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Baby girl...
Brielle’s eyes soften, a small curve to her lips. I don’t realize I’ve moved closer until I’m shoved aside, and Bass slips between us.
He dashes up the steps, grips her by the arm, and pulls.
I lose my shit, dart forward, rip his arm from her body and gently nudge her back.
My brothers come to stand before her, and Bass’ eyes shoot wide.
“Are you for fucking real?!” he shouts. “You want to guard her from me? That’s my fucking sister!”
Brielle’s hand lands on Captain’s arm and his eyes find mine.
I give him no sign, so when she goes to step around him, he lets her.
She steps closer, toward me, and my gut twists when she inches past. “Bass, please. Don’t do this.”
“Seriously?!” is shouted from behind us and all eyes snap that way.
Barbie sits on the edge of the door, her arms folded over the hood. “We drove ten fucking hours through the night to get to you, then you ignore him for days, and that’s the first shit you say when he whoops ass in your name?!”
“Shut up!” Bass shouts.
You can spot her eye roll from here. “What, you know you’re thinking the same thing!”
He whips around. “I said—”
“Yeah, yeah,” she cuts him off, dropping back in the seat and rolling up the window.
Brielle tips her head, squinting at the car, at the girl. “Who is that?”
“Don’t.” He glares at her. “Get in the car, Brielle. Now.”
My heart stops.
She can’t leave.
I need her here, we need her here.
As if he could hear my inner thoughts, he says to her, “You don’t belong here, Brielle. Let’s go.”
“You’re an idiot if you think that’s true.”
“And you don’t know shit,” he forces past clenched teeth. “Stay the fuck out of it.”
“I know you haven’t been to see her, that you don’t have someone watching out for her. That you pretty fucking much dropped her and ran and she was miserable before us.”
He rushes me, pushing his bloody forehead to mine. “Watch it.”
“Nah, motherfucker.” I’m getting pissed over my own words, over what she went through. “You watch it. You might not be under our thumb no more, punk, but don’t forget where you’re at. I could run you over with that sweet little ride of yours, and there ain’t shit you could do about it.”
“I will—”
I meet his step forward with one of my own. “You’ll what?”
“Stop!” Brielle shouts, coming down the stairs and facing off with us both. She frowns from me to him. She looks ready to say something, to shout, but the longer she stands there, staring at him, reality slips back where it belongs, front and fucking center.
This is her brother, her family.
The one person in the world she felt she could—can—depend on. Her safe place.
And she’s missed him, she told me so.
What am I supposed to do? Make her choose between me and him? One or the other?
We’re no longer in the same place, so how can she have us both?
If she leaves, I’ll crumble.
It will break me.
Goddamn it, I might have to follow her.
But my family...
“Stop thinking about what you want, Brielle, and think about what’s best for you.” Bass glares at her.
I almost feel bad for the dickhead after that, because those are the wrong words to say to the girl who has only ever done what her big brother asked of her.
Brielle comes down the steps, her eyes tight, unease heavy within them, but she’s strong, and she’s ready to make him understand.
So I step back and let her take the lead.Brielle“Are you really going to stand here and pretend you know what’s best for me?” I ask, but not for a response. “You have no clue what my life has looked like since the day I was sent away, and now I know that all that time you lied to me about the one thing in my life I hated more than our parents.” My voice dies down, and my brother’s features grow taut. “Do you even know what that was?”
Royce is closer now, too far to touch, but close enough to feel.
My silent support.
My lungs expand. “Not being able to be with you, forced, or so I thought, to be separated from you.” A low laugh leaves me. “You were all I ever had, Bass. Did you not feel like half of you is missing when we were apart like I did? Are you really just happy living this lavish life somewhere else? A life I don’t even know about where you have a fancy car and drive around with Miss America in your front seat? I mean, am I nothing to you?”
He slips closer, his eyes pleading. “I have done all of this for us both. I came here alone, sent you there, left, found somewhere to create a brand-new fucking life for us.”
