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“I took it to help you. I knew Sawyer was blackmailing you with something. I understood it the moment you started acting weird. Beating up Billie for no reason? Dating Sawyer? That’s not you. Setting her up? You would never do that.”
He looks away and out the window. “You were in danger, and I wanted you out of this shitty town. So the night you and him set Billie up, when you all went to bed and I helped Billie get home…I took the money from Volkov and half of Elliot’s scams. I put the bag at your house and under your mom’s bed.”
He hits the back of his head against the headrest. “I didn’t realize Sawyer would look for it at your place. He found it and probably left it there thinking you were keeping it for him. We caught him that same day, then we tortured him over a few weeks, and he threw you under the bus, wanted to make you look like the traitor so we would let him live. That’s what Elliot and I were coming to collect that day. That’s why I helped you escape. I wanted to give it to you, but I had no way of going back in to get it without Elliot knowing. So I just helped you out and…you were gone.”
“You didwhat?” Kay hisses, turning around. “You helped her leave?” She turns to Elliot. “Did you know that? And where thefuckis my money?”
“I didn’t know until we found the money at Jade’s. Ethan told me everything then.”
“You knew?” I gasp.
He eyes me but keeps answering Kay, solving one problem at a time.
“And chill, will you? Your money is at my house. I’ll give it back. I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to hurt my brother.”
“Please,” Ethan snorts. “He didn’t tell Kay because he wanted to hold it over my head.” He looks at me, his black eyes sucking the soul out of my body. “So I’d be a good boy and help him look for you, even though I knew you were safer away from here. So I wouldn’t talk to you when we brought you back and he could keep going with his life-long plan of making you his without me getting in the way.” He turns to Elliot. “Protecting me? It’s calledblackmail, asshole.”
I run my hands through my hair, grabbing my roots and pulling.
“You two are fucking insane,” Kay hisses.
“You watched her beat me up!” I shout. “You didn’t say anything!”
And then the truth comes out, breaking my heart.
“It was easier to keep you docile if you were scared,” Ethan admits in a tone that barely portrays regret. His eyes come back to me. “And as much as I hate myself for it, I wanted you close as much as Elliot did.”
“Motherfuckers.”
They both look at me, not saying anything. They know I’m right. They betrayed me. They have nothing to defend themselves with.
They manipulated me the whole time. They crushed my sanity and stole my heart. And now I’m exactly what they want: nothing without them.
“I hate you both,” I rasp.
Kay shakes her head, clearly disappointed in them. She checks her phone and looks at me with pity in her eyes before it’s replaced by her usual darkness.
“I don’t have time to deal with this shit. We have to get back on the road,” she tells me. “We’re wasting precious time.”
“You’re not laundering my money,” I tell her. “The moment we’re done here, I’m leaving.” I look at the two men I love. “For good this time.”
42
ELLIOT
Cute Girl - Diggy Graves
I walk into the bank, dressed in a suit that doesn’t even belong to me, and dragging my fissured heart with me.
Ethan and I are not good people. We could have lived and died keeping that fucking secret with us. But no, he had to bring his emotions into this, to let the guilt take over, and now Jade is back to square one, hating us.
Fucking asshole.
Maybe we’re both assholes. Maybe we should have told Kay we were the ones with the money the whole time.
Of course, it was painful watching her suffer from our lie. Of course, we fucking hated ourselves for it. Especially Ethan.
Me? It gave me something to blackmail him with, and it kept Jade scared, worried for her life, in need of protection. The entire thing worked perfectly for me.
