silence was the response he had received, "Why would you ask someone to do this?"

Tess answered for the momentarily speechless woman, "She claimed she had wanted to test you. I asked if this was the necessary way, but she power played me and reminded me of my place as her maid and nothing more. She told me that she knew what was best for her son, reminding me that I had to do whatever she said since I was under her."

Jayden grimaced, his chest tightening as he swallowed in the information.

If only Jayden knew there was much more to stomach down. He would forcefully become a ruminant just for the four stomachs they bore.

Man had to be well-prepared for anything in this life.

Tess murmured, "I'm sorry."

But Jayden recalled that she had twisted the story of the shower scene to the maids. The story the maids had received from her was that he had been inappropriate with her, and not the other way around. Why would she lie about it?

"Tess," he said, turning to face her, "Why then did you lie to the girls? Why did you tell them that I had been trying to have my way with you when you knew that wasn't true?"

Tess nodded her expectation of his question, and apologetically said, "Well, when the rejection happened," she clarified, "I wasn't against the rejection happening, but the way it happened. My ego was severely bruised. I hadn't expected you to snap that way."

"Then again," she added, "this is no excuse for what I did. I'm sorry.”

Mrs. Benson marched towards Tess and Josey, “You got what you wanted. Now, leave!”

“Oh, hon,” Josey chuckled, folding her arms over her chest, “We’re only now just getting to the juicy bits.”

“I will not tolerate this in my own house!”

Jayden observed his mother’s sharp demeanour, anger rolling off her shoulders in waves. Why was she so against this? What else had she been hiding?

He needed to know everything.

“What else?” he turned to Josey who caught his gaze, her lips tight but her eyes glinting with a smile. “Tell me everything you know,” he instructed. "Everything I need to know."

“Definitely,” she assured.

The night sure was cold but the hall was absolutely on fire. Intense silence visited the dysfunctional gathering, moving languidly through the hall so much that even a pin drop sound would be heard.

Josey cleared her throat, “Jayden.”

The fact that she had mentioned his name in a strict tone caused his shoulders to tense, his senses fixed on her so he caught her body language and heard every single thing she had to say.

She began, “I know the moment Florence became a part of your life, your life had ended before it even had the chance to begin.”

Jayden folded his hand into an agonizing fist, his chest tightening from the accuracy of her wordplay. Kira drew closer to him when she had noticed his tenseness, unwilling to tolerate any attempt by anyone to open wounds which had healed, her saviour instincts kicking in.

She was there, she had seen it all unravel before her young eyes. She knew exactly what the child had been through in the hands of Florence.

Josey cautiously went on with a question, “Visiting her in prison two months ago gave you the closure you needed, huh?” Her question exposed his prison visit to his parents. They had no idea that Jayden had travelled to the prison to see that mortifying woman.

His parents inhaled sharply, Mrs. Benson gasping, “Jayden, what in God’s name is she talking about?”

His father added, “Tell me she's just bluffing. You wouldn't go near that woman.”

However, Jayden nonchalantly admitted, “I did.” He looked them dead in the eye, “I went to see her in jail.”

“Why would you do such a thing?” Mrs. Benson’s whiny voice irritated Kira as the young girl voiced out,

“I advised that it would be the best thing to do,” she confessed, “for him to move on from his past. He needed the closure he was denied, thanks to you.”

His mother implored, “Why would you go to that prison without informing us?”

However, Kira decided to handle this matter, mostly because she had advised him to visit Florence, “Because he is a grown man who doesn't need his parent's permission to make personal decisions for his life. He needed the closure, and he received it. Along with some information which had me questioning you, Mrs. Benson.” The sharp gaze Kira threw at Mrs. Benson made the woman internally flinch.

These two would never be on good terms. Kira was upset that this woman had always found a way to make excuses for every single thing in hers and her son’s lives, instead of handling the matter maturely. She was so fond of making excuses even when he had shied away from them. What kind of a mother was she?

“What?” Mrs. Benson placed a manicured hand on her neck. What on earth had Florence told them? And why hadn’t Jayden ever spoken about it?

Kira went on, “When Jayden had repeatedly asked Florence why she had done what she did, she had told him to ask his mother.”

Mrs. Benson’s lips parted like they had a strong repellency for each other, but no words had come out.

Complete silence engulfed the room. Even the maids were in shock. The tension could be sliced with a knife.

Josey was the one who broke the silence. “Now,” she shifted her glance between Jayden’s parents, Jayden, and Kira, as she spoke, “Florence was a sick motherfucker. A fucking child predator with no scruples. Nothing will ever excuse her palpable actions."

Josey went on, "However, what you don't know is that she had not just woken up one morning, deciding to abuse a child for five fucking years. As sick as she was, this woman appeared in your life for a reason," she looked Jayden dead in the eye. Shifting her gaze to his parents, she inquired, "Isn't that right, Mr and the wonderful Mrs. Benson?”