Cursed [Jai Brooks]

Version Of Events- Chapter 38

“Did you just say Jai?” he gasps, a gloomy twinkle of hurt flashes across his eyes and then quickly disappears and is replaced with something else “Did you fuck him?” he hisses catching me off guard

“What?” I can’t help but be hurt by his accusation despite the accuracy. The look in his eyes is disheartening and vexatious, an array of mixed emotions. “N-no I didn’t fuck him” I run my hands through my hair in frustration.

“Are you in love with him?” his voice tremulous, his breath thick with worry. He starts fiddling with the silver band on his middle finger, his question making me feel queasy. How do I answer? I can’t tell him that I love Jai without telling him about us, I can’t tell him about how I feel for Jai regardless, it’ll crush him, pardon the pun. I’ve taken more time to conjure an appropriate answer than I realised, Luke’s expression wavering from indignant to impair.

“When I’m with you, I’m not in love with him” I answer somewhat honestly. To some degree my answer is true given that when in the presence of Luke my thoughts are clouded only by my love for him and my need to be with him, so the dull ache of missing Jai is nullified but when alone my heart explodes with overwhelming love for him.

“But when you’re alone, or anywhere but with me, you are?” he tries to hold an angry tone but fails as his voice cracks and unwarranted tears spill from his eyes. I reach my hand to his cheek but he hits it away with such force I yelp in pain “don’t fucking touch me, don’t you dare” he hisses, his tone shaking me to my core, he takes a deep breath and wipes the tears from his cheeks, I sit on the floor in front of him, afraid to move, he glares down at me, his eyes burning into mine “did you fall in love with him before or after you were both kidnapped?”

“I-I” I stutter unsure of how to answer, did I love him without my humanity? Did I love him before all of this madness? 

“Or were you even kidnapped?” he asks, realisation suddenly hitting him, I take a sharp intake of breath as he begins to piece together the puzzle of this mess.

“Yes I was kidnapped, how could you ask such a thing?” I scream outraged by his accusation despite how right he is, I have to hide the truth from him no matter what, he can never be aware of what Jai and I did in those few months that we disappeared, it'll be both a danger to him and to us. I retrace our story and revise whether it sounds convincing, I was so sure at the time but now that I’m being questioned I feel all kinds of uncertainty.

“He was there, the night of the fire” he whispers as if building together some story “it was him, wasn’t it?” he asks as if he already knows “oh my god, he set the fire” his head falls into his hands and he begins to sob violently, his jerking movements shaking the chair

I try to reach up to touch him but he pushes me away “Luke you’ve got this all wrong, Jai had nothing to do with it, it was Trunken” I shout over the volume of his voice. I have to convince him I have to.

“Don’t lie to me” his voice echoes off of the alcohol stained walls, the remainder of Luke’s fit of anger. “I know what he did, I know now, he did this” his voice returns to whispers, which honestly frightens me more.

“Luke, whatever you think you can’t tell anyone” I place my hands on his knees and force him to look at me “I don’t know exactly what you think you’ve figured out but believe me that any truth withheld was only to protect you, it was to protect us” I rush my words desperate to reassure him, I love him, I need him to believe me.

“Tell me everything, now” he demands, and I know that I have to tell him some version of the truth and I have to pray he believes it because my life depends on it.

I start from the beginning, the taunting notes from Jai leading to my sister’s death and the ‘accident’ in Disneyland, I explain the events in the form of a story, the way Jai would’ve told them. Jai wrote notes to arouse me, he wanted to excite me and he did just that, Luke’s face shattered as I told him, then my sister, he fucked my sister to make me jealous, to make me realise how much I wanted him and it worked. Then, my sister’s death, suicide seemed the only optional cause of death that would convince him. Disney land I explained as a freak accident, Jai’s whereabouts of that day are none of our concern, he was only initially there to taunt me and to out us to him. Then I moved on to the night of the fire, the night that changed everything, after Luke and I made love Jai text me, he told me that he loved me, which of course is a complete lie, then I told him that I text Jai back telling him that I want nothing to do with him and then he came to find me, and by the time that Jai got here I had been grabbed by Trunken, Jai tried to push him off but he resisted, so he did the only thing he deemed fit, he set a fire, trapping both Trunken and I inside. Jai’s plans initial plans were to get me out and if he had time to go back for Luke, but by the time Jai had got me out it was too late, the apartment crumbled into masses of rock crushing Luke beneath it. My version of events sounded semi believable and given that Luke’s memory wasn’t fully intact I had the opportunity to alter the story and I could only pray that he believed me.

For now he decides to believe me, not entirely convinced by my deceit, I can tell he’s still reeling from my earlier reveal about my love for Jai although I didn’t admit it in so many words. “Will you stay with me tonight?” he asks, my heart warms at his request and I can’t help the childish grin that quickly covers my face

“Of course” I whisper and his smile soon mirrors mine. He wheels down the hall of the small apartment and through a door into a bedroom which I presume to be his. I help him out of his chair and pull back the covers of the large king sized bed, he sits down and swivels his legs up onto the bed and under the covers. He peels off his t-shirt making my stomach clench with lust, I want him but I can’t be selfish with him.

“There’s a t-shirt in the draw if you want one” he nods towards a chest of drawers opposite the bed, I follow his directions and open the first draw, I pull out a plain burgundy t-shirt and shut the drawer. My eye catches on something on top of the chest of drawers, a mirror and dotted around it are several pictures, pictures of me and him, and a few of him, his mom, Beau and Jai, the all look so happy, and I can’t help but wonder how this all happened. I take a deep breath and walk towards the bed, aware of Luke’s steady gaze on me I peel my jeans down my legs, before I pull the jumper up and over my shoulders and replace it with his t-shirt, the whole time his eyes watching me. I sit on the edge of the bed and fold my clothes in a neat pile on the bedside table and peel back the covers and wriggle in, I edge closer to Luke begging for this tension to disperse but he moves away from me. Is this how it’ll be from now on?

“Please” I beg, I need his touch, I need to be in his arms.

“Y-You know I, I can’t” he says awkwardly, his cheeks flaming with embarrassment, oh he thinks I wanted sex. I do but right now all I want is to be loved by him.

“I just want to be in your arms” I admit, he visibly relaxes and shuffles closer to me; I turn around so that my back is against his front and he wraps his arms around me. Eventually I drift into a sweet escape.

This is only a filler chapter for a chapter that'll be posted tomorrow. Please continue to support this book it really means the world to me, all of your comments make me smile so much and these next two chapters are a sorry for the last slow update. What do you think will happen now that Luke is slowly trying to piece things together? Will Hope's lies catch up with her? Will Jai make a return? Let me know what you think in the comments below. As always I will be dedicating the chapter to one of you readers so get commenting and voting, until tomorrow.