Page 79 of Pretty Broken Things

With her incapacitated, I leave. I’ve been staying at my old apartment, because the lease wasn’t up. Since Benji is pretty much the perfect man, he paid until the end of my lease. Poppy was sent to stay in Tracy’s old room, so Jesse knows where I am at all times. Too bad for him that he sent a train wreck of a human being to watch me.

This is it. My last chance to warn them. It might sound stupid given that Jesse made me come on to Sin a few days ago, but I still think he’s my best chance to make them hear me. He’ll protect her, even if he thinks I’m lying. Then I can leave here with a clear conscious.

I find him between his classes lurking in the shadows. He seems to prefer disappearing into the darkness rather than having people gawk at him. Stepping in front of him I slip into the role he expects. I hate it, but it’s a way of hiding. Bitchy Tessa can’t be hurt. She doesn’t care what they think.

“Figures I’d find you lurking in the shadows,” I say to him.

His face hardens, and I’m glad I’m this Tessa, not the real one. She has a need to be liked. “What do you want, Tessa?”

What do I want? I’d really like to not feel like I’m being split into two separate people. I also wish I could look into the mirror without wanting to smash it. And it would be pretty fucking awesome if I could sleep through the night without waking up screaming in a cold sweat. That’s not what he’s expecting of me though.

“I told you what I wanted back at the bar. You’ve done nothing to help me get Ford to talk to me.” Not that I expected him to, or that I’ve been trying to talk to him myself. I haven’t tried to talk to Ford since I realized he blocked my number.

“Why would I help you? You’re a toxic bitch, and he’s better off without you.”

I flinch. I can’t help but think a lot of people would be better off without me. Maybe it’s cruel to entertain Benji’s request that I think about our future. I can’t think these things right now. I need to be strong for just a while longer.

I scrub my hands down my face to try and get back on track. “I told you I could help you. I mean that. If I tell you what Jesse is doing now that he’s back, will that get you to listen to me?”

He crosses his arms, looking every bit the trained killer. “Start talking.”

“He thinks I’m helping him. I’m supposed to get you in a compromising position and have Raven catch us.”

He leans back and tries to appear unthreatening. I almost roll my eyes, because I fully plan on telling him everything I know. I’d come out with all of it right away if I thought they’d believe me and not potentially do the opposite of what I say out of distrust.

“Why would you do that?” he asks me.

Just like I thought, I’m not to be trusted, so they better question every thing I do. The thing is, I don’t trust them either. Not with this. The only person I’ve spilled the gory details to is Benji, because he’s also the only person on this planet I trust implicitly.

I guess an alternate truth will have to do. So I craft one he will believe. “Because I’m stupid. I hooked up with him after that weekend at the cabin.” I almost vomit saying that.

“I didn’t know there were cameras set up.” Actually, I was painfully aware there were cameras recording all of the vile things he and his friends did to me.

“He said if I didn’t help he’d put it up on the internet.” I have to blink to keep the tears from spilling, because he never threatened to put those tapes on the internet. He just did it. There are fetish sites where perverts get their rocks off to all sorts of illegal and immoral things.

Sin frowns. “You say you care about Ford, but you were willing to drag his name through the mud to save yourself from embarrassment?”

Right, because of course IgaveJesse those pictures and video. Not once does it occur to them that they were taken from me, or why I might have had them in the first place. I don’t fight it. Why continue to battle against an image people are hell-bent on believing?

“I’m not as strong as you,” I say looking down. That part is true. I know they’ve all survived horrors, but I don’t know if I’ll make it through this. I’m not sure I want to.

“You had friends. You could have turned to any of them and told them what was going on. They would have had your back.”

I almost laugh, except there’s not a damn thing funny about this. “Really? Not a single one of them has bothered to check in on me. Ford said he loved me, yet he walked away without looking back.”

He shakes his head. “It seems to me he’s done nothing but look for you.”

I shrug. “Maybe.” This is why I don’t tell them the truth. They wouldn’t believe it.

“I screwed up, I know that.” He’s never going to let me forget breaking up with him to protect him.

“I’m going to try and fix it though.” I’m going to do for them what none of them would do for me. I’m going to risk everything to keep them safe, and then I’m done with them forever.

“I’m still listening,” he says. That’s all I need. Once he hears the story he’ll protect Raven whether he believes me or not.

“I told Jess that his plan won’t work. Raven won’t believe you cheated on her, no more than you believed she was seeing Ford on the side.”

I can see he’s still skeptical. “If there’s no danger of us falling for his shit, what are you warning me about?”

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