Page 141 of The Unravelings

“What are you doing here? How did you…” My voice trails off as my brows furrow when I look past him. “You broke in,” I accuse in a breath.

Or he’s sneaky and has a key. I wouldn’t put it past him, honestly. If he’s as good a hacker as he says he is, then who is to say he doesn’t break into people’s rooms, too?

JJ rolls his eyes with a huff. “Do you really want to be alone?” he asks, eyeing me up and down.

Do I?

The answer is yes, but also no. I mean, I have Waffles to cling to as the storm continues to batter its way through Greenwood, leaving nothing but rain and destruction behind. I yelp when thunder booms again, seeming to shake the building once more.

“Besides, you said I could come over earlier.” He gives me a smug expression. “Some things never change, huh?” he whispers, plopping down beside my bed on the ground with a sigh. “I was actually on my way over here when that happened.” He gestures to the turn of the weather outside my window. “Seems like it came out of nowhere.”

“I think it did,” I whisper, shaking my head.

“And him?” JJ asks, gazing at Waffles with a smirk. “You kidnap dogs now?”

I snort, ruffling Waffles’s fur. “Can’t kidnap a dog that comes willingly. He was right outside my dorm building, waiting.” I shrug.

“You were supposed to meet me at home, boy,” JJ says, giving the dog a stern look.

Waffles huffs in response and licks my chin again.

“And what were you doing?” I gently run my fingers through Waffles’s fur more, feeling a lighter sense of ease now that JJ is here, sitting on the ground beside my bed. Which is an odd feeling to have, especially for the crimes I’ve accused him of.

JJ lets out a breath. “We make fake IDs on the side for extra money. I was delivering them to someone in the next building over.”

“Fake IDs?” I question, trying to ignore the rain heavily pouring against my window.

“It’s our own little business venture.”

“Just like what you all did with the Coliseum?” I raise a brow at what they turned our secret hideout into.

JJ cringes. “Not exactly like you remember, huh?”

“Yeah, last time I was in it, it was empty, and we were searching for gold,” I hum. “Then, it turned into a place for blood baths and booze. What happened there?”

Shadows consume his face as the lightning continues to be our only light, streaking across the sky.

“What happened is we lost sight of a lot of things, Liv,” he whispers sadly. “We created these ventures here to keep our sanity…” He trails off, lifting his face to look directly into my eyes. Only slivers of his dark brown eyes are visible as he checks me over. “We lost a lot when we lost you. Ourselves. Our girl. Our sanity. Livy, we did all this to forget, I guess.” There’s a sadness clinging to every word he says, and he sighs heavily.

With trembling fingers, I gently run them through his dark brown hair, wet from the rain. “You’re all wet,” I murmur, trying not to overthink what I’m doing.

“I ran through the rain, and I brought you something,” he says, grabbing my hand in his and stopping my motions through his hair. There’s a desperation to his grip when he brings the back of my hand to his lips and gently kisses me. “I’ve been trying to think of anything to prove to you that we weren’t in town. I swear, Liv. We would never, ever have hurt you like that.” There’s something in his voice that catches as he mumbles against my flesh. Like this might be the last time he sees me here.

“Prove me wrong then,” I mutter.

A part of me believes my words. I want him to prove me wrong and show me that it wasn’t all a lie. That our love meant something. That the time we spent together was more than a passing phase for the four of us before it went up in smoke, and ashes remained.

I want the truth. No matter the cost. If it wasn’t them, then I want to know who was responsible. Besides Franco, of course. He was there. I know that much. I saw his face. Felt the hatred of his snarls and the knife at my throat before he slit it. But the other three? They wore masks to hide their identities, and I never questioned it. Franco called them by their names. They answered. Like they were Hux, JJ, and Mack. They didn’t speak until the end. They held us down as Franco inflicted the pain. I was in such a vulnerable position, on my knees and begging for my life; I never questioned that night or what I saw with my own two eyes.

I believed everything that happened. But what if my eyes were lying? What if things aren’t what they seem, and everything was a manipulation?

JJ digs into his pocket and pulls out his phone. “This is the best I could do for now, since it’s been so long since we left town. But every casino has to keep security footage for a certain amount of time. And Franco’s? He keeps them forever on a private server.” His phone illuminates his face as he taps on his screen, giving me a chance to look JJ over. Finally, he stops and takes a deep breath. “This video is time-stamped from the casino we were working at. You remember that, right?” His gaze whips to me with a need for me to understand, pleading with me to hear his side of things and not dismiss him.

“Franco set something new up in Vegas, right? Around that time?”

“Yes. Exactly.” He nods several times. “This is us. You can see the time stamp that night in the right-hand corner. It puts us at the casino the night you died. There’s no way we could have flown or driven home to be here in time.” He holds up the phone for me, displaying the three of them wandering through a crowded casino and taking in the patrons as they play the slots and card games. I tilt my head as the video continues, cutting to several hours later, where they’re still there doing the same. Well, until Huxley gets a phone call and abruptly leaves the screen.

“Why were you there that night?” I ask, flicking my eyes to him.