Page 153 of Take What You Want

“I get that. I texted him this morning.”

Jane perks up. “What did you say?”

“Just that I’m sorry and that I hoped that he would hear you out. And that when he’s ready, I’d like to talk to him, just the two of us.”

“What did he say?”

“He didn’t respond.” I didn’t expect him to, but I wanted him to know that I want to make this right.

“And how did it go with Arun? Does he know who leaked the photos?”

“Exactly who you suspected.”Kerra.

Jane’s face darkens as she says, “I knew it.” She picks at her nails. “I’m sure Arun has ideas of how to handle things.”

“He does.”

She flicks her eyes to mine. “And do they include throwing me under the bus to try to save face?”

I’m not going to lie to her. “He was considering it.”

“Look, you need to do what’s best for your career and if that means?—”

“It’s not an option.”

She bites her lip. “Nikolai…”

“It’s not,” I say sternly.

“But then you did all of this for nothing. You need music. You need to sing.”

“I need you more.” She opens her mouth to interject, but I continue, “My career is going to be fine. We’re going to weather this storm, I’m going to publicly apologize to you and Kerraand the fans who are disappointed in my actions. We’re going to keep it lowkey for a few months, and we’ll re-debut when my album drops. It should give the public enough time to move on to something else and when we reemerge months from now, it’ll show that this is the real deal.” Plus, as Arun pointed out, it doesn’t hurt that Jane is Walker’s sister. Hardcore fans knew about her already and they’re already voicing their excitement that the two of us are together.

I push her feet off my lap and pull her into my arms. She snuggles in immediately, tucking her head into the crook of my shoulder.

“I can’t live with myself if I’m responsible for taking away your career,” she murmurs sadly.

“You won’t. People have survived much worse press than this.” Sadly, cheating scandals are a dime a dozen. “We’re going to be okay, LJ. We’ve made it through worse and we’ve found our way back to each other. Nothing is going to change that.”

She looks up at me with those big green eyes of hers and they shine with so much trust, so much love. “Promise?”

I kiss her softly. “I promise.”

44

JANE

“Since I’m such a good friend, I’m going to pretend like you haven’t been ignoring my calls for the past few days and give you a pass because your ass cheeks are currently out for everyone to see online,” Hallie chides me the moment she answers the phone.

I chuckle through a groan. “I’m sorry, it’s been you know…quite an eventful seventy-two hours.”

“Mhmm, that’s putting it lightly. Have you seen the shit people are saying? I’ve had to set screen time limits for myself or else I’ll sit under posts all day telling people to fuck off for you.”

“You don’t need to waste your time doing that, but thank you. And no, I deactivated all my social media and have stayed far away from the internet.” I don’t need to see what people are saying about me. The reassurance I get from Nikolai and the reassurance I give myself is all that matters.

“That’s smart,” Hallie agrees. “How’s Nikolai doing?”

“He’s surprisingly calm about the whole thing.” His attitude toward the situation has helped keep my own feelings in check. We have each other at the end of the day and that’s whatmatters. “Although, the photos are how my brother found out about us so that hasn’t been the best.”

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