Lucy paced around her kitchen with a worried look on her face.
"What's wrong honey?" Nick asked in concern, noticing something was up.
"It doesn't matter," Lucy said quietly, not able to look him in the eye.
Nick made her a cup of tea and handed it to her. He was feeling guilty about the way he had acted in the past few weeks and was trying to make it up to Lucy.
But Lucy hardly noticed, she had something important on her mind. "Thanks," she said as she took the cup from him.
"What are you doing today?" he asked. "I'm going to the studios to do some recording, you can come along if you like,".
Lucy looked at him and smiled, Nick was being so nice. "Thanks but I have some things to do,". She loved Nick and was annoyed at herself for being unfaithful.
Soon Nick left, leaving Lucy alone in the house. As soon as his car had driven away, she picked up her mobile and called Ben.
"Hi," he said as he answered, sounding tired.
"Hi Ben, are you free today, I need to speak to you," Lucy said, her voice shaky.
"Oh, well... OK then," Ben agreed.
"Thanks, come over as soon as you can," Lucy said before hanging up. She then called Linda.
"Hi," Linda answered. "Did you hear about Sam?!".
"No, tell me,".
"She's divorcing Pete!".
Lucy laughed. "They've only been married a couple of months!".
"He was cheating on her so she's entitled to a couple of million dollars in a divorce settlement," Linda continued. "I read it in The Sun, and I phoned her this morning and she told me it's true,".
"Lucky for her," Lucy said. "A couple of million dollars!".
"Yeah," Linda laughed.
"Anyway," Lucy continued. "Do you have Mark's number? I haven't got it,".
"Yeah, I'll read it out for you," Linda agreed. "Not that I want anything to do with him any more. Oh, by the way I'm seeing Shane tonight, I think we're back on again,".
After saying goodbye, Lucy called Mark.
"Hiya," he answered.
"Hi," Lucy said nervously. "I need to speak to you, can you come over?".
"Yeah, I can come," Mark agreed. "But I'm flying back home to Ireland tonight so I'll have to leave before five,".
"I won't keep you here that long, don't worry,".
They hung up and Lucy sat nervously waiting for them to arrive.
Heather sat on the sofa at Linda's house and tried to concentrate on the TV. But her mind was on Ben.
It had been almost a week and he still wouldn't talk to her. She desperately wanted to talk to him and explain things, but he didn't give her a chance. And she missed Nicole like crazy.
Her mobile bleeped; she had a message. Her eyes widened as she read who it was from. Ben!
He had replied to her message about Nicole. 'You can see her on Sunday,' the message read. 'I will drop her over at Linda's house. You will be hearing from my solicitor soon,'.
Heather's face fell. "He could have said this to my face," she muttered.
Linda entered the room. "I'm off to visit Helen," she said.
"OK," Heather replied. "Maybe I should come... but that might not be a good idea after what happened,".
"Yeah," Linda agreed, Heather had told her everything.
"Paul's going to tell her what went on," Heather explained. "But not yet, not until she's recovered. I just hope she doesn't hear it from someone else first, I know rumours are spreading,". Heather frowned. Helen had been mad at her before the accident, and after all that had happened since, would she speak to Heather again..?
"Here you go," Lucy said as she handed Ben and Mark drinks. They sat in her lounge on the same sofa she had been on with Ben a couple of weeks back.
"Are you going to tell us what's going on?" Mark asked.
"Yes, of course," Lucy said nervously. She felt two pairs of blue eyes looking at her impatiently. "Um... Mark, you remember that night after the video shoot,".
"Yeah," he smiled. "How could I forget,".
"And Ben, that night when we met at the club and came back here,".
The two of them looked at each other. "You saw her too?" Ben said to Mark.
"Yeah," Mark nodded with a grin.
"Well, I have some news I think you both should know," Lucy mumbled. "I'm... I'm pregnant,".
Ben's mouth dropped open in shock. "Oh my God,".
"I don't know who the father is," Lucy explained. "It's either one of you two, or Nick. But I don't think it's Nick because we were going through a bad patch recently and didn't..." she trailed off.
"We'll be here to support you," Mark promised. "Isn't that right Ben,".
"Yeah," Ben nodded. "Of course. Have you told Nick yet?".
"No, I'm telling him tonight. But of course, he'll assume he's the father. This is private between the three of us, OK? Please don't tell anyone else,".
They both promised to stay quiet about it. "I won't say anything to Heather, OK," Lucy told Ben. "By the way, how is she? I haven't seen her in over a week,".
Ben looked down at the ground. "I don't care how she is," he muttered.
"What?".
"She was cheating on me," Ben announced, unaware that Lucy already knew about the affair.
"Oh no, that's awful!" Mark exclaimed. "Who was she seeing?".
"Paul," Ben spat angrily. "He was supposed to be my mate, the little...".
"I'm really sorry," Lucy said, patting Ben's shoulder. "I hope you can work things out,".
"I want a divorce," Ben said. "And I'm taking her to court to get custody of Nicole,".
Sunday arrived and Helen had some visitors at the hospital. She was on the road to recovery now, but still had a long way to go.
"Hi," Helen said weakly from her bed as she saw Linda, Shane, Tasha, Christian and Naomi enter her room. She was still confined to her bed but the doctors had told her she would be able to leave hospital in about a month.
"We brought you some grapes," Naomi laughed, placing a huge bowl of grapes on the bedside table. "How are you feeling today?".
"Not too bad, but my leg's killing me," Helen replied. It was broken in two places and hurt a lot.
"Have you seen the twins yet?" Tasha asked.
"Yes, Paul brought them over yesterday, they had missed me so much," Helen smiled. "It was great seeing them again,".
"Everything OK with you and him?" Linda asked.
"Yeah, why shouldn't things be OK with us? He's done a great job looking after the twins on his own. By the way, is Heather going to come and visit me?".
Linda glanced at the others, who all knew what had happened. "Um, I expect so,".
"Oh good," Helen continued. "I want to apologise for that stupid argument we had, I don't want to fall out with her,".
Naomi and Christian exchanged looks. "Yeah, I'm sure she doesn't want any fallouts either," Naomi said.
"What about Ben?" Helen asked. "I hear that Heather looked after the twins a lot, did he mind?".
"Ummm," Linda said. "I suppose I'd better tell you. Heather and Ben have broken up,". Of course, she wasn't going to tell Helen why. She would leave Paul to confess it in his own time.
"Oh no!" Helen gasped. "Oh, poor Heather, I bet she's upset. What happened?".
"Oh, they had a lot of arguments," Linda said vaguely. "I don't know the details,".
Heather stood by the window waiting for Ben to arrive with Nicole. They were supposed to be there five minutes ago.
Finally, Ben's blue BMW pulled up outside. Heather rushed to open the door.
"Mummy!" Nicole cried as she rushed to Heather with her arms wide open.
Heather picked Nicole up and hugged her tighter than ever. "I've missed you," she cried with tears in her eyes.
Ben put his hands on his hips. "I'll come and pick her up at dinner time," he said.
"Wait!" Heather said quickly. "Ben, we need to talk,".
"No we don't, my lawyers will say every I need you to know in court next month, you should get a letter about it soon,".
"Can't we discuss things like adults, I'm sick of arguing," Heather reasoned. She looked at him with pleading eyes.
Ben sighed. "I don't really have anything to say to you except that I've very disappointed with what you did,".
"I'm sorry," Heather said sincerely. "I didn't want to hurt you,".
Ben looked down, unable to meet her eyes. He was feeling guilty himself about what he had done with Lucy and the fact he might be the father of her child, but still thought Heather was more in the wrong. After all, his had only been a one night stand when he had been drinking. Heather and Paul had been carrying on for months.
"When's mummy coming home?" Nicole asked Ben.
"Mummy's not coming home," Ben explained. "But you'll still see her, don't worry. Bye bye sweetie," he kissed her and headed back to the car.
"Why you crying mummy?" Nicole asked as she noticed tears slipping from Heather's eyes. Her own big blue eyes were also filling up.
Heather wiped her eyes and forced a smile. "Come on darling, let's go to the park," she said, avoiding the question.
Heather took her daughter's hand and they walked down the street towards the park. She tried to force Ben off her mind and concentrate on Nicole, after all she wouldn't get to see her much anymore if Ben got his way...
.