Page 88 of The Secrets We Bury

“I’mgetting out,” I correct him.

“No, that can’t be it,” Gio snaps, dropping his arms. “You’re fucking with us.”

I sidestep him when he comes towards me. “I’m not fucking with anybody anymore,” I snap. “I’m not playing your games. I thought I could handle shit on my own, but I realized I’m fucking tired of playing the poor fallen princess. I don’t want to be fucking poor, Gio.”

“You don’t give a shit about all that?—”

“What?” I whirl on him and lift a brow in challenge. My hands find my hips and I manage to muster the most condescending stare I can. “I don’t give a shit about money? Ha!” The laugh I release is an echo of the pain cracking my chest wide open. “I care about not starving and sleeping on a bed that I don’t have to fucking share. What did you think this was going to turn into?” I ask. “Did you think I was going to be happy being passed between the three of you? Do you have any idea of what people say about me? I’m fucking the Scorpion Kings. I’m the whore of Silverwood. The joke. The outcast.”

Vile, disgusting words seep out from between my lips.I don’t care,I want to scream.I don’t care about any of it.I just want them to be safe.

Instead, I say, “There’s no university in the world that will take me if they think I fucked my way through high school. They have morality stipulations, you know. It’s better this way. I realized what an idiot I was being before it was too late. You should be thanking me.”

“Thanking you?” Gio bursts out, his jaw dropping.

“Yes,” I hiss the word at him. “You should thank me because I’m not going to go to the police about all the shit you did. Themen you’ve killed or the bodies you’ve buried. As long as you stay the hell away from me, I will keep my mouth shut and no one will ever know.”

“You’ll know,” Nolan’s response is quiet, but I hear it as if it were right next to my ear. I take a breath and slowly pivot towards him.

“Yeah, and that’s where it can end.”

He tips his head to the side, his expression that same empty canvas. “You killed too,” he reminds me. “Twice. What’s to stop us from going to the authorities?”

I laugh, a bitter noise. “Who would believe that the princess of Silverwood Prep could kill someone?” I ask. “And even if you did—I’m going back to where I belong. To the land of power and money. My uncle would make sure to squash the three of you like the bugs that you are.” I swallow roughly, dropping my hands and turning away from them.

“Do us all a favor,” I snap as I take the first step towards the car. “Forget that you ever fucked me and forget everything else.”

The driver’s side door of the sedan opens and a somewhat familiar man dressed in a loose-fitted suit with his flat brown hair slicked away from his face circles around the vehicle to open the back passenger door for me.

“Juliet!” I ignore Lex’s shout as I step inside and the man shuts the door behind me. “Juliet!” His second shout is muffled by the barrier between us.

For a moment, I turn my head and glimpse him storming towards the vehicle, but Gio dives in front of him, blocking his path.

Hurry. Hurry. Hurry.I silently plead for Morpheus’ assistant to get in the car and drive away. Before my resolve crumbles. Before they see my face. Before they can stop me.

Stuart gets into the driver’s seat and shuts the door behind him. “Juliet!” Lex’s yell grows louder. I close my eyes as the carpulls away from the curb, execrating down the street. I count backwards from ten, trying to stop the flood of tears, but by the time I reach one, it’s too late.

My face is a mess. My nose is clogged with snot and I’m shattering into a million pieces.

33

GIO

“What the fuck just happened?”

Neither Nolan nor Lex answers me as the taillights of the retreating sedan flash red as they slow to the stop sign at the end of the street and then turn out of sight. I whirl to face them.

“Dudes!” I gape at them. “Whatthe fuckjust happened!”

Lex’s expression is one of pure shock. He looks like he got sucker punched by a rabid animal and is still processing. I focus my attention on Nolan. The motherfucker stares down the street and slowly lifts his beer to his lips and takes a long sip. The sight of his composure makes me lose mine.

It takes three long strides to reach him and when I do, I round back and punch him in the face. Nolan’s head snaps to the side and he stumbles back a step, that bottle crashing and shattering on the pavement.

“Answer me!” I scream. Did Juliet really just leave? Why isn’t hedoinganything?

Nolan doesn’t punch me back. Instead, he maintains his calm and merely reaches up to wipe away the trickle of blood that escapes the corner of his mouth from where my blow rippedopen a cut on his lower lip. “What do you want me to say?” he asks.

“I want you to tell me that you and Juliet planned this,” I snap. “That this is a fucking practical joke or—orsomething!” Because it can’t be real. Juliet did not just leave us. She didn’t go back to…