Page 83 of Roots of the Wicked

Chapter Thirty-Four

Jax

Lying flat on my back, I stared into the wide-open nothingness above me, my mind, a mine field of exploding thoughts. “Fuck!” I shouted into the darkness of my bedroom. Chase’s pleas echoed inside my head. What if someone had set him up? The virus would destroy all evidence of it.

We’d been through so much together in such a short time that he had managed to earn my trust, and I had bared my deepest sorrows to him.

I sprang up, snapping on my lamp.

“The drone,” I whispered to myself.

A few days ago, TK had sent me snapshots of the drone ,captured from a CCTV camera, when it was being flown back into the city. We attempted to identify the drone, but the images had been so blurred, it had taken a while for them to be sanitized.

Less than thirty minutes after I had thought to give Chase the benefit of the doubt, my heart was broken all over again. The letters flashed across my screen in big fancy red letters, the diamond shaped logo with the letters revealing the name of the owner. Those letters formed words I had seen a number of times—Swift Impressions.

The drone belonged to Chase’s company. I knew that Swift Capital had several imprint companies that produced products sold on the market. Swift Impressions, was one of those companies that happened to be in the same building as, Swift Capital.

The doubt I’d had about Chase being set up, was doused in gas, and instead of a match, I imagined myself using a flamethrower to obliterate it.

I was unable to reach my father to tell him how bad I had fucked up, trusting Chase. The only time my father didn’t answer my call was when he was out of the country. He would also record his voice mail message in French for me when he would be unreachable.

When I turned on the television, things just kept getting better. Every channel I flipped to had my face plastered on the screen. They had identified me as the woman draped around Chase’s waist. My efforts to stop this shit hadn’t worked. I had officially become a billionaire’s play toy, and every eye wanting to have a look, could now see me.

I made no attempt to stop the flow of my tears after the surge of raw emotions had set them free. Being filmed during a private moment, with the possibility of being exposed without my consent, stirred painful childhood memories that gave me a headache.

My nerves had gone up in flames, and I was unable to contain the toxic level of anxiety flowing through my jittery body. Snapping back the covers, I ran to my small living room bar, searching for the liquid courage I needed to get me through the night.

After I had downed the third drink, my doorbell sounded. I was such a mess, I staggered to the door, ready to use the liquor bottle in my hand, to beat Chase upside his head. However, my blurred vision made out TK standing on the other side of the door.

When I let him in, he took one look at me, and pulled me in for a strong hug that I desperately needed. He took the bottle of vodka from my hand and sat it on the table before closing and locking my door. Although I had never officially given him the address to my main residence, it didn’t surprise me that he knew where I lived. He didn’t taunt me with, I-told-you-so’s. Instead, he walked me to my couch, and sat holding me as I cried into his shoulder.

“You’re going to be okay. This will blow over in no time.” His reassurances went on until I drifted off to sleep.

***

A day later.

“I’m downstairs. Get your ass up!”

It was a text from Lena. She had been calling nonstop, after I stopped answering my phone a few days ago. I’d shared with her that I was dating someone, but I hadn’t given any details about who it was that I was dating. She knew my dating situation well, so she hadn’t ask after how things were going, assuming it wouldn’t last past a week.

After I buzzed her up, I left my door cracked so she could step inside. Otherwise, she would beat the door down and disturb my neighbors. I sat on the couch with my feet tucked under me and waited, my energy depleted. It appeared something in nature knew that I needed the few people in my life I counted on. Lena showing up a day after TK had spent the night was the closest they had come to meeting each other.

She was going to let me have it for not answering my phone and making her worry if the seething voice mails and text messages she left me were a sign. She would also lend me her ear and a sturdy shoulder to lean on.

A burst of positive energy course through me at the sound of her approach. Using the tip of her finger, she pushed my door the rest of the way open. She looked the door up and down like it had offended her. I felt like shit, but the sight of her made me crack a smile. She stood in place, hand on her hip, eyes zeroed in on me.

It was eight in the morning and her hair was styled in a perfect shoulder-length bob with thick bangs. Her make-up was painted flawlessly over her creamy mocha skin. She wore a blue silk robe-dress that was stylishly draped over her body with black ankle kissing boots.

She did a once over the interior of my apartment before she strutted in, hand fixed on her small hip, eyes back on me. She stopped before my crumpled body on the couch. Glaring down on me, she wiggled only her manicured nails in a gesture for me to give up whatever drama I was holding back.

“Spill it and don’t leave anything out,” she said before dropping onto the couch next to me.

She took my hand, interlocking her fingers with mine as I struggled to gather my words.

“Tongue can’t do this to a person. That man must have put some super dick on you. You don’t answer your phone. You got my damn blood pressure up worrying about you. Look at your hair, and this ratty ass robe. Jesus Jax. You’re my fucking inspiration, my prime example for what I want to end up resembling when my transition is complete.”

I didn’t need the mirror to tell me I looked like shit, I felt it. Her calling me out for it only made me feel more of the impact Chase’s betrayal had left.

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