Chapter 27 Candace
Chapter twenty-seven
Candace
The puzzle was mocking me.
Three hundred pieces of golden retriever, spread across Sebastian's hospital tray like a jigsaw crime scene. I'd been working on the same patch of fur for twenty minutes, and I was starting to suspect the manufacturer had included duplicate pieces just to torture people.
"That one goes there," Sebastian said, pointing lazily from his reclined position.
I squinted at the piece in my hand, then at the spot he'd indicated. "No it doesn't."
"Yes it does."
"It's the wrong shade of yellow."
"Candace." He raised an eyebrow. "It's a dog. The whole thing is yellow."
I shoved the piece into place.
It fit perfectly.
"I hate you."
His grin was slow and irritating and did absolutely nothing to my stomach.
"No you don't."
The room smelled of industrial cleaner and the faint sweetness of the flowers Rosie had brought yesterday—already wilting in their plastic vase. Monitors beeped their steady rhythm in the background, a sound I'd grown so used to I barely heard it anymore.
But he looked better. So much better than that first day—than those horrible hours when machines breathed for him and monitors beeped warnings I didn't understand.
The grayish pallor had faded, replaced by something warmer, more alive.
He'd showered this morning, his dark hair curling wild and unruly against his forehead.
A buzz came from my bag.
I ignored it.
"You going to get that?" Sebastian asked.
"Nope."
He raised a brow. "Persistent, whoever it is."
"Persistent is one word for it."
He studied me for a second. The fog that had clouded his eyes those first few days had cleared completely now. Now he was sharp. Annoyingly so.
"Ex?" he guessed.
"Something like that."
He nodded slowly, not pushing. Just accepting.
That was the thing about Sebastian. He didn't pry. Didn't demand explanations or answers I wasn't ready to give. He just... let me be.
It was why I kept coming back.
I'd bolted that first day—running the moment he'd recognized my voice, the moment he'd fixed that confused, searching gaze on me and called me an angel. I'd fled like a coward, mortified that he'd heard. Every pathetic confession I'd poured out in the safety of his unconsciousness.
So I'd come back the next day. Just to check on him, I'd told myself.
And the day after that.
And every day for the past two weeks.
I'd been there when they moved him out of the ICU.
Been there when he took his first shaky steps with the physical therapist, his face gray with effort and his knuckles white on the walker.
Been there the day he was transferred—watching Rosie fuss over the wheelchair while Sebastian insisted he could walk to the new room.
He'd lost that argument.
It gave me something to focus on. Something that wasn't Garrett's relentless texts or the bruise that had finally faded from my cheek or the hollow ache of rebuilding a life I'd let someone else dismantle.
Here, in this room, I could almost forget all of it.
Almost.
The door swung open.
Damien stepped through, looking more relaxed than I'd seen him in weeks. The permanent furrow between his brows had softened, and a lightness in his expression.
"Hey." He nodded at me, then Sebastian. "How's the patient?"
"Annoying," I said.
Sebastian's mouth twitched.
"Emma's not with you?" I asked, noticing the rarely empty space beside him.
"Nah." He settled into the chair across from me, stretching his legs out. "She's taking the day for herself. I booked her a massage and a facial at that spa on Fifth."
I smiled. "Good. She deserves it."
Hospital visits, work, taking care of everyone but herself. She deserved every minute of that massage.
"Aww," Sebastian whined from the bed. "I was looking forward to some more eye candy."
"Watch it," Damien warned. "She's mine."
Sebastian's grin widened. "That's what you said about those race cars when we were kids. I sold those suckers for a popsicle." He tilted his head, feigning innocence. "Maybe Emma would be willing to help me with my next shower—"
"Finish that sentence and I'll put you back in the coma myself."
I snorted, nearly choking on my own spit.
Sebastian chuckled. "You wouldn't. Mom would kill you."
"Worth it."
"You know," I said, keeping my voice light, "Emma and I used to shower together at camp."
Both brothers froze.
Two sets of dark eyes swiveled toward me in perfect unison.
I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing. Oh, this was too good.
"Keep going," Sebastian prompted.
I glanced at Damien. He was trying—and failing spectacularly—to look disinterested. The flicker in his expression and gape of his mouth betraying him completely.
Oh, this is going to be fun.
"We were thirteen," I continued, leaning back in my chair like I was settling in for a long story. "The camp bathrooms were in this creepy old building at the edge of the woods. No lights after ten. We were terrified to go alone."
Sebastian nodded eagerly. "Understandable. Continue."
"So we'd go together. Hold hands on the walk over. Keep watch for each other." I sighed wistfully. "There was this one night—a thunderstorm knocked the power out. We had to shower in complete darkness."
Damien's throat bobbed, eyes glazing over.
"Just the two of us," I added. "All that steam. Soap suds everywhere. Emma dropped the shampoo bottle and we both screamed, grabbing onto each other..."
Sebastian was leaning forward now, puzzle completely forgotten.
"And then," I said, dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "With water dripping down her body we—"
"Okay. That's enough." Damien's words came out strangled.
Sebastian and I burst out laughing.
"You're a monster." Sebastian laughed. "An actual monster."
"You should see your faces." I wiped a tear from my eye.
Damien scrubbed a hand over the neatly kept scruff on his jaw, cheeks tinged pink. "You're as bad as he is."
"Worse," I corrected cheerfully. "I'm worse."
Sebastian chuckled, then turned to Damien with an expression of pure innocence.
"Speaking of Emma—I've been meaning to ask." He paused, scratching his chin thoughtfully. "How is she in bed?"
The room went dead silent.
Damien's left eyelid twitched. "What did you just say?"
"You heard me." Sebastian shrugged like he'd asked about the weather. "I'm curious. She seems like she'd be a wildcat. Am I right? I'm right, aren't I?"
"I will smother you with that pillow."
"What?" Sebastian threw his hands up, the picture of wounded innocence. "Isn't this what brothers are supposed to talk about? Locker room stuff? Male bonding?"
"We have never once talked about this."
"Well, maybe that's our problem. Maybe if we'd communicated more openly about our sexual experiences, I wouldn't have ended up in a coma."
Damien stared at him. "That logic makes absolutely no sense."
"Doesn't it though?" Sebastian tapped his temple. "Think about it."
"I'm not thinking about it. I'm thinking about how easy it would be to unplug one of these machines."
"You wouldn't."
"Try me."
Damien leaned back in his chair, arms crossed, trying to look stern—but the corner of his mouth kept twitching.
And Sebastian, propped up against his pillows like a king holding court, seemed to live for every crack in his brother's composure.
They had the same jaw. The same stubborn set to their shoulders.
But where Damien was controlled, contained—every emotion locked behind a fortress of professionalism—Sebastian let everything spill out.
Every smirk, every eye roll, every terrible joke delivered with the timing of a man who knew exactly how annoying he was being.
And I loved every second of it.
"You know," Sebastian mused, "for a guy who runs a billion-dollar company, you're remarkably easy to rile up."
"And for a guy who almost died, you're remarkably determined to finish the job."
"What can I say?" Sebastian spread his hands wide. "I like to live dangerously."
"Clearly," Damien muttered. But there was no venom in it. Just exhaustion. And beneath that—so far beneath I almost missed it—relief.
He'd almost lost his brother.
I'd been so focused on Sebastian's recovery, on the day-to-day progress, that I'd almost forgotten the terror that had preceded it. The phone call that had shattered Damien's world. The waiting. The not knowing.
Emma had told me pieces of it. How Damien had barely slept those first few days. How he'd talked to Sebastian for hours, even when the doctors said he probably couldn't hear.
Looking at them now—bickering over baseball cards and sponge baths like nothing had happened—I understood something I hadn't before.
This was how the Holts loved.
Not with soft words or tender declarations. With insults and threats and the unshakable certainty that no matter how bad things got, they'd show up. Again and again and again.
My phone buzzed again.
I groaned, pulling it from my purse and slipping from the room. Sebastian's gaze burning holes in my back.
The hallway was quiet. Sterile. The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, casting everything in that flat, unforgiving white that made even the healthy look ill. I leaned against the wall and looked at my screen.
Twelve missed calls.
Forty-three texts.
All from Garrett.
I scrolled with numb fingers, watching the messages shift like a mood ring from black to red.
Garrett: I miss you.
Garrett: Can we please talk?
Garrett: I'm trying here, Candace. I'm really trying.
Garrett: I went to therapy today. I'm getting help. For you.
Garrett: Why won't you answer me?
Garrett: I saw your Instagram story. You're at the hospital again?
Garrett: Who's the guy in the background?
Garrett: Candace.
Garrett: Candace answer me.
Garrett: I swear to god if you're fucking someone else.
Garrett: After everything I've done for you.
Garrett: You ungrateful bitch.
Garrett: I'm sorry. I didn't mean that.
Garrett: Please. I love you. I'm just scared of losing you.
Garrett: Pick up the phone.
Garrett: PICK UP THE FUCKING PHONE.
Garrett: I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Please.
The messages blurred together.
Love, rage, remorse. Rinse and repeat.
My phone trembled against my palm.
He's escalating. A small voice whispered. This is how it starts.
Memories surfaced unbidden. The ones I'd buried so deep I'd almost convinced myself they weren't real.
That night at the club two years ago. I'd gone to get us drinks and the bartender was slammed, so I'd waited. A guy next to me had struck up a conversation—something harmless about the music, the crowd. I'd laughed at a joke. Nothing more.
But Garrett had seen.
Later, in the hotel room, he'd pinned me to the bed. His weight crushing the air from my lungs while he screamed in my face. Whore. Slut.
I'd tried to explain. Tried to apologize for something I hadn't done.
He hadn't listened.
He'd fucked me instead.
It took me years to admit what it was.
Rape.
Hard and angry, his fingers digging bruises into my hips while I cried and begged him to stop.
And afterward—afterward he'd held me so gently. Kissed my tears away. Told me he was sorry, that he just loved me so much it made him crazy.
I'd believed him.
God help me, I'd believed him.
And then the night I'd come home late from Emma's apartment. We'd been watching movies, lost track of time. My phone had died.
Garrett had been waiting in the dark.
You love her more than me, he'd spat. You'd rather be with her than me. Is that it? Am I not enough for you?
I'd tried to calm him down. Tried to explain.
But he'd kept going. Tone rising. Eyes blackening. Until finally—finally—he'd pressed two fingers to his temple like a gun.
Maybe I should just do it, he'd said. End it. Would that make you happy? Would you even care?
I still remembered the way he'd mimed pulling the trigger. The sound he'd made—bang—while staring straight into my eyes.
I'd stayed up all night after that. Terrified to sleep. Terrified to leave. Terrified that if I did anything wrong, I'd wake up to find him dead and know it was my fault.
That was the night I'd learned to make myself smaller. Quieter. To shrink into whatever shape kept him calm.
Now I stood in the hospital hallway, the memories circling like vultures, each pass taking a piece of me with it.
I stared at the phone in my hand.
Forty-three texts.
Twelve missed calls.
I closed my eyes. Counted to three.
It's over. You left. You're safe. He can't hurt you anymore.
The words rang hollow. Rehearsed. A mantra I'd been repeating for weeks without ever quite believing it.
You're in a hospital. There are people everywhere. He doesn't know where you are. He can't—
My phone buzzed.
Garrett: I know you're reading these. I can see the little checkmarks. Stop ignoring me or I swear to god Candace I will find you and we will have this conversation in person.
The air left my lungs.
The door behind me swung open.
"Candace?" Damien's concern carried toward me. "Everything okay?"
I spun around quickly, shoving the phone into my pocket before the smile hit my face.
"All good!" I chirped. "Just my mom. You know how she is. Wanted to make sure I was eating enough vegetables. I told her hospital Jell-O counts as a fruit, but she wasn't convinced."
Damien studied me.
I held the smile. Didn't let it waver.
Nothing to see here. Just bubbly, carefree Candace. Life of the party. Never a problem in the world.
"You sure?" he asked.
"Positive." I patted his arm and slipped past him toward the door. "Now come on. Your brother's probably fucking up the puzzle as we speak."
My phone sat in my pocket, heavy as a grenade with the pin half-pulled.
Waiting.