Too Late for Regret novel Chapter 79

Holden’s POV

I already knew that things were about to get worse. Gretchen just basically admitted that what Tiffany had been accused of, she had actually done. I felt sick. We had asked them to help Ana, yet they both took the opportunity to hurt her as much as they could. Then tried to threaten her into silence. My mother was crying: she had held out hope for Tiffany. But I think Dad already suspected what had happened. I believe that’s why he left her in jail until someone tipped off those reporters. Tiffany probably told Gretchen to do it because

she wanted to get out of jail.

I saw her face, and Tiffany was scared, which meant that things were going to get even worse for her. I knew who those guys were. They used to be jocks at our high school. The minute she saw them, she paled. What in the hell has she done? If she hurt Ana, I won’t let her off. Dad already said that he would be cutting her off completely if Tiffany were convicted. Mom was still thinking that she could still find Tiffany a husband. But I’m not so sure that Tiffany is going to be able to dodge a conviction.

Ana has always been smart. She makes lists, and in very thorough as her mind works quickly. I knew I hurt her, but I didn’t know how much Tiffany had done to her. She probably thought I would warn Tiffany about the video being restored, so she didn’t mention much to me. I hadn’t even told Tiffany that the footage from that night had been recovered. I’m sure Ana noticed that. Tiffany serious hurt Ana that night. Rodney was now showing evidence of the injuries Ana had sustained that night from the medical report.

The jury was already forming an opinion of Tiffany, and it’s not a good one. I doubt that she’ll be able to dodge the punishment that she deserves this time around. The man that Mom had lined up for her needed a wife. I could understand why he didn’t want to be involved in a scandal. Neither Dad nor I wanted to be involved in this either. I knew Dad wanted to just pay a fine and move on. Despite my parents sitting behind Ana’s parents, the Caldwells were not swayed. I can tell that Reid is pissed. He is angrier than I’ve ever seen

him.

I’m fairly certain that our hopes of keeping this quiet are now destroyed, due to the nature of the allegations. Reid made sure that no reporters were allowed in the courtroom. He was trying his best to protect Ana now. I’m sure he will also try to protect her after the trial. But she seems to be holding up pretty well to this point. I saw my sister trying to mess with her at the start, but Tiffany is no longer smiling.

The first of the three men was called up and sworn in. Seth was just as upset as I was, waiting to hear what was going to come up next. She had warned us about some of the bullying in the hospital. Charlie seemed to be relaxed, but I saw his fist clench. I guess he knows what’s about to come out, and he’s angry for Ana. I knew I needed to brace for it. She had touched on things that happened in the girls‘ locked room. So I have to assume that this guy was one of the individuals who were present with her while she was naked.

“Mr. Andrews, can you tell me what happened in the girls‘ locker room, with Ms. Caldwell, about ten years ago?” my attorney asked.

“Objection. How would this man know what instance is in question? Or where is Attorney Briggs is going with this?” Tiffany’s attorney spoke up.

“I can be more specific, Attorney Stevens. Mr. Andrews, can you tell us about an incident that involved you

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and your friends that went down at your high school? One that involved Tiffany Vaughn and Ana Caldwell that occurred inside the girls‘ locker room? This would be an occasion where Ms. Caldwell ended up naked in front of you and your friends. I’m assuming that this didn’t happen more than once,” Ana’s attorney asked. His tone was polite, but it was clear that he was mocking Attorney Stevens when he spoke.

“Tiffany had sent me and my friends a text. She invited me and my friends to come to the girls‘ locker room. She had invited us there before; usually, we met up in the equipment room. But she asked us to come to the

girls‘ locker room on this occasion,” He started to speak.

Tiffany gave a strange gurgling kind of sound, before grabbing her attorney’s arm and giving him a look.

Once that begged him to stop this line of questioning. But at the moment, there was no reason for him to

stop anything or object. Her panic didn’t escape Ana’s attorney.

He turned back to the man on the stand and said, “Please continue.”

“So like I said, she asked us to come to the girls‘ locker room to meet up,” he replied.

“Was it just you?” her attorney asked.

“No, she and Gretchen asked me, Greg, and Mike to come there. The usual group,” he answered with a shrug.

“The usual group?” Ana’s Attorney repeated, confused.

“Yeah, we had a free period together, and we would meet up with the girls to talk and stuff,” Clayton Andrews

replied.

“So just to clarify, it was you, Clayton Andrews, along with Gregory Hughes and Michael Hall, who would

regularly meet up with Tiffany Vaughn and Gretchen Loomis?” he asked.

“Yeah, football season was over, so we had time on our hands. We all knew each other pretty well, and

enjoyed, well, getting together,” Clayton replied.

It was apparent that we all knew what getting together meant. Tiffany didn’t look back at hearing our mother’s gasp of shock. Tiffany always acted as if she were so innocent. She didn’t dress innocent, but she was never out late, and she didn’t date. If she did go out, it was with Gretchen, and they were always back on time. Our mother had bought her act completely. For her to hear that Tiffany had been having s*x school, she was honestly shocked.

“So it was normal for you three to share them during the times you got together?” Ana’s Attorney asked.

“Objection, what does this have to do with Ana Caldwell?” Tiffany’s Attorney finally questioned. Tiffany kept looking worse the long this went on. In the court of public opinion, she was looking even more guilty with each passing moment.

“We’re getting to that, Counselor. I just wanted everyone to realize why they were meeting up and that it had already happened several times while on school property.” Ana’s Attorney replied.

“Well, they’re not in school anymore Ms. Vaughn was eighteen years old. While it may be a little improper to be doing that at the school, it wasn’t against the law. It was also a decade ago, so why is it being brought up now?” Tiffany’s Attorney asked.

“An excellent question, Attorney Stevens. Mr. Andrews, can you shed light on why I’m bringing this up?”

“Well, every time we met up before, it was just Tiffany and Gretchen. But this time, when they let us in through the emergency exit, Ana was there,” he replied.

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“What was she doing?” her Attorney asked.

“She was lying on the floor, naked, trying to cover herself with a towel. She had been hit before we got there; she had slap marks on her face, but she also had marks on her ribs and stomach. None of us put out our hands on her. I just want to make that clear. She was hurt before we arrived. Gretchen was filming Tiffany hitting Ana. She also ended up sending the video to us, but I deleted it. I knew who Ana was. I didn’t want to be involved in anything having to do with the Caldwell’s getting angry with us. Tiffany picked on her all the time. She kept trying to take the towel Ana was using to cover herself. During the struggle, the towel was eventually pulled off. It happened pretty quickly. The door had been propped open, and within about a minute of our arrival, she lost the towel,” he replied.

“What did you do?” her Attorney asked quietly.

“Well, we were going to leave, but Tiffany demanded that we stay. Ana got up and ran into the bathroom, taking her clothes off the bench as she went. I don’t know where she went after that. We got with Tiffany and Gretchen. None of us really paid attention to Ana again. I guess she ran out the emergency exit, or hid in the bathroom until we left. But we didn’t go there knowing what Tiffany was doing. We looked away when Ana lost her towel. She was on the larger side, and none of us were interested in her at the time,” he answered with a shrug. “She looks better now than she did back then. But at the time, no one was willing to step up and defend her. If you did, you were going directly against Tiffany and all her friends. It would have been

social suicide to do so.”

“Do you know what was on the video she sent the three of you?” Ana’s Attorney asked.

“I do, it started with Tiffany hitting Ana after surprising her in the shower. Then, she followed her as she ran away from Tiffany, who had some sort of police baton with her. The kind you use for protection, one that extends. I know it had to hurt her, but we hadn’t known what Tiffany did before we got there. It was hours later that we saw the video and found out. We hadn’t seen Tiffany hit her with the baton, or we would have stopped her. She was just slapping her when we arrived. I swear we would have stopped her if we saw what she was doing,” he replied.

ཁ 。 — ཝཿ ཥ ཚ ༀརྗ༅ འཇ༴

He was looking at Ana when he said that he would have stopped it. I’m not sure if I believe him or not. He just said that the whole school knew that Ana was getting bullied, and not one person was willing to step in to help. They were all scared to cross my sister. No wonder Ana changed so much. She had no hope. We had gone to college, and no one was willing to intervene to stop what was happening to Ana.

Ana suffered for no reason, and my heart hurt for her. The other two men got up and basically said the same thing. Not verbatim, but close enough that we all knew that they were telling the truth. My mother looked horrified as more information eventually came out as to how it all worked out with two girls and three guys. My father looked like he had sucked on a lemon. I wanted to tear them all apart for not helping Ana. They were practically adults when the incident occurred. They had no excuse.

The worst part was that one of them, Greg, still had the video saved. Clayton and Michael had deleted theirs. It was good, for proof, but absolutely humiliating for Ana to have to sit through it. They pixelated her important bits, but you could tell that she was naked when Tiffany ripped the towel off of her. Tiffany deserved to be punished for what she had done.