234's Lifelines

75. Twice bitten

Random: Am I the only one who hates reading long messages? Long Facebook statuses, long anything except it's a book? lol 

Song: I bet my life -Imagine dragons

Brooke: "You and Haley fighting?"
Peyton: "That depends on which Haley we're talking about, Haley Scott; the nice girl that played TRIC, or Haley James; the not so much of a wife that left town and never called - because her, I have a problem with."
Brooke: "Do you ever think maybe it just got to be too much for her? Like, leaving the whole Chris thing out of it, maybe she just got scared of needing somebody too much."
Peyton: "Needing them so much she just... abandoned them?"
Brooke: "OK, you can hate me for saying this, but maybe your problem isn't so much with Haley as it is with Ellie; your returning birth mother."
Peyton: "No, Brooke, my problem is with anybody who just... vanishes and then waltzes back in and expects to be instantly forgiven and your problem is you're not gonna have anybody to help you paint this place if you don't stop telling me what my problem is."

- One Tree Hill

***

"By then I already knew Lexis was alive and even if he wasn't I was never going to be able to give E what he wanted. I never even really acknowledged the marriage, so I signed the papers and sent them to him,"

"Didn't he need the marriage to become Patriarch?" Jess asks.

"He was named Patriarch months back. It's not been publicly announced but it's a known secret. He has already started the hand over process. So I returned and the rest you know,"

"I never brought him up because I didn't think we were married. Not even while we were married on paper did I ever really acknowledge it as more than the signed papers that said husband and wife,"

"Why didn't you tell me?" Jess asks moving down.

"After what happened with Nathan. I didn't want you to misunderstand. I was scared you'd believe him more than me,"

"How could you ever think that?"

"I don't know, I wasn't thinking,"

"That much is obvious," Jess says and sighs.

"Forgive me? I really am sorry,"

Jess stays silent. She was also lying to Hera so who was she to judge her. 

"If you forgive me I'll forgive you," Jess says.

"Forgive you? For what?" Hera says and thinking she meant the lies from five years back she says, "Jess I forgave you years back,"

"What are you talking about?" Jess asks confused.

"Don't you mean the whole 234 virgin thing?" Hera responds.

"No, not that," Jess says and gets up interlocking her hands. She paces back and forth not sure how to say it.

"Jess you're scaring me," Hera says voice fills with concern.

"IteamedupwithLexistomakeyoulosethecase!" Jess says quickly and in one breath.

"What?" Hera says believing she'd misheard.

"I teamed up with Lexis to make you lose the case,"Jess repeats, this time slowly and cautiously, shutting her eyes, unable to look Hera in the face while admitting it.

Hera's forehead furrows.

"You...what?"Hera says refusing to accept what she heard.

Jess lets out a heavy sigh and opens her eyes.