Page 100 of Masked in Deception
“Did you…” My voice cracks, and I must be a masochist for how much I have to know the answer to this. “Did you sleep with him?”
She’s still nonchalantly flipping her magazine pages, barely paying me any attention. “Hmm, I’m not sure. He had a mask. It could’ve been anyone. He said he was Michel, though, and ItrustMichel, so…”
God, I deserve that, and it hurts more because I know I do. I can’t stop the tears from escaping now. “I just,fuck, Margot.I know I deserve that, but please…”
“You’re being a little pathetic right now, Jack. Jesus. I didn’t sleep with him.” She rolls her eyes and stands up, stretching and drawing my eye to the sliver of skin she shows as her shirt rides up.
She’s lazily doing walking lunges across the room while I cry, and her apathy is so much worse than her anger. “I know I’m a piece of shit, Princess, but you don’t have to be this cold to me.”
This has exactly the effect I desired, and she rises and turns to me with fire in her eyes, crossing the room and shoving her finger into my chest as she raises her voice.Yes. Touch me, yell at me. Anything.
“Are you fucking kidding, Jack Carter? You ripped my heart out of my chest,again, and you’re sad about me beingcoldto you? You should be glad I didn’t kill you! You’ve been stalking me, not giving me an inch of space, suffocating me with your presence even after I flew across an ocean to get away from you. Now I’m anxiously awaiting my nephew’s arrival, and you still won’t let me out of your sight! You followed me to the bathroom!” Her chest is heaving now, and as perverse as it is, I’m not sure she’s ever looked more beautiful.
“I know you don’t believe me, but I was going to tell you. I promise. Before we went to Paris, I was going to explain myself. I wasn’t trying to fool you. The first night in the club, when I realized it was you, you still hated me. I thought you would always hate me, and I would have no other chance to have you in my life, so I took it. I’m sorry. You don’t have to believe me, but I promise I never meant to hurt you,” I cry, and she’s joined me, wiping the tears angrily from her face.
“Your promises don’t matter at all, Jack. You lied to me. You hurt me and took advantage of me. We were together, and youlied,” she screams. I open my mouth to try to find something to say when the last voice I want to hear right now pierces the tension in the air.
“What’s going on in here? Jack? What’s Margot talking about, the two of you were together?” Henry asks, placing the gift baskets he was carrying down onto a side table.
Nobody moves. I’m unwilling to break the silence, and I don’t even have anything to say if I did. The thing I always feared, the anxiety that kept me up at night, is about to crash over me like one last lethal wave. The only family I’ve ever had is about to cease to exist, and I’m the one to blame. The fact that it’s happening on Ledger’s son’s birthday is something I’ll always regret, and I doubt the child will ever hear the name Jack Carter.
Henry is objectively a genius, and it doesn’t take long at all for him to connect the dots. I see everything click into place behind his eyes, and I wish I wasn’t looking. I’ve never seen such a combination of hate and disgust.I don’t think I’ll be leaving this hospital intact.
“You were together?” Henry asks in a low whisper, stalking slowly toward me like a panther approaching unsuspecting prey. “I know too much about you, Jack Carter. So either you cheated on my baby sister…”
“I would never.” I squeak out.
“Or mybabysister was the woman who you came to me for advice onhow to dominate!”
I’ve never heard Henry raise his voice, and I’m shocked into silence. Margot’s face pales in my periphery as she realizes that neither of us is in control of this situation now. We’re both just along for the ride.
“You asked me, in detail, how toproperly punishmybaby sister.You told me and my brother, to our faces, that she was yournatural good girl!Did you know it was her? This is your chance to live. Did. You. Know?”
“Yes,” I choke out, and before I know it, he’s grabbed me by the neck and has me shoved against the wall on my tiptoes. Margot could probably end my life here if she wanted to, by clarifying that shedidn’tknow, but she stays silent.
I’m so focused on how Henry is holding me up with one hand and trying to breathe, that I never see the punch coming—heavy and right in my ribs. I crumple to the floor on a wheeze. I’m being pulled up, and I have a feeling the next one is coming for my face, and I deserve it. I see Margot over Henry’s shoulder, tears streaming down her face and a hand over her mouth as he pulls back.
“Henry, wait!” she cries, but she’s interrupted by Ledger bursting in.
“It’s a boy!” He’s sobbing, tears of happiness wetting his shirt. Everything that was happening in the room before he came in stops, and all of us shift our focus immediately to the new dad. We’re in one big group hug, Henry grabbing me around the waist and digging in a little extra on the side that he punched. Margot beams, and even eye contact with me doesn’t dim her smile.
“He came about an hour and a half ago. I’m sorry I didn’t come out sooner, but we were doing skin-to-skin time and taking pictures. He breastfed for the first time,which is fucking hot, by the way—”
He laughs as Henry interrupts him with a disgusted, “Jesus, brother.”
“Mom is in there now. Margot, do you want to go?”
She pulls her bottom lip between her teeth and looks at me, wondering if I’ll make it out alive without her here. I give her a subtle nod, and she turns to go. This is my mess to deal with, not hers.
Wincing, I take a couple of steps back as Henry and Ledger face me shoulder to shoulder.
Ledger notices and gives me a concerned look that hurts because I know it’s about to shift into something else. “Jackie, are you okay? What happened, man?”
Henry doesn’t beat around the bush. “Margot was Jack’s sub. He knew it was her the entire time. He’s done something to betray her and break her trust. She’s very upset.”
If I thought that hurting Margot and Henry, and losing their trust, was enough to break my heart…seeing my best friend, the man who’s always been closer to me than a brother, look at me with disappointment…God. I can’t live with this.
“You were fucking Margot? And you knew you were?” he asks, pain evident on his face, like he can’t believe I would do something like this. I can’t believe it, either.
