A Dance Of Crowns & Thrones | Book I

Chapter 160 | June 19th | The One That Lies

Timeline - June 19th - Present Time

Jesse's head was pounding; biting her nails, she glanced at Toni.

He had sat mortified at the edge of the bed he had awoken from. The red-headed still sat next to him, staring out the glass windows from the suite, cross-legged and comatose-like.

"They would have surely stopped us?" she looked down, and the pretty heart ring sat promptly on her wedding finger.

"You really think they would have? This is going to hang over our heads for years," he groaned before falling back to the bed. Toni had still been trying to recollect anything that had happened.

"What did Jasmine put in our drinks? I remember my night until she came back with the drinks. Then it went hazy."

"Same," Toni mumbled.

Jesse turned, fumbling, trying to find the phone she threw after getting off with Eko, who, had been cacking up in laughter at her. The nerve of that woman, her mind snarled.

Hearing the rummaging around, Toni propped himself up, watching as she tried to look for something amongst the mess on the floor of her clothing.

"What are you doing?" His interested piqued.

"Trying to find my phone."

"Why?" The drawled question came.

"I need to call Jazzy to figure out what she gave us!"

She rampaged in the search through her clothing where the phone was tossed and found it. She quickly dialled Jasmine's number, and thankfully after four consecutive rings, she answered the phone.

"This better be urgent," the muffled voice came through the phone; she was not a fan of being woken up rudely like this.

"Do you have any idea what happened to me last night!"

Yawing, Jasmine stretched on the bed next to three glorious naked men with whom she had spent the night.

Rubbing a hand over her face, she tried to open her eyes to find that the room was filled with an unholy light; shaking her head, she closed them again.

She was at the point where she was now asking herself what the hell she was drinking last night.

"Whatever you gave us last night! Has completely fucked up our life. Do you understand that!"

"Look," a little more tentatively, Jasmine opened her eyes, but her arm was propped up to block out the worst of the sun.

"The strippers said it was some tonic they used to help with their nights."

"Did this tonic just make you forget hours and hours of your life, making it all some blur that trips you out!"

Jasmine rolled over in the bed, her hand touching a face that grunted as she tried to wake him. "that, like, tonic," she muttered, "is this what is meant to happen?"

"Hmm," the voice replied, nodding.

"He said hmm," Jasmine replied lazily, stretching her body between the three naked ones.

From what she could remember from last night, it would take place in her top ten.

"Hmm!" Jesse shrieked, "that's it!"

"Best night ever," she laughed.

"Best night ever!" Jesse screeched down the phone, "how the fuck did Toni and I end up like this!?"

"Like what, Jesse?" rolling onto her stomach, admiring the closest naked butt to her, "the last time I checked, you were with Sawyer, Richie and Toni drinking. What happened?"

"Well, somehow, that tonic ended up in the drinks Toni and I had!"

"Toni was finding you drinks; you were knocking them back with him. Babe, I am not your parental guardian to monitor what and how much you have! Nor to have a lecture on taking random people's drinks. You don't know what's in them."

"Are you lecturing me, of all people!"

"Babeee," Jasmine began, "I let fate take its course when you guys started sucking face. You needed it. To loosen up. To breathe after dick face."

"You let fate take its course!" Jesse screamed down the phone, "JASMINE!" then, in her rage, she hung up and threw the phone again.

Toni dared to creep to the end of the bed, laying chest down, propped up on his elbow. The tiara, still in his tangled hair, stared at Jesse, that all but looked like she was about to have a nervous breakdown.

"Do you remember anything of how this happened?" Jesse rolled her head to the man over her shoulder.

He contemplated telling her what led to all of this for a moment. Only for a moment, because he had wanted to tell her what the hair-trigger point for them had been, he wanted to tell her that he couldn't trust anyone that didn't absolutely love her like he did.

But, considering how their morning had gone so far, he wasn't prepared for that conversation, and he sure knew Jesse wouldn't be in the right mind to pick up their conversation from the night before.

Toni, in denial, instead shook his head, "no idea."

Jesse ran her hands down her face, "this can't be happening, god, this can't be happening. How did this happen!" Shrieking and screaming now like a child with a tantrum.

Toni watched her convinced that it was was better to continue to lie than to complicate all of this further, like she cared that he was in love with her, like she wanted to date one of her best friends.

Especially not after she broke up with Aiden, somebody that had been an important part of Jesse's life. Not when it was still so raw. She didn't need to know how he felt with all of this; it could all wait. One day.

"Seriously Toni!" She threw herself to the bed, throwing a pillow over her head.

"I'm at a blank," he shrugged his shoulder, putting on that mask he displayed so conveniently at times, "but I'm sure Eko and Matthew took photos to humiliate us for the rest of our lives."

"Fuckkkkkkk!" Jesse she screamed further into the pillow.

"Better to rip the band-aid off," Toni chuckled, "add it to the books of fucked up things we've done?"

"Ughhh!" she screamed into the pillow. "We are never going to talk about this again. Understood? We're just going to pretend it never happened!

Toni sat up a boy watching as Jesse mumbled into the pillow and his heart sank. 

And with that, swallowing all the love he felt for the woman seated behind him on the bed, he understood that they all needed to navigate through the next chaotic forty-eight hours leading to the wedding of the century, a celebration that was about to consume their lives.

Besides from the way Jesse reacted he told himself, it looked like he was taking his secret to the grave with him.