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I didn’t shake my head, but I didn’t answer him either.
“Fuck,” he said, getting to his feet and kicking out at the couch. “Fucking hell, just fuck.”
“Stay out of it,” I told him, and my voice sounded like the sad little girl’s I’d come to know so well through the years. “Really, Tristan, stay out of it. You need to.”
“I can’t,” he snapped. “Even if I wanted to, I can’t! Blue is trying to find Stephen right now, and he knows what Morelli did to us and where he was going. The whole fucking party knows what Morelli did to us and where he was going, even if they don’t know who he is yet. They’ll find out, Elaine! Your whole fucking family is gonna know it soon enough! You won’t be able to keep that shit away from them!”
I could feel my heartbeat in my ears, the sickness swimming around my belly, and the beer, and the spirits, and the fizz didn’t matter; my head was stone-cold sober and plunging into the pits of despair. He was right. Of course he was. My family would be finding out about this. They had to.
And so would his. So would Lucian Morelli’s.
We were both fucked, both of us beyond redemption in a world made of sinners.
“I’ll find a way out of it,” I said to myself more than Tristan. “I’ll hide it, say something different, I’ll find a way.”
He was shaking his head as I spoke. “A way out of them finding out that you were at a backstreet party with Lucian Morelli knocking people out cold? Good fucking luck with that.”
“I’ll find a way,” I insisted, but I could feel the sobs bubbling back up. “He’ll find a way.”
Tristan’s eyes were cold as ice when they met with mine. “His father will kill him, Laine. The very moment he finds out he was chasing you down, he’ll tear him apart.”
I let out another sob, and he pushed it. He fucking pushed it.
“Why are you fucking crying, Laine? Lucian Morelli saying his last goodbyes should have you smiling, not fucking sobbing.”
I wiped my eyes, and he could read it in my stare right back at him.
“Holy fuck,” he snarled. “You’ve gone and done it, haven’t you? You’ve fallen for the asshole monster. You’ve fallen for one of the damn fucking Morellis.”
I could only answer with another sob and another wipe of my eyes, because even I couldn’t lie that strongly, not anymore. I couldn’t deny I’d fallen for Lucian Morelli. Not to the man who knew me better than anyone else ever had.
Tristan carried on pushing, striding around with his hands in his hair.
“He killed Stephen Cannon, didn’t he? Just fucking tell me!”
So I did. I did tell him. I looked him square in the eye, and I gritted my teeth and I told him.
“Yes, Tristan, he killed Stephen Cannon. He stabbed him in the guts and watched him bleed to death on the floor, and I wanted that. I wanted it, too.”
His jaw dropped, and he paled, and he staggered away from me. “You wanted him to? Why the fuck would you want him to?”
I forced the words. “He was trying to rape me. That asshole Stephen Cannon was trying to rape me. He was hurting me, and I was begging him to stop, but he wouldn’t listen, and Lucian saved me. Lucian Morelli saved me.”
Tristan was shaking his head. “No. It can’t be. No, Elaine. Don’t you dare fucking lie to me.”
I kept my stare hard on his. “I’m not lying. Stephen Cannon was trying to rape me, and the monster saved me from him. I was saved by the so-called monster.”
My best friend cursed and put his head in his hands, and then he cursed to himself, over and over, because he knew it as well as I did. The whole damn situation was a cesspit full of shit with no clear way out.
“My family can’t find out about this, Tristan,” I said. “If there’s any way in the whole damn world it’s possible, they can’t find out about this. You have to help me.”
“HOLY FUCK!” he yelled, but he didn’t say no. He couldn’t say no.
“Please! Please, Tristan! I have to find a way out of this. They can’t know Lucian Morelli saved me from Stephen by butchering him in a city dive while I watched.”
I daren’t tell him he fucked me in the ass. Even I couldn’t share that truth.
“People will know, Laine! Not unless he wipes out the whole damn party!”
He was right, but there was no way I could give up, not without trying. I’d be signing my own death warrant if I did.
But that wasn’t why I was doing it. That wasn’t why I was trying.
I wasn’t trying to find a way out of this mess to counter my own death warrant. My death warrant was already signed over to the Power brothers. I was expecting it.
