Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 80689 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 403(@200wpm)___ 323(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80689 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 403(@200wpm)___ 323(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
Wide-eyed, he searches around the room before his gaze zeroes in on me. He grins in a way that disturbs me, makes me think it would have really been a shit idea had Jonas and I split up.
Even more concerning, he has his hand behind his back as he starts toward us.
The letter opener?
“Stay where you are,” Jonas warns him.
“I’ve just come to show you something.”
I hold up my hands. “Simon, you can show us whatever it is from there.”
“I think Jonas will find it very interesting, given the conversation we just had.”
“Why do you look like this?” I ask, far more concerned about his appearance than anything else. “Did you cut yourself more?”
“Oh, these little things? No, no. I’ve been in the woods. Had to dig this up. Went to your little hiding spot in the briars. We act like we’re so distant now, but how did I know that’s where it’d be? There’s still something tethering us together, like there’ll always be.”
Tension rises within me.
I have a horrible suspicion what he dug up.
No, he didn’t. He wouldn’t.
“I saw you head into the woods with some of them after Father killed himself,” Simon says. “You didn’t return with them that day. I figured you were burying the only truth that remained, and I was right. But now I have it. You marked it like you wanted it to be found—a stick cross, marking it like a grave.”
“Simon, you need professional help,” Jonas says. “Please let us help you.”
“You’re right. I think after all Ryan has put me through, I do need help. And you want to know why?”
I’m waiting for him to reveal what’s in his hand—God, I already know, and I wish I didn’t.
“Some nights, I want to creep into his room,” Simon recites, like he put the piece to memory, “and while he’s sleeping, crawl under his sheets and only let him know I’m there when he feels my mouth against his hard cock.”
My face flushes with heat.
“What are you talking about?” Jonas asks.
“Ask your boyfriend. They’re his words,” Simon says as he finally reveals a black journal, raising it before him. His thumb is tucked in to keep it open to a specific page, which he begins reading from. “How about… I dream we’re in the woods, wrestling because he wants to show me how strong he is. He pins me to the ground. Before I know it, his lips are against my neck and he’s tearing at my clothes. He needs me. He wants me. His wet kisses don’t let up—”
“Stop this!” I shout, his words a cruel attack on my soul.
“I want him inside me. I want him making me call his name. I want his body pressed up against mine, thrusting. I want him to fuck me till I cry.”
Tears rush to my eyes. “Why are you doing this?”
“Kieran. My Kieran. My perfect, beautiful Kieran.”
Simon looks up from my journal, and I start toward him. “Give that back!”
“This was one of the innocent bits,” Simon tells Jonas. “You should read the other vile shit that’s in here, the sort of stuff he should be ashamed to have even imagined.”
“You didn’t have a right to read that!”
“I have a right to expose you! I already read all this when we were kids. You think your twin wouldn’t peer into your private journal? It was my right to see this as much as it was to know my own thoughts. I knew how you really felt. Now you see, Jonas. This was what this pervert thought about. It’s all there. His constant, unwavering obsession with his brother. The vile things you made Kieran do in these fantasies, but then you dare accuse him of violating you. And the lie you told Father. He didn’t believe you either.”
The tears escape my eyes.
He’s right.
“Because I showed him this, just like I’m showing Jonas,” Simon goes on.
In an instant, my grief shifts to something dark. “You what?”
“I followed you to Father’s office. Heard you tell him that lie about what Kieran did that day, and I knew I had to disprove it. To not let you taint his memory. So I took this to Father to show him your deception. Told him of your obsession with Kieran. Told him what I saw the two of you doing like animals at the shed. Told him what a liar you were and read him these filthy pages. I exposed you.”
“Simon,” Jonas says, “just because he fantasized about those things doesn’t mean he wanted them when Kieran did that.”
Simon’s jaw drops. “You’re still defending him? After what you just heard?”
But my grief has transformed. Now I’m fucking seething. I can barely think straight.
All these fucking years he’s kept this from me. All these fucking years of self-loathing and blaming myself, thinking if I’d just said more or the right thing, only to find out this shit.