“Why did you go to him?” I know I sound like a dick, but the question rips itself out of me before I can stop it. “Why confide in him and not the rest of us, especially when he’s been such a fucking wreck?” Rage and hurt build inside me, looking for an outlet, and even though I’ve spent weeks feeling bad for him and wanting my friend back, now I just want to kick his ass.
“It’s not that.” She rubs her temple like this is a complicated math question, but it’s not complicated. It’s simple.
“It sounds like that,” Parker says. “Sounds like he fucked up and chased you away and still ended up with the golden seat.”
My anger builds inside me. I’m not usually like this. I’m calm and measured. I’m the one who found her when the rest of these assholes were about to give up and die. How could she letSoren in first? I’m not talking about this damn apartment. It’s a metaphor for her entire life, and he doesn’t deserve a place in it.
“There’s no way,” Orion says. “There’s no goddamn way! Is that why you made me fuck him with you last night?” Disgust drips off him, and his question punches me in the gut.
“You’ve been fucking her with him?” I ask Orion in shock. Maybe I’ll fight him too. Fuck all of these guys.
“Please, guys, calm down,” Sable says, and the only thing that actually settles me down is how afraid and sad she sounds.
She walks over to Soren. I watch mesmerized as I’m forced to watch this fucking bullshit. She grabs his hand and whispers, “We need to tell them. They need to know the truth.”
“No,” he says, voice hard and not whispering like she is. He raises his eyes from her to us in a clear challenge. “There’s no way.”
What the fuck is going on here?
“Everything leads back to it,” Sable tells him. “How else am I going to explain what I did to her? They are going to kill you because of this stupid room. We need to tell them.”
He shakes his head. “You have a lot of reasons to hate her. They don’t need to understand one night in your room when I was trying to k?—”
He cuts himself off, but I already know where he was going. I’ve been worried about him since the night he told me he was going to jump out the window, but I convinced myself that I had no reason to be. My gaze cuts to Orion, who looks like he’s stopped breathing, pale, and vaguely sick at the realization he almost lost his brother.
“I’m tired of them hating you.” Her voice carries so much emotion that I wince.
I never wanted to hate Soren, even when he hated me. I remember him as the clever boy who was actually different from the rest of them. The only one who saw the world like me.
“What is she talking about, Soren?” Orion cuts through the bullshit. “Because I am about to freak the fuck out if you don’t tell me what’s going on.”
Soren shakes his head, and Sable approaches him with an apologetic expression and her arms spread. She expects him to reject her, but I know better, and he immediately folds her into his arms. “This was really fucked up, baby,” he says.
“I know,” she admits. “I’m sorry. I know I promised to keep your secret, but I love you, and I can’t carry this anymore. It’s not right.”
Soren breathes her in, a shaking hand resting over her blond hair. “I love you too.”
“Soren, what is happening?” There’s too much vulnerability in Orion’s tone. That’s not something that happens often, and the pain in his brother’s voice registers on Soren’s face like a strike. His brother’s fear is too much for him to take, and while I won’t admit it, I’m scared too.
“And it’s not safe to keep them all in the dark anymore,” Sable adds. “Someone is watching us, so there’s no telling who else knows.”
Soren’s eyes flash like he hadn’t considered the possibility she’s suggesting. He nods against her and lifts his eyes to us. He doesn’t move away from Sable, and I know he needs her strength. I wait quietly, not daring my own mind to try to fill the silence. Whatever I think, I know it’s worse. I can see it in my friend’s eyes and feel it in the hollow pit of my stomach.
“Arabella drugged me before someone recorded that video.”
CHAPTER 58
SOREN
Silence follows my admission,and I push my hand into my pockets, hoping to find that pill bottle magically. I kept my promise to Sable, though, and since she flushed them, I haven’t called Dr. Gallows to request more. It’s been much harder than I could anticipate, especially right now. Their eyes are glued to me, each one of my oldest friends and my twin brother. When the pills don’t magically appear, I squeeze Sable tighter, cursing her and thanking divinity for her presence in my life in the same breath.
I didn’t want to be this vulnerable, and it burns to do it, but I know she was right.
“Arabella drugged you?” Lex starts. “How?”
Isn’t that what we all would love to know? The question that won’t stop spinning inside my head and torturing me. How the fuck did she get close enough to me to put me in that position?
“Are you sure that’s the first thing you want to say to him?” Sable asks him from my arms.
