Chapter 4 I want my daughter

Hailey loved her two friends despite the two living a life of drinking and partying. They were her best friends since they were ten. Both girls worked as waitresses at a bar which was frequented by rich and spoilt boys.

That particular night the two friends came to her university apartment and apologised for not celebrating her twentieth birthday with her. She didn't mind really as she was busy with her studies, but they insisted that they wanted to make it up to her. They took her to a night club, and it was her second time going out to such place with these two.

That night she could feel that there was something not right about the club, but she didn't want to disappoint her friends, so she forced herself to stay and try to enjoy.

The next thing she remembered was asking herself, "why....am I naked and who is this man sleeping besides me?" She remembered wanting to scream and then found herself with her hand on her mouth trying to suppress her scream.

She got out of the bed and dressed quickly rushed out of the suite. She ran aimlessly until she was further away from the hotel. She quickly found her way back to her university apartment and rushed into the shower and started scrubbing herself.

She realised that her first time had been taken by a stranger and she didn't even know how this had happened. She intended to find her friends and ask why they did that to her as she now remembered feeling dizzy after the drink, they gave her.

She however found herself calling Dorothy and after a long chat decided not to ask the girls or even talk about it.

Later she found out that she was pregnant and made her own choice to keep her baby and took a year out of university to give birth to her daughter. With the help from Edward, she went back to complete her degree and Orla stayed at the orphanage.

Edward had offered to buy her an apartment near the university so that she could stay with her daughter, but she refused. She wanted to fully concentrate on her studies and build a better life for her daughter.

"Dad she is my daughter, and she must stay with me." Casper had now gone straight to his father's hotel suite and the two men were disagreeing on what was the right thing to do.

"Casper you raped the girl and how are you going to explain that to her? What will Orla think of you when she discover what you did."

"I did not rape anyone dad. My friends paid for her virginity as a birthday present for me." He was now speaking on top of his voice and immediately stopped and stared at his father

"By the way how did you find out about my connection with her?"

Edward hesitated but knowing his son he knew he would not stop asking him until he got a satisfactory answer.

"When she told me what happened to her, I had to investigate and that is when I came to know that it was you who raped her." Edward stunned his son who had no idea that his father knew Hailey before the incident.

Casper was now shaking his head. "I knew you were part of this. How foolish of me to think that you discovered her after the incident or something."

He was now very angry. "I asked my friends why they thought of that as a present and they talked about being approached by certain girls who were selling their virginity.."

"You know it's not true. She was drugged and found herself in your room. Why do you think she didn't wait for you to wake up?" Edward was angry as well and the father and son were now shouting at each other not giving each other the chance to listen to the other one.

"I have known Hailey since she was ten and the two girls who did that to her were her trusted friends from the orphanage." Edward had seen that their argument was going nowhere so he decided to come clean.

"Your late uncle Daniel's car crushed with Hailey's parents, and I was at the hospital when I heard all the relatives of the poor ten year old refusing to look after her." Edward explained to his son that he felt sorry for the girl and decided to sponsor her.

Casper knew that his uncle's driver was driving his uncle from a conference and he collided with another car and the driver died on the scene. He carefully listened to his father when he explained how he went to the orphanage and just offered to sponsor her as a random pick.

"Why couldn't you just adopt her and maybe this would never have happened to her?" Casper could not understand why his father picked that option.

"Your uncle's driver was in the wrong, so I didn't want anyone to use that and disrupt Hailey's life." He said but his son could see that there was more to it that his father was disclosing. He vowed to find out on his own.

"I want my daughter dad and you had no right to keep this away from me." He seriously said but his father kept telling him that it was not a good idea.

"What you and your friends did was wrong, and those girls confessed that you were part of the idea of drugging Hailey, and this is not good for you son." Edward did not want to complicate the case.

"Dad when I got in that bed she was already there, and I don't even know how she got there and where she came from. I just had sex with her and as promised by my friends she was a virgin." He tried to make his father understand but he was still refusing.

"Now that you know Hailey and your daughter, you can use the excuse of being my son to just go and see your daughter once in a while."

He continued. "Pearl won't even accept her when you marry her so don't complicate a life that is complicated already."

Pearl was Casper's actor girlfriend and he had told his parents that he was serious about her. She had not been formally introduced to Lyn and Edward, but they had heard rumors and they asked their son who admitted that he was in a relationship with her.

There was dead silence as the two men tried to digest what was happening. Casper had checked in the same hotel, so he told his dad that he was now going into his suite. It was now past midnight and his father told him that he was leaving very early and was not going to disturb him.

'Why did this happen to me? Dad is right, Pearl won't understand if she discovers how Orla was conceived and also Hailey won't understand that the boys said they paid for her virginity.' He was now scratching his head deciding what to do.

He decided to give himself time to think about it and he poured himself a drink before he got into bed.

The next morning, he was awakened by the sound of the vibration of his phone. He checked the caller ID, and it was Pearl.

"Babe are you still out of town? I tried calling yesterday and you were not picking up." He sat up and checked the time and he saw that it was around 9am. The surprise news of having a daughter was giving him a headache and had forgotten that he had not called his girlfriend or checked if she had called.

"Yes, I'm still out because me and my father had huge business to deal with." Surely, he was not going to tell her about the business being the unexpected daughter.

"You didn't tell me that you're now conducting business with your dad. I thought you said he is not involved anymore." She remembered him perfectly saying that his father only wanted to take care of his mother.

"The man is still the chairman so he can conduct business if he feels like." He told her that he was staying an extra day, but his father was returning that morning.

"It's a shame because I wanted you to attend a function being hosted by one of my friends or I could drive there." She said but he told her that the business meetings would not interest her at all.