Page 145 of Take What You Want

“And there were some of you two that looked like they were outside of a hotel. More innocent than the others,” Hayden adds.

“There’s nothing fucking innocent about this,” Walker quips. “Now answer my question. How long have you been fucking Jane?”

I hang my head and my lip thumps with its own heartbeat from Walker’s punch. “It’s not like that, man.”

Walker laughs half-heartedly. “Are you serious? Then what’s it like? Because it looks to me that you’ve gone behind my back, lied to my face, and hooked up with my sister in a public place and put her in a position where she’s exposed to the world. You think I don’t know how you are with women? You think I’m going to be cool if you sleep with her, then dump her when you get bored? I know how you operate.”

“She’s different.”

He scoffs and his immediate dismissal of me sets my teeth on edge.

“She is. This is just a hook-up. When I say it’s not like that, I mean…it’s complicated.”

Walker holds his hands out. “I have all fucking day.”

Hayden shifts, face withdrawn, while Reid leans against the wall with his arms crossed, watching intently.

I suck in a breath. “First off, I just want to preface that we did want to tell you. It’s eaten us both up over the years.”

“Years?” Walker chokes, and I cringe.

“We got together toward the end of senior year.” His eyes practically bulge out of his head. “We broke up before we all moved to LA so I promise you, I never cheated on her. We got reconnected when I asked her to look over my contract for me.”

I can see the gears turning behind his glare. “So you two have been together this entire time she’s been out in LA? While she’s been living with you?” He shakes his head. “I fucking trusted you.”

“Like I said, it’s complicated. And I promise, I will sit down and explain it all to you. But right now”—my chest clenches painfully—“if what you said is true about these photos, I need to go find Jane.”

Walker blocks my way, pain marring his face. “I want you to explain it to me now.”

How do I even begin to unravel nine years of history to him when I’m not even sure he wants to listen?

I settle for the bottom line, the need to find Jane reverberating through my bones. “I love her. She’s it for me.”

My declaration seems to surprise Hayden, but it does nothing to appease Walker. If anything, his shoulders hitch closer to his ears and he balls his hands into fists.

“How many?” His voice is pure gravel.

“What?”

His eyes melt holes in my skin as he seethes. “How many of our songs are about my sister?” He steps forward menacingly. “How many of our fucking songs did you write with me, side by side in studio, knowing that they were about her while you kept that from me?”

My silence only seems to anger him more.

“Huh?” He shakes my shoulders. “Tell me!”

“All of them,” I whisper, the words so faint they barely make it into the air but they ring loud and clear for him.

He drops his hands to his sides and stumbles back. His anger seems to give way to hurt and he looks at me as if I’m a stranger.

“How could you do that?” he murmurs, shaking his head in disbelief. “How could you not tell me?”

“I wanted to. We both did?—”

He cuts me off with a slice of his hand through the air. “Don’t speak for her. I don’t want to hear you talk on behalf of the both of you.”

I raise my hands in surrender. “I’m sorry. I really, truly am. I never wanted you to find out like this.”

“You mean, you didn’t want me to find out at all?”

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