Graceful Deception

14. Your Face...I Want To Punch It

Chapter 14

Your Face…I Want To Punch It

 

 

I was officially an awful person.

A horrible girlfriend, too.

And, let’s not forget, probably even a traitor to some degree to the Brotherhood.

Why exactly?  Well, that little run-in with Juliet?  Yeah, I didn’t say anything to John about it later that night.  Or even the next morning.  Not even the next few days.

No, I just kept everything that she’d said about the Knights “kidnapping” me in Paris to myself and didn’t say a word. 

What probably made me even more terrible was that, now that I’d thought over what Juliet had said for a few days, I sort of wanted to go just so I could know what exactly it was that she wanted me to know about.

Curiosity was what got me into all of this, and it was definitely going to get me in even deeper.

At first, when I’d gone back to John at our table, he knew something was up just by the amount of time I was in the bathroom.  He’d tried to make a joke of it, saying that he’d thought I’d been kidnapped or something, but I could see the truth of it in his eyes.  He knew that something was up with me, just by my expression or even how I was almost completely silent before I suggested that we’d head back to the hotel. 

What made him even more suspicious was when I bolted up out of our bed later that night, sweat beading down my face and neck and my heart pounding in my chest. 

It had been a while since I’d had the nightmare of what had happened with Juliet back in London.  I was used to my normal dreamless nights, so having the nightmare over again for the first time in months scared me. 

But this time, it was different.  Instead of Juliet in front of me with a knife in her stomach, she just pulled it out, no trace of a wound anywhere, and walked toward me.

“You’ll know why we have to do this, Emilia darling,” she’d grinned, grasping the knife in her hand even tighter.  “We have to get Jonathan right where it’ll hurt him the most…which just happens to be right here.”

And not a moment later, she lunged for me, plunging the knife into my chest, right over my heart. 

That was when I’d woken up, my scream bubbling up in my throat before I felt John sit up beside me just as fast as I had.  His eyes held the shock and suspicion at the sudden reappearance of my nightmare.  I knew what he must have been thinking.  What had happened that would bring them back?  Nothing had happened when I’d run into Ryan, so…

But before he could ask me, or even before I could just blurt out the truth, I shook my head, laughing slightly at myself and telling him that it was nothing.  He didn’t believe me, not even a little, but he let it go, just like I was silently wishing he would. 

The next few days, I tried to act as normal as possible.  John was doing the same, but I could tell it was all an act.  He would speak normally to me, maybe even too normal.  But as the day turned into the next, his attitude changed again and I knew he was pissed.  He didn’t even bother trying to hide it like he had before. 

And that he knew exactly what had happened. 

There was a certain something that had made him that way, because it certainly wasn’t me telling him everything. 

When we’d come back from dinner with Stella and Ren that night, there had been a letter with John’s name – well, the fake name he’d used for the rooms – scrawled across the envelope.  Sure, I’d been curious to know what it was, but I could wait until he read it.  So as I started taking off my shoes and jacket, I watched him as he read and as his eyes narrowed until they were tightly squinted.  He’d crushed the paper in his fist, growling that he’d be right back, before slamming the door on his way out.