I nod. “For cutting you off, but also for not speaking out more when you came out, and he kicked you out. I hope you know that I don’t share his opinion about you or LGBTQ.”
There’s a moment of silence, and I brace myself for his reaction. If he’s angry, I really don’t blame him. I’m angry with myself.
“When he kicked me out, there was nothing you could do. You tried to make him see reason, but that was a lost cause. That was exactly why I never came out to him and he had to catch me in the act. I knew he would react the way he did.”
I interrupt him. “I know, but?—”
“We were seventeen when he kicked me out. I already said this, but having you with me then would have made everything twice as hard. If anything, I felt guilty about leaving you with him. And I was right.”
One stray tear falls down my face, burning a hot track all the way to my lips. “You were right?” I don’t get what he’s trying to say.
“I’m not gonna lie, I was mad at you,” Luke admits. “I’ve played this conversation in my head countless times since the last time we spoke. I’ve planned all the things I would say to you when we spoke again. But I should have known, Bex. I should have known you wouldn’t just cut me off without explaining. He left you no choice. He exploited you and all his other clients. He put you in the impossible position of following his rules or losing everything.”
There are a lot more tears from where the first one came from. “It still doesn’t excuse that I didn’t walk out. I never wanted to cut ties with you, Luke. I knew it was wrong, but I was too afraid.”
His eyes are shining with a kindness I don’t deserve. “You had nowhere to go, Bex. He held all the strings. Your dancing career, your education. I’m sure he’d blackball anyone who leaves him. He didn’t have that power when he kicked me out, but it sounds like he has a lot more influence now. And he’s still your father. Our father. I hate him, but a part of me will always miss him and feel guilty for disappointing him.”
I understand that. That’s one of the reasons why it took me so long to leavePure Shineand its rules.
“Tell me the truth,” Luke coaxes me. “Things got worse once you accepted his orders to cut ties with anyone who didn’t live in his house. Am I right?”
I blink away the tears, wiping my face with the back of my hand. “Yeah. He started overseeing every aspect of our lives. Before, the chefs he employed followed a tailored nutrition plan approved by the athletic department’s nutrition team. He took his idea of cutting the fat to the extremes and he made a list of permitted foods. He dictated the quantities each of us was allowed to eat, and banned any foods that came from outside the house.”
Luke wipes a hand down his face. “Fuck. Is this why you haven’t eaten hash browns in a while? I think inmates have more freedom in prison.”
My brother doesn’t know how right he is.
“After the rule about our diets, he started looking at every relationship we had. Obviously, he pushed people to distance themselves from their families like he did with me. Romantic relationships with people outside the house were also actively discouraged.”
“Jeez,” Luke snorts. “What’s the next step? Arranged marriages?” His eyes widen when he sees the look on my face. “Shut the front door. Seriously?”
“It started with low key comments about how some auras matched others. How spending time with someone who had the right aura could improve our focus and, ultimately, our performance. But he controlled even those relationships. Once he started pairing people up, he created theno touch rule.”
Luke pinches the bridge of his nose. “Do I even want to know?”
I sigh. “We weren’t allowed to touch one another, unless it was specifically required by a performance. For example, any guy who danced with me would be allowed to lift me, or touch my hand. But outside of practice and recorded performances, touch was seen as a sign of problematic behavior.”
“That’s some bullshit.” My brother snorts. “So your fiancé, the one you practically left at the altar. Was he someone he approved of?”
I squirm in my chair. “Yeah. Dad thought my social media following had grown stagnant. His plan was for me and Kurt to help each other’s careers. He turned the house into some sort of compound. He built some apartments behind the main house and he planned to move married couples there. Kurt and I were supposed to be the first couple to marry and move in for our senior year. Until Kurt had to report to Hartford for summer training with the Heroes.”
Luke’s jaw hits the floor. Some kind of understanding dawns in his eyes. “Hold on a second. Your fiancé is Kurt Priestly? The Bridgeport Tigers’ captain?”
I swallow around the lump that forms in my throat. “Yeah.”
“I’m sorry,” Luke’s tone has a cautious edge. “But Kurt isn’t exactly one of my favorite people.”
That makes two of us. But I don’t say that out loud. “Why?”
The answer doesn’t surprise me. “Because he’s an asshole. He’s a coward who will take cheap shots, rather than fighting like a man on the ice. I respect players who are physical. What I don’t respect is someone who will hit his opponents from behind. And that motherfucker always aims to injure. Sorry, but I’m glad you didn’t marry him.”
“I’m glad I didn’t marry him, too.” My voice breaks, and Luke leans closer, wiping my tears with the pads of his thumbs.
“Bexie-Boo, please don’t cry. Come here.” He moves a strand of my hair, tucking it behind my ear.
The gesture, combined with the moisture from my tears, washes away some of the makeup I used earlier to hide the bruises on my neck.
I know Luke sees them when his eyes widen and his mouth drops open in shock. “Bex, what the fuck happened to you?”
