73. Scarlett
Scarlett
T he path to the dinner deck was lit with golden lanterns swaying in the sea breeze, casting soft pools of light along the wood. The air smelled like salt, grilled fish, and something sweet—mango maybe, or the wildflower perfume of a storm that hadn’t hit yet.
Laughter drifted ahead, low and loose. A bass line thrummed beneath it, slow and moody.
I took my time, the silk of my dress moving like smoke around my legs, brushing my thighs with every step. The open back letting the breeze kiss my skin. Just bare skin, high slits, and a mouth painted the color of ruin.
The deck came into view—long table set with white linen, crystal glasses catching fire from the candlelight. Plates already half seared with fish, blistered vegetables, fruit that looked stolen from a dream.
Voices stilled when I stepped onto the wood.
Trace looked up first, eyes tracing the shape of me without apology. His glass froze mid-lift.
Alde’s fingers tapped once on the stem of his wine glass, then stopped.
Rhett gave a slow grin. “There she is.”
Kane let out a low whistle. “Didn’t know you were dressing for bloodshed.”
Zekes attention flicked over to me like a file drawn across steel.
I walked to the table, every step measured, my gaze daring someone to challenge that I sat down at the head—without being asked.
“I like this vibe,” I said, crossing one leg over the other reaching for a glass of wine. “Secret hideouts with five-star service. Real cozy.”
Rhett grinned. “You clean up alright.”
Kane chuckled. “She doesn’t clean up. She just arrives and wrecks the place prettier.”
Trace poured more wine.
Alden finally raised his glass. “To surviving another day.”
Zeke raised his. “And to whatever the hell’s coming next.”
I held up my glass and smiled.
I curled one leg beneath me and sipped slow, watching the way their bodies shifted every time I moved.
Kane was halfway through a story about a gas station pickup line gone wrong when Rhett started choking on pineapple.
“She was a cop,” Rhett wheezed. “With a record.”
“Allegedly,” Kane muttered, tossing a grape at him. It hit Zeke’s plate with a dull thud. Zeke didn’t even flinch.
I leaned in, resting my chin on my hand. “Your best line, Rhett?”
He didn’t miss a beat. “Are you a fight club? Because I’d let you ruin me and never speak of it again.”
Kane groaned. “Someone cut his mic.”
I laughed, head tipping back. The wine burned soft and low through me, the candlelight bleeding into everything.
“Your turn,” I said, pointing my glass at Alden.
“I don’t use lines, Love.”
“Of course you don’t.”
“Confidence,” he said flatly.
“Arrogance,” I returned.
Zeke still hadn’t spoken. His gaze hadn’t wavered, either. Every time I moved, he tracked it. Like I was a live wire, and he was waiting for the shock.
Plates were nearly bare now—fish bones, fruit rinds, and streaks of heat left behind. The candles flickered harder as the wind picked up, storm-scent curling in from the water’s edge.
Kane leaned back with a grunt, stretching. “This wasn’t how I pictured lockdown.”
I raised a brow. “What did you picture?”
“Something with fewer secrets,” he muttered. “And less damn humidity.”
Rhett cracked a smile. “Definitely didn’t expect training sessions before breakfast and mystery threats before dinner.”
I tilted my wine glass in his direction. “You’re not here for comfort.”
“No,” he said, eyes locked on mine. “We’re here for you.”
The words landed with more weight than I expected.
No jokes. No smile.
Just the truth of it.
Alden shifted in his seat, one knuckle dragging along the edge of his plate—subtle, controlled, like movement was safer than speaking.
Trace’s hand tensed on the wine bottle, the glass stem catching candlelight as he refilled his glass without drinking.
I leaned back, fingers ghosting the rim of my glass.
“I wasn’t supposed to be your mission,” I said, voice low. “But here we are.”
No one argued.
The wind shifted—cooler now, thick with salt and something electric. A storm biding its time.
The second bottle of wine was nearly gone, and with it, the last shreds of restraint.
Kane had one leg slung over the arm of his chair, shirt halfway unbuttoned, laughing so hard at something Rhett said he nearly knocked over the wine.
Rhett was red-faced, wiping his eyes, holding his stomach.
Zeke hadn’t moved much—still brooding at the edge of the table—but even his silence felt less lethal.
Trace swirled his glass slowly, his forearm resting on the table, tattoos catching the candlelight. Alden sat beside him, rigid, the only one who hadn’t cracked. Yet.
But I wasn’t watching them for cracks.
I was watching for truths.
“You ever gonna tell me what this actually is?” I asked, twirling the stem of my glass between my fingers. “The Hollow Order. Sounds dramatic as hell. But what does it mean?”
Trace shifted in his seat.
Even Kane stopped laughing.
Alden was the one who answered, his voice low. “It’s older than you think.”
Rhett leaned forward, suddenly serious. “Started as a brotherhood. Protection. Secrets. A way to keep power away from the wrong hands.”
“And now?” I pressed. “Is that still what it is?”
Zeke’s voice cut in from the shadows. “Depends who you ask.”
“And if I’m asking you?”
He didn’t blink. “Then I’d say it’s a leash. One we’ve all learned to wear.”
The table went quiet.
“And me?” I asked. “Am I the key? The threat? The storm?”
Kane exhaled. “You're all three.”
Alden slammed his drink onto the table, tension radiating off him in waves.
I turned to Trace. “It was your idea to train me. Why?”
His eyes met mine. Not soft. Not kind. Just honest. “Because if anyone’s going to survive this, it’s you, Sunshine.”
The words didn’t flatter. They burned.
I stared down at the flickering candlelight between us, then lifted my glass. “Well. Here’s to being the chaos no one saw coming.”
Rhett clinked his glass against mine. “We saw it.”
I let the wine linger on my tongue, then looked up again. “So how long do I have before you stop pretending this is a vacation?”
Trace spoke first. “You’re not safe here.”
“I figured,” I said. “But why now? Why bring me? Why hide me with you?”
Alden answered, finally. “Because you were already in it, Scar. You just didn’t know yet.”
And there it was.
The truth that didn’t settle — it detonated.
I set my glass down. Smooth. Intentional. The weight of it matched the one tightening in my chest.
They watched me. But no one interrupted.
“Most of you have known me for years. You crashed my birthday parties. Slept on my couch. Acted like my friends. And through all of it… you kept this from me.”
I looked at Trace. “You trained me. You kissed me. And you still didn’t tell me.”
His stare didn’t waver. But it wasn’t defensive—it was resigned.
I turned to Alden. “You were there for everything. Every breakdown. Every night I thought I was going crazy. And you didn’t think I deserved to know the truth?”
Rhett shifted forward, elbows on the table like he wanted to fix it but didn’t know how.
Zeke finally spoke. “It wasn’t about trust.”
“No?” I shot back. “Because from where I’m sitting, it sure as hell looks like it.”
Trace’s voice came low. “We didn’t choose the rules.”
“And I didn’t choose this,” I snapped.
I stood, pushing my chair back without flinching. “So what am I to you? A liability? A loophole? Some prophecy no one wanted to deal with?”
Alden rose too. Not to challenge me. To face it.
“You were already in it,” he said. “Before any of us ever met you.”
I stared at him. “So I was born into this thing and you still decided to keep me in the dark?”
Zeke’s voice cut in again. “We didn’t know everything.”
“But you knew enough.”
I let that sit, as I sat back down in my chair. Just long enough for the sting to land.
Then I reached for my wine again and raised it slightly. “Here’s to secrets.”
Rhett tapped his glass against mine. “And whatever the hell’s coming next.”
I didn’t drink. I held his gaze, then looked down the table at the rest of them—each one trying not to flinch, not to fold.
“I’m going to ask one more time,” I said. “And I want the truth. No deflections. No riddles. No more treating me like I can’t handle it.”
Alden nodded once.
I took a breath, then met Trace’s eyes. “What the fuck is the Hollow Order?”
A pause. Not a dramatic one—just a breath they hadn’t expected to take.
“Think of it like the spine beneath everything,” Kane added. “The thing that keeps the world from snapping.”
“The spine of what?” I asked.
“Power,” Zeke said. “Control. Secrets.”
“It was built to hold the balance,” Trace added. “To keep certain things from tearing everything apart.”
“Like what?” I asked, frowning.
Rhett shrugged, his tone still unusually serious. “Sometimes people. Sometimes truths.”
“And you’re all in it?” I asked.
Each of them nodded.
“Since when?”
“Most of us were born into it,” Kane answered. “Or chosen early. It’s not something you walk away from.”
I turned to Trace. “And I was never supposed to know?”
“You were supposed to be safe,” he said.
“That worked out well,” I muttered.
Alden didn’t flinch. “You’ve known us for so long. We didn’t know how to tell you without losing you.”
“I’m not some fragile little thing you need to protect with lies,” I snapped.
“No,” Trace said, meeting my gaze again. “You’re not.
“We didn’t know how to tell you,” Rhett offered.
“No,” I snapped. “You didn’t try.”
Trace opened his mouth, but I held up a hand.
“I’m not mad that it’s dangerous,” I said. “I’m mad that you all stood there for years, acting like I wasn’t already bleeding for this.”
A crack rippled through the center of the table—the kind of silence that hummed.
“I would’ve come with you,” I said. “If you'd asked.”
Kane spoke softly, “That’s why we didn’t.”
I stood back up, slowly, my chair scraping against the wood, the hem of my dress catching in the breeze.
But I didn’t walk away. I poured more wine, let them see the fury in my posture, the way I straightened my shoulders like a warning.
“I’m not your mission,” I said. “Not your secret. Not your pawn.”
Trace’s voice was gravel. “We know.”
“Do you?” I asked. “Because every time you keep something from me, you act like you’re protecting me—but you’re just reminding me I was never given a choice.”
They didn’t answer. Maybe they couldn’t.
I stepped back from the table, fire and salt still burning in my throat.
Then, quieter, “You want me to trust you? Start treating me like I belong at this table. You keep waiting for me to break. To fold. To choose.”
I rested my hands on the back of the chair, nails digging slightly into the smooth teak. My voice was steady, but something in me wasn’t. Not anymore.
“I just think it’s funny,” I added, gaze sweeping the table. “I told you things I’ve never told anyone. Trusted you before I even knew why. And all this time, you were protecting a lie.”
Trace’s gaze didn’t flinch. But I saw it—the smallest crack behind his control.
My heart thudded once, loud in my ears. I wasn’t sure if it was fury or heartbreak.
“You don’t get to pretend this is about keeping me safe,” I said, softer now. “You weren’t protecting me. You were controlling what I knew. Watching me stumble towards something you already understood.”
I let that cut.
“I would’ve chosen you anyway, you know,” I said quietly. “All of you. Without the lies.”
A breath caught somewhere down the table. I didn’t care whose it was.
“You don’t get to call it protection,” I added. “You lied. For years.”
Still, no one argued. Which was worse.
So, I pivoted. Cold and controlled.
Because if I couldn’t have honesty, I’d take power.
“You all know I’d have to pick one of you eventually, right?”
The words dropped like a grenade.
Rhett’s glass hovered halfway to his mouth. Kane stilled. Zeke’s gaze sharpened. Trace—he stared like I’d just flipped a switch inside him.
I took a breath, then twisted the blade.
“Or none of you,” I added, voice low, cutting. “Because I can’t have all of you.”
“And that’s the thing,” I said, my voice stronger now. “You keep waiting for me to fall. To break. To choose. But I already did all that.”
Then I turned and walked away—slow, deliberate, barefoot on the warm wood.
The night opened in front of me.