“You’ve messed with my daughter, my nephew, and my niece. You’re lucky you’re still breathing free air at the moment. Leave now or I will not hesitate to escalate the situation you find yourself in.”
Jace grabs a nearby vase and chunks it at an opposite wall, shattering the vase and putting a hole in the wall. “You can’t do this to me! You know what you are Cora?”
Jackson’s grip on me tightens trying to shield me from Jace’s lashing, but I stand and take it.
“You’re a fucking bitch, Cora. A tease. A cunt.”
“ENOUGH!” Daddy barks out.
This time when Jax pulls me tighter to him, he wraps his body in front of me, as if protecting me from the sight that continues to unfold before me.
“Jace, I suggest you leave, or I will have you removed.”
“I see how it is, Jax attacked me! I could press charges against him!”
“And then we would press charges against you and the unwanted sexual advances you forced on Emma.” Uncle Trey sounds feral.
“She wanted it! She was practically begging for it! She’s just like her sister.”
“I did not, you son of a bitch! I told you to stop! I begged you to stop, repeatedly! You covered my mouth to stifle my screams! You didn’t listen!”
Emma is in tears and I can't believe what I’m hearing. When she told me about what Jace did to her, she made it sound...why didn’t she press charges earlier? Why did they keep this from us? And sister? Am I the only one that heard that part?
“Fine.” Jace puts his hands up in surrender and defeatedly heads to the door, stopping just short of the threshold. “You wanna know something, Cora?”
I peak my head around Jackson. There is nothing he can say to me that could justify his behavior tonight or ever for that matter. “No.”
“It doesn’t matter how bad you want your sweet Jax. Nothing will ever happen between you two until you’re twenty.”
Jace laughs as if he’s won and confusion drapes down over me. Sister? Twenty? Little secrets coming to light.
“Shut up Jace.” Jax growls out in a tone to match our fathers. Wolves, bears, lions, have nothing on the three men standing in this room. Soon I realize that I’ve begun to inch away from Jackson. Away from his protection.
“Yea. Your parents made him agree to it.”
No. I search for air as the walls around me close in. NO.
“I said, enough!”
“So joke’s on you. That kiss you’ve been holding out for, not gonna happen.”
I’m further away from Jackson as he lunges for Jace. If Jace were lying, Jax wouldn’t be so intent on silencing him.
“You fucking bastard!”
“And the sweet little image you have of you two being each other’s first...imagine the amount of pussy he’ll have by the time you’re twenty. Random fucking hookups, drunk one-night stands, experimental, he’s not saving himself for you, what man in his right mind would. You’re nothing.”
This can't be right. Jax reaches out for me, but I turn on him, ripping my arm from his grasp.
“Don’t fucking touch me!”
Jax stands frozen in his tracks. Watching helplessly as I move closer to Jace. Sure he might be uncouth and a womanizer, but right now he seems like the only person in the whole fucking room who hasn’t lied to me. Too much of what he’s said makes sense and I realize that I can no longer rely on my parents or even Jax to take care of me. It was up to me moving forward.
With a quick right hook I connect with Jace’s nose. A shattering snap is heard and an electric bolt of pain surges through my arm.
“You bitch!” Jace screams in agony clutching his nose.
“Get the fuck out of my house!”
The instant Jace is out of view I turn about-face, Jackson, my parents, Aunt Liv, Uncle Trey, all seem to be waiting for my next move. My head is swimming with Jace’s remarks, my hand shaking in pain, I can feel my pulse in my cheek and the twitch in my eye seems to keep time with my heartbeat.
“Is he lying?”
The room is eerily quiet.
“Is nothing allowed to happen between Jax and me until I’m twenty?”
Rapidly, I blink to hold back my tears. Again, more silence as I stare at them begging for just one of them to say something.
“Tell me he’s lying!” My voice comes out in a wailing of pain.
“Please tell me he’s lying! There’s no way my family would willingly do this to me!”
I cock my head in Jackson’s direction, my eyes pleading with him to tell me it’s all a lie, but he doesn’t. He stands there looking as heartbroken as I feel, and my tears begin to pour out of me.
“Cora.” Mom’s voice is quiet and smooth, just like when I was little, and she was shooing my nightmares away. Except there’s no waking up from this nightmare. “We thought this was what was best for both of you.”
Jax just stands there, one step forward, one step back. He was the one who was supposed to save me. Supposed to protect me. He promised me this morning he’d never hurt me. “When the fuck did you know?”
He tries to hold my gaze but can't. Weak man.
“Last year.”
“Specifically when?” I snarl out.
“The night I took you out for breakfast and we ran into Ms. Trousseau.”
I’m going to be sick. “A year! You’ve known for a fucking year, and you never said shit about it! Instead you pursued me. You made me feel things for you. That day in the tree house, or better yet, last night, or even an hour ago in my bedroom! All times you lead me to believe there was something more. All times you lead me on.”
“Cora—”
“No! Don’t fucking talk to me. I hate all of you! Happy Thanks-fucking-giving!”
I can't stand to be in the same room as any of them. I feel betrayed. Lost. Alone. And I don’t know if I will ever be able to forgive any of them. Ever.
Chapter Forty
The look shared between Mom and Aunt P speaks volumes. Emma’s reactions to Jace sitting next to her, is even louder. I may not be that involved in Emma’s life, but even I know she has that dance nailed down. She dances all over the house, and I pay attention.
With everyone seemingly distracted, I make my way up the stairs to listen outside Cora’s door. Something’s going on between Emma and Jace, but I can’t put my finger on it. How does she go from ogling him one minute, to shuddering in fear the next?
Shit, Cora’s turned on music. Damn Emma, she just made this a little harder. However, I’ve listened to my fair share of private conversations between her and Becca to know that even when Em’s trying to be quiet, she’s still loud.
“The reason he’s not allowed over anymore is because mom caught him groping me.”
I bite my knuckle against the urge to scream. My sister. Of all people, he goes after my baby sister. That motherfucker just signed his own death wish.
I was looking for a reason to kill him, and here it is, delivered to me on a nice shiny platter.
I rocket down the stairs, my chest leading the way while my feet struggle to keep up.
“You fucking piece of shit!”
Jace takes one look at me and he knows.
Mom and Presley move the boys outside just in time for me to tackle Jace, bringing a lamp down with me.
“I was looking for a reason to murder you, and thanks to Emma, now I have it!
Jace laughs as I get punch after punch in. A true psychopath. No remorse for his actions, only looking to stir the pot instead of defending himself.
I half expected Robert and Dad to pull us apart, but they don’t. I know they don’t give two shits about Jace.
“Jackson! Stop!”
Fuck. I didn’t want Cora to see this, but I’m locked in battle and can't stop myself.
“Jackson!”
Tears. Sobs. Someone is crying. Emma. It’s got to be Emma.
I’m too focused on taking my rage out on Jace.
There’s blood on my fist,
but I’m not sure whose it is. My fists are raw. Each blow agonizing, but I refuse to let up until I feel a second set of hands on me. Small and soft, grabbing at my forearm each time I pull it back. Cora. I stop immediately only to see Jace go straight for her face.
It was no accident. His punch was purely intentional. I saw it in his eyes just before he connected. I didn’t have time to go back after him. Cora needed me. She needed to know safety, to feel protected.
Moving in between Cora and Jace, I splay my legs, cupping her face in my hands, kissing the bruise that is already starting to form and quickly wiping her tears. He doesn’t get to see her cry. He doesn’t get to see her at her weakest. She’s my strong Buttercup.
I pull her into me. Shielding her away from anything he might say or do, but then she surprises me and does the most powerful thing she can do; she ruins him with help from Presley.
His blood rises to boiling and he begins his attack on Emma, and it’s worse than I could have imagined. Despite Dad’s threat, Emma will press charges against Jace even if I’m the one that has to talk her into it. He does not get to walk away clean from this.
Thankfully Dad and Uncle Robert have her surrounded the second he takes a step in her direction and Jace seems to give up.
He heads towards the door, and then slowly turns and opens his big mouth, spilling the truth to Cora. Everything I told him about our situation comes out like word vomit, and he’s all too pleased with himself.
Our parents’ plans, my agreeing to the arrangement, twenty.
I’m so focused on him that I don’t realize she’s slipped away from me until it’s too late. She’s visibly shaking, whether it’s from the adrenaline of the afternoon or from anger, I’m not sure. I try to bring her back to me, try to comfort her, but her words are filled with venom and disgust. Almost pure hatred.
“Don’t fucking touch me!”
Instead she walks over to Jace, and with one fluid motion, throws a punch that easily breaks his nose.
I’m so proud of her, and yet terrified of what’s to come.
She looks at us demanding answers. Answers that she knows will only hurt more. The truth does not set you free. The truth is ugly, and wrong and heartbreaking.
She is completely broken and there is nothing I can do or say to fix this right now.
I know the pain that she’s going through. It’s the same pain of betrayal I felt a year ago. I promised to always be honest with her. I failed and now she knew the truth. There were no more secrets.
I want to explain it and comfort her, but as I step forward and say her name, she immediately stops me.
“No!”
It wasn’t a plea. It wasn’t a request. It was a hard and firm command, and I was going to follow that command. She deserved that.
She walked through the same door Jace had just stepped through and I knew she was heading down to the studio. It’s where she always went. It didn’t matter what she was dealing with, or how she felt, that studio was her sanctuary.
“It’s all my fault.” Emma’s pained sobs catch me off guard. How could she possibly think this was her fault.
“It’s not your fault honey. I should have told Cora that Jace wasn’t allowed to come.”
“No. It’s my fault. Trey and I should have told you guys sooner about Jace.”
“It’s no one’s fault but mine.” Robert’s eyes land on me as he shakes his head. “I’m sorry Jackson, but I shouldn’t have given in to you. We should have stayed away. You and Cora should have grown up separate from one another.”
“Robert, don’t be daft. If it’s anyone’s fault, its mine. I should have never let Liv talk me into building the tree house in the first place. I’m sorry Jackson, but it only helped keep you two close.”
“No.” I whisper, “It’s my fault. I pursued her even after I knew the rules. I lead her on. I wanted more and didn’t care about your reasonings. Despite what you think, Cora was mine, age wasn’t going to matter when it came to us.”
“We should have told her. It was only a matter of time before she found out.”
* * *
My family was right. I was evil incarnate.
And as I looked down on the fallen rubble from my perch, I was angry at each and every one of them. Jace had once been mine. My first kiss. My first fuck. Things were great until the day he tried something with Emma and basically attacked her. Was I not good enough? I had brought that on my sister. She was sweet and pure, whereas I danced in the flames and laughed at danger.
My whole life I’d felt broken. Like I was missing the switch between right and wrong, good and evil, fear and flight, but Jace made me feel as if that little switch wasn’t important. I got lost in him and as he would ram me from behind over a counter, or drive into me against a wall, I felt complete, but with him gone, I was once again broken. I was an addict. Cora and Emma had stolen my drug. Stolen my Jace.
I knew all along what Jace wanted with Cora, and I didn’t care. I was helpless. A lost soul hell bent on leaving a path of destruction.
I snuck out the back door as he was leaving out the front. Waiting for him. Ready for him. But he brushed me aside as if I were nothing to him anymore.
I didn’t expect anything serious.
I wasn’t like those two in there, holding out for love, and Mr. Right.
I was broken, and would be until I no doubted, left this planet at an early age.
* * *
After helping to clean up the mess I made, I make my way down to the studio and turn the doorknob. Locked. Of course she would choose now to start locking the door. I knock hard against the black steel door. “Cora. Please open up.” The volume on the music increases. “Cora. Open up.” Still the volume climbs. “Cora! Open the damn door!”
The door forcefully swings open and comes close to hitting me in the face. Something I’m sure she intended to do.
“What the fuck do you want! There is absolutely nothing you can say to me that would justify keeping me in the dark. It’s not just your life, Jax. You were playing with my life as well. My feelings. My emotions. Everything was real. I fell for you and you betrayed me.”
“Cora, please just listen to me.”
“What were you going to do, Jackson? String me along until you got bored with me? Till you realized I wasn’t worth the wait and then leave for someone else. Someone not considered jailbait.
“You know, I kind of expected this from my parents, and slightly even yours, but from you?”
“Cora, I’m sorry. I fucked up and I’m so sorry. You have to believe I never wanted to hurt you.”
“You know that would be a lot easier to believe if you hadn’t practically destroyed me a couple of years ago.”
“Please Cora.”
I grip her arm as she paces by me for the twentieth time. Stopping her. This time she doesn’t pull back from me but drops her head and cries. I have to get her to see how much she means to me. How much I care about her. How much I love her. And that’s when I commit to either making the stupidest move of my life or the smartest.
I cup her face in my hands, thumbs resting just in front of her ears, my fingers gripping the back of her neck and bring her eyes up to meet mine. She’s crying uncontrollably. “Please Cora, open your eyes. Let me see them.”
She squints harder and shakes her head no.
“I love you Cora Ann. I always have and always will. I know you’re pissed at me, but I’m not going anywhere. I’m right here, just look at me, I’m right here.”
I bring my lips down to meet hers and she throws her arms around my neck, pulling me closer, her mouth working feverishly against mine. In a hungry manner as she pushes her tongue past my lips and begins to explore my mouth. My tongue strokes against hers, before she changes the angle of our kiss, I follow suite. Never breaking, never separating. She pulls me down harder, arms wrapped tighter, hands searching, grabbing, pulling. It’s raw and passionate, hungry and wild, stealing air from each other. I shift one hand to th
e back of her neck, holding her in place while the other wraps tighter around her waist, pressing her against me. Her tears never stop, but only seem to increase in size and intensity the longer we’re connected. She hangs on to me like this is the last time we will ever touch and it’s utterly heartbreaking.
As I pull away from her, both of us gasping for air, her tears fall harder and she refuses to open her eyes, standing there just for a moment, remembering. It’s perfect and raw, but so, so wrong. I wanted to kiss her out of love, not in desperation. I cup her face once again, but nothing I can do can stop her shattering. Like a crystal vase with a fissure crack, shards of glass pool at my feet until she is nothing.
When she does finally open her eyes, they are ice cold and hollow: dark pools of anger and hatred, all her pain directed at me. And in that second I know I’ve lost her.
I don’t need the sharp sting of her hand to my face, or the feel of her delicate hands pushing hard against my chest as she shoves me out the door, to know she’s gone. I felt it in her kiss, as she struggled to hang on to the good. It was a knife to the heart.
“Don’t ever come near me again!”
The door slams shut and locks immediately. The music is turned up to an ungodly level, and no amount of me beating on the door makes it budge. This is it. The end.
I stay outside the studio door for hours before Robert comes to take me inside.
How did I let this happen?
I am one hundred percent responsible for today.
“It’s my fault she’s gone.”
“You’re giving yourself too much credit. We all messed up.”
“She’ll never forgive me.”
“Yes she will. It might take a couple of years, but she will.
“Gram always told you that she belongs to you, and you to her. She was a smart lady. You’ve got to have faith in the bigger picture son. Just give it time.”
Chapter Forty-One
Jackson just gave me my first kiss and I’m sitting in a corner, crying my eyes out. Definitely not how I ever imagined it to be.
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