Chapter Forty-Seven
IT HAD BEEN four days.
Four mornings of waking up in a quiet room that wasn’t Chain’s, sunlight spilling across lace curtains his mother had picked out years ago, the smell of coffee drifting up from the kitchen.
Four nights of lying awake, staring at a ceiling fan that turned too slow, my chest aching with everything I hadn’t said and everything I was afraid he’d never let me say now.
I was staying at Chain’s parents’ house.
Right under his nose.
The irony of that hadn’t stopped hurting yet.
It helped that his parents weren’t here. Briar said they were off on one of their camping trips and wouldn’t be back for a few more days. The house felt paused in their absence, like it was holding its breath along with me.
Briar sat at the kitchen table across from me, legs tucked into her chair, hair pulled back in a messy knot like she hadn’t bothered fighting it this morning.
Two dogs were settled at her feet. She flipped through a basket of vet bills and feed receipts, lips moving silently as she added numbers in her head.
I watched her for a long minute, my mug cold between my hands.
She knew everything.
I’d told her that first night when she picked me up, my voice shaking so badly I’d barely gotten the words out. About Zach. About the note. About the motel. About Chain walking in at the worst possible second. About how it had looked, and how wrong it all was.
She hadn’t interrupted once.
Just listened.
“You’re wearin’ a hole in me,” Briar said without looking up.
“I’m not,” I muttered.
She lifted her gaze, one brow arching. “You’ve been starin’ like you’re about to confess to a murder.”
I huffed out a breath. “Feels like one.”
She leaned back in her chair, studying me in that quiet, unsettling way she shared with her brother. “You can’t keep doin’ this, Lark.”
“Doin’ what?” I asked, even though I knew.
“Hidin’,” she said simply. “Waitin’. Punishin’ yourself.”
“I’m not hiding,” I said. The lie sounded thin even to me. “I’m givin’ him space.”
She snorted. “You’re avoidin’ him because you’re scared.”
The words landed clean.
“You didn’t see how he looked at me,” I said quietly. “It wasn’t anger. I can handle anger. It was… final. Like he’d already decided who I was.”
Her expression softened, just a fraction. “I know exactly how my brother looks when he’s hurt.”
I swallowed. “Then you know why I can’t just walk into the clubhouse and demand he listen.”
Briar set the papers aside and leaned forward, elbows on the table. “Calder’s stubborn. He’s proud. And when he thinks someone played him, he digs in like concrete.” She paused. “But he’s not cruel. And he’s not stupid.”
I dropped my gaze to my hands, the faint scars across my palms catching the light. “He thinks I cheated on him. He thinks I chose Zach.”
“And you didn’t.”
“No,” I said, my voice breaking. “I was trying to end it. I was trying to tell Zach I couldn’t keep secrets anymore. That I wouldn’t lie to Chain again. I just… didn’t get the chance.”
She reached across the table and took my hand, her grip solid and grounding. “Then you have to tell him that. All of it.”
“What if he won’t listen?” I whispered. “What if he looks at me like I’m nothing again?”
“Then at least you won’t spend the rest of your life wonderin’ if you should’ve tried,” she said gently. “Calder respects the truth, Lark. Even when it hurts him.”
I shook my head. “You didn’t see how far gone he was. I thought he was going to kill Zach.”
“Yeah,” she said softly. “That tracks.”
A weak laugh slipped out of me despite myself.
She squeezed my hand. “You need to go to the clubhouse. Not to fight. Not to beg. Just to tell the truth. Then let him do with it what he will.”
“And if he tells me to leave?” I asked.
Her gaze didn’t waver. “Then you leave knowin’ you didn’t lie to him anymore.”
Silence settled between us, thick with everything at stake.
“You’re hidin’ in his parents’ house,” Briar added quietly. “He’s already closer to you than he knows. Don’t let fear be the thing that finally puts distance between you.”
My chest tightened.
I’d escaped a cult built on silence and obedience. I’d promised myself I’d never let fear decide my life again.
And yet here I was.
“I don’t know if I’m strong enough,” I admitted.
Briar smiled, small but fierce. “You survived that cult. My brother’s temper doesn’t get to be the thing that scares you into disappearin’.”
I closed my eyes and breathed through the ache in my chest.
When I opened them, the decision was already there. Heavy. Inevitable.
“Okay,” I said softly. “I’ll go.”
Briar stood and pulled me into a hug that smelled like hay, sunshine, and home. “Good,” she murmured. “Because whether he realizes it or not, Calder Riggs is already sufferin’. And you’re the only one who can fix this part.”
As I pulled away, dread and resolve twisted together in my gut, one truth cutting clear through both.
I was done hiding.
Whatever waited for me at the clubhouse, I would face it head-on.
Even if it broke my heart all over again.
***
THE CLUBHOUSE LOOKED the same. Of course it did. It had only been four days.
Same gravel crunching under the tires when Briar parked. Same hum of bikes somewhere behind the building. Same scent of oil and pine that had once felt like safety and now just made my chest ache.
I sat there a second longer than necessary, my hand wrapped around the door handle, heart thudding hard enough I could feel it in my throat.
“You okay?” Briar asked softly.
I nodded even though it wasn’t true. “Let’s just find him.”
Briar went inside first. I stayed just outside the door, out of sight, not ready to answer the questions I knew would come from the women inside.
The main room was loud with late-afternoon noise.
Laughter. A pool game mid-argument. Someone yelling over music.
I peeked around the door and scanned faces without really seeing them, my pulse ticking higher with every second Chain didn’t appear.
“Gatsby said he went out back,” Briar murmured when she came back out.
We slipped through the door, the noise dulling behind us. The air back there was cooler, shaded by trees, the ground uneven and worn smooth by boots and time. I took maybe three steps before I saw movement ahead.
Chain.
He was walking out of the treeline like he belonged to it, cut on, shoulders loose. And hanging off his side, fingers curled into his vest, was Sugar.
She laughed at something he’d said, head tipped back, body pressed close like she knew exactly how to fit there. One hand slid across his chest, casual. Familiar. Her mouth hovered too close to his jaw.
The world tilted.
I stopped so fast Briar nearly ran into me.
“Oh,” Briar breathed. “Shit.”
Chain hadn’t seen us. Not yet. His attention stayed on Sugar, his arm slung low around her waist, holding her there without effort or hesitation.
Something in my chest cracked clean open.
This wasn’t a misunderstanding. This wasn’t timing or fear or silence doing damage.
This was him choosing something else.
My body moved before my mind caught up. I turned and walked back the way we came, my steps quick and quiet, like if I moved fast enough I could outrun the image burning itself into my brain.
“Lark,” Briar hissed, following. “Wait—”
“I can’t,” I said. My voice sounded too calm to be real. “I can’t do this.”
We reached the car and I yanked the door open, climbing in with shaking hands. Briar slid into the driver’s seat a second later, keys already in hand.
She didn’t say anything as she pulled away from the clubhouse, gravel spitting under the tires.
Neither did I.
I stared straight ahead, my reflection faint in the windshield, eyes glassy and distant. Chain’s face replayed in my mind, over and over. Not angry. Not hurt.
Relaxed.
Like he’d already moved on.
“He thinks you betrayed him,” Briar said quietly after a minute. “He’s spiralin’. This isn’t—”
“Don’t,” I whispered. “Please don’t try to explain it.”
She fell silent, understanding that explanation wouldn’t change what I’d seen.
I wrapped my arms around myself, the scars on my palms pressing into my skin, grounding me in the present. I’d come here ready to tell the truth. Ready to fight for us.
Instead, I’d found proof that the damage had already spread.
He didn’t chase me. He didn’t look for me.
He filled the space I left with someone who knew exactly how to be easy.
The car rolled on, the clubhouse disappearing behind us, and with it the last fragile hope I’d been carrying.
I pressed my forehead to the cool glass and finally let myself feel it.
Not anger. Not jealousy.
Loss.
Whatever we’d been building had burned down while I was trying to save it.
And this time, I didn’t know if there was anything left worth salvaging.