Page 75 of Fighting the Odds

“Let me up and I’ll tell you. I swear if I had known the truth, I never would have treated Sierra that way.”

“Wesley?” Sierra’s soft voice speaks up.

Chapter 35

Wesley

Her uncle!

He owns the club she dances at.

How could he let her dance there?

Anger builds in me, but fuck. What place do I have to say anything? I’ve treated her like trash, even got every fucking person at school in on bullying her.

“Why are you here? Wasn’t the video enough? What else is there left to do to me?” Sierra asks, where she sits surrounded by the guys.

“Please, just let me explain. That's all I ask. There’s something you need to know,” I beg. I’ll grovel at her feet if it’s what it takes to get her to listen to me.

“Let him up, Rico. I’ll listen to what he has to say. Then he can go and never talk to me again.” Her words are cold, so unlike the warm heart I knew her to have. I did this to her. I made her this way.

The pressure that’s on my back suddenly vanishes and I’m able to slowly stand. I lift my hand and run it through my hair, pushing the longer strands out of my face, and look at the beauty before me.

Once upon a time, I was going to ask her to be my girl. Then that night happened. That stupid fucking night that I wish I could go back to now and protect her, instead of leaving her to go through all the vile things my father did to her.

“Go ahead, boy, before I rip you to shreds,” Rico says from behind me.

I step over toward where Sierra sits on the couch, but Colton quickly moves from behind it, blocking my path.

“That’s close enough!” he barks at me.

“Fine. First Sierra, I am so fucking sorry. That night, at the party in my house, was supposed to be the best night of my life. I was, I am, so in love with you. I was going to ask you to be my girlfriend, then you disappeared. When I went looking for you, I found you in my dad’s office,”—Fuck, I hate calling him that—“and I saw the two of you together. You know—”

“No, I don’t know. What were we doing? Because I don’t remember the majority of that night. Something you would know if you had ever talked to me or listened to what I had to say.” Her voice rises as she stands from the couch and storms over to me, hitting me in the chest with her fist.

“It looked like you were having sex.” Her hand goes to her mouth as she lets out a gasp. Cyrus steps over to her, wrapping his arm around her and whispers something in her ear. “I know now you weren’t. You were being raped.”

Fuck, I wish I could be the person to console her, to be holding her in my arms, but I lost that chance.

“He’s the one. Your father. In the video?” she asks, her lips trembling.

“Yeah. He is. I’m so fucking sorry. I found a flash drive in his office and saw your name on it. Savannah was at my house and noticed it. She took it and made a copy. I didn’t know what was on it. I promise it wasn’t me who sent it out. I just wished I had watched it earlier. If I’d done that, I could have stopped it from ever being leaked.”

“So your scumbag father drugged my niece and raped her? And you saw it and did nothing?” Rico steps up to me, towering over me.

“I didn’t know she was drugged at the time. All I saw was my dad and my best friend, the girl I loved, having sex. My family was ruined, and I was pissed and I took it out on Sierra. For that, I will forever be sorry. It was part of some game. He either recorded it and sent copies to his friends or it was a live feed. Maybe both, I’m not sure.” I slip my hand into my front pocket and pull the flash drive out, handing it to Sierra.

Rico reaches out, snatching it from my hand before she can take it.

“She doesn’t need to see it. What she’s seen already is enough.” His deep timber voice fills the room.

“But I need to see it.”

“No, you don’t, sweetheart. It’s in the past, but we will make him pay for what he did to you. What he put you through. I promise on my soul he will suffer,” her uncle tells her.

“Okay, Wesley, you brought the flash drive. You can go.” She turns away from me and walks back over to the couch, sitting down between Zan and Brax. I don’t miss how each of them takes one of her hands in theirs.

Are they together? Like all three of them? And this Cyrus guy? He seems pretty chummy with her.

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