Page 56 of Hidden Desires

“Hey, baby,” he says, voice low and so real it’s like he’s in the bed with me. “Are you alright?”

I can’t speak for a second, just breathe and listen.

Finally, I say, “They know, Jack. Not everything, but enough. They’re never going to leave me alone now. I feel like a criminal.”

He sighs, heavy with sympathy. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I know this isn’t easy.”

“I don’t know what to do. I can’t lie anymore, but if I tell them, I lose everything.”

He’s quiet for a moment. Then: “You don’t lose me. You’ll never lose me.”

It helps, a little. But the ache is still there, old and deep.

Jack continues. “You can keep pretending, but it’s eating you alive, sweetheart, and it’s obvious that you can’t keep going like this. So you can come clean, risk the fallout, but at least you’re free. Or you can just pick up and walk out. Move in with me, let the dust settle later. I’ll back you up, no matter what you choose.”

I clutch the phone so tight my fingers go numb.

“I love you,” I whisper. “I wish I was stronger, but I don’t know what to choose.”

He laughs, gentle. “You’re already the strongest woman I’ve ever met.”

We talk for a little while, not about the problem but just small talk that gets my mind off my conundrum. We discuss the neighbor’s barking dog, the Twins’ chances this year, the other weird neighbor who dresses up his mailbox for every holiday. The tension ebbs, just enough for me to exhale.

After we say goodnight, I lie there, staring at the ceiling, watching the shadows mutate as cars pass by on the street outside. Sleep is impossible. My brain spins the same three options, over and over:

Option One: keep lying, keep going, until it all blows up or I vanish under the weight.

Option Two: tell the truth, blow up my life, lose my parents’ trust, maybe forever.

Option Three: leap. Move in with Jack, change my number, start over from scratch, hope the pieces land somewhere safe.

I think about the cam shows, the paralegal job, the secret joy of being Jack’s girlfriend, even if he’s twice my age and my dad would set him on fire. I think about the way Jack looks at me—hungry, proud, and like he’d never ask me to be anything but myself. I think about my mother’s face when she found the lingerie, about my father’s voice when he said I was “killing him” with the secrecy.

Somewhere between 3 a.m. and 4, my brain just… stops. I go numb, all the way through.

But when the sun comes up, filling the room with ugly, honest light, I know exactly what I’m going to do.

No more lies. No more halves. No more hiding.

Even if it means losing everything.

13

CHAPTER 13 – THE TRUTH EMERGES

Eliza

Jack’s house is a shrine to masculinity and power, every room a testament to the kind of man who used to fly jets upside down. His furniture is dark and heavy, and the walls a clean white, decorated sparsely with a plaque here or there, or an aviation print. He’s got the heat cranked to sixty-eight but I’m still cold, my fingers slightly numb as I clutch the folder to my chest like it’s a fucking Bible.

He watches me from the leather couch, one arm thrown over the back, biceps bulging under a shirt that shows off his broad shoulders. Even now, when I’m nervous, I can’t help but be attracted to this magnetic man, with his piercing blue eyes and patrician features. There’s a lowball glass sweating on the coffee table in front of him, two fingers of rye, untouched. He’s doing that Air Force thing—letting me spin out, reading my panic with a calm expression, waiting until I run out of fuel.

“Sweetheart, if you make a trench in my floor, I’m billing you for the refinishing,” he says, voice dry as the steppes of Kazakhstan.

I stop, feet glued to the floor, heart jackhammering. “Sorry. I just… I have to show you something, and I don’t know how.”

He pats the cushion next to him, and I shuffle over, feeling twelve instead of twenty-one. My hands are shaking, so when I sit, the folder rattles against my knees. Jack’s gaze flicks down, then up, taking in my flushed cheeks and trembling bosom. His eyebrow lifts. “Are you about to serve me with a restraining order, Eliza?”

I manage a shaky laugh. “No. Not unless you get handsy, old man.”