Page 122 of Dirty Like Seth
Seth wasmine. That was all there was toit.
He was mine now, and I was never letting himgo.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Elle
The next day,Flynn pulled up to the church and let me out. He didn’t come inside with me; I’d already told him I wanted him to waitoutside.
I’d asked the band to come together for an emergency meeting. No film crew. I’d told Dylan, expressly,Just Dirty. And he knew exactly what thatmeant.
If you care about me, please do this for me,I’d cried to him over the phone, late last night, after Seth left. Because there was a part of me that was afraid they wouldn’t do this for me.Get them to come,I’d pretty much begged him.I need you all to bethere.
And Dylan told me,They’ll be there,Elle.
I could tell, by the vehicles in the lot, that they were. When I walked into the church, they were all waiting for me: the innermost innercircle.
Jesse, Dylan and Zane, along with Brody, Maggie andJude.
Jessa wasn’t here yet, but she’d texted to let me know she was on herway.
Seth wasn’t here yet, either. I’d asked him to come a little later than the others. I’d begged him to come, and after some initial refusal, he’d agreed. But I needed to talk to Dirty first. I needed to get a sense of how they were all going to handle this, without him here to catch the brunt of it if this went verybadly.
Maggie herded everyone together into the various old pews and chairs we had strewn around. She passed out coffee. She gave me a hug. Even though she couldn’t know what I was about to say, it feltgood.
They all sat, dead quiet, looking at me. I took a deep breath, stuffing down the nausea that kept trying to creep up, then told them what I’d come here tosay.
“Seth is in my life—tostay.”
Silence.
Everyone just sat there, looking atme.
Maggie glanced at Brody. No one else moved, let alonespoke.
Finally, Jesse crossed his arms over his chest. “What does thatmean?”
“It means she wants him in the band,” Zane translated. And he wasn’t wrong aboutthat.
“I’m more than willing to work with him on the side if that can’t happen,” I told them. “That’s not a threat. I’m not leaving Dirty. I just want you all to know how serious I am about this. About him.” I met Jesse’s eyes, briefly. He looked back at me, his expression dark, unreadable. “I don’t know everything that happened between Seth and Jessa…” I glanced at Brody. “But I know it’s not what you all seem to think. I know that much. And I knowhim.”
Silenceagain.
At least everyone seemed to be digesting what I’dsaid.
I wasn’t sure if any of them, other than Dylan and Jude, had figured out that my feelings for Seth went beyond professionalism and friendship. But I wasn’t exactly ready to say,I’ve fallen in love with him, and he’s knocked me up, so deal withit.
“Well, Idoknow what happened,” Brody said, finally breaking the silence. “And maybe you don’t know Seth as well as you think you do,Elle.”
I opened my mouth to respond to that, not even sure what I was going to say, when Jude cut in. “You don’t know everything.” He was speaking to Brody, not me, and everyone turned to look athim.
Judesighed.
Then he took a long look up at the ceiling, like he really didn’t want to say what he was going to say next. Like he couldn’t quite believe he was going to sayit.
“Seth owed a lot of money to the MC,” he growled out. “And you do not owe money to the MC.” He looked at each one of us in turn, as he let his words sink in. “In the end, I needed him out of the band because of the heat coming down onhim.”
Jesus. Not what I wanted tohear.
