Until I can't speak.

If I can't speak, I can't lie.

And if I can't lie, I won't have to live in this version of purgatory, caught between protecting him and destroying his world.

The yard falls silent, every pair of eyes burns into us. I feel like most of my life I've been living in a zoo anyway, so this seems fitting. The anger that's been brewing for years boils over, impossible to contain any longer.

"Open your fucking eyes, Jake."

The words hang heavy in the humid air, and for a moment, confusion flickers across his expression. It's like he doesn't want to hear what I'm saying, doesn't want to acknowledge the cracks in the perfect picture he's painted of our father. The willful blindness in his eyes just feeds the fire in my chest.

"If you think he actually gives two fucks about you, you're setting yourself up for heartache," I continue, my voice low but firm. Each word feels like glass in my throat. "You're a pawn in his game, and the second you cross him, he'll forget you're his blood."

Jake's face hardens, his jaw tightening as anger flashes in his eyes. "Wow. You really do have your head so far up your own ass you can't hear the shit you're spitting out."

"Paint me as the villain all you want," I say, stepping closer, the weight of years of secrets pressing against my chest like a stone. "But you're making a bed with the devil, so you better be ready to sleep in it, because I'm done protecting you from him."

"I never needed you protecting me from shit!" he yells, his voice cutting through the buzz of the party like a knife.

The hardest part?

He has no idea how wrong he is. But he'll learn.

He has to.

Even if watching that realization break him breaks me, too.

54. Like A Bull In A China Shop

CHAPTER 54

LIKE A BULL IN A CHINA SHOP

NORA

Nate's voice slices through the air as cold as ever.

"But you're making a bed with the devil, so you better be ready to sleep in it, because I'm done protecting you from him."

Jake's response erupts, raw and jagged. "I never needed you to protect me from shit!"

My heart stutters in my chest. I've seen Jake angry before—storming off after fights with Nate—but this feels different. This anger has teeth, deep-rooted and poisonous, like something that's been festering beneath the surface for years.

I stand frozen, anxiety crawling up my throat like thorns. Every muscle in my body screams to move, to do something, but I'm paralyzed in this familiar space—the no-man's land between two brothers tearing each other apart. It's killing me watching the people I love most turn into strangers before my eyes.

"Jake, please—" My voice comes out soft, pleading, as I step toward him.

He doesn't look at me. "Not now, Nora."