That's what made it infectious, and my mouth curved before I could stop it. Any day I got that out of her was a win because those moments were getting rarer the closer we crept to the top.
My phone buzzed.
Ezra’s laugh cut off clean, her eyes snapping to my hand.
Valentina's message crossed my screen.
Val:Missing you!
A photo of Val and her friends came in next, all of them crammed into the Syndicate booth at Cerc, glasses raised, smiles bright and careless.
I chuckled and typed back.
Cal:Have fun, babe. I’ll see you soon.
“That Valentina?” Ezra asked.
I slid my phone into my pocket and nodded. I didn’t miss the shift in her voice, small, but there. She hid her feelings from everyone else, but I’d grown up listening between her words.
“Yeah,” I said, pushing just a little. “She was pretty upset she couldn’t come tonight.”
Ezra’s gaze drifted across the club, over the lights, the bodies, our sisters, anywhere but me. She hummed once, noncommittal.
“Mm.”
That was it.
The music kept pounding. The crowd kept moving. But something settled between us all the same. It was quiet, solid, like a wall being built one brick at a time.
I leaned back, staring at the ceiling, letting the noise wash over me.
Val wasn’t supposed to be here. Tonight was for us, the Desmond kids, before responsibility closed its grip and never let go again.
Five of us against the world.
Plus, I wasn’t the kind of man who dragged his girlfriend everywhere like a lifeline. At least… that was what I told myself.
Ezra’s silence pressed heavier than the music.
It always circled back to Valentina. Every time. No fights over power, no arguments about strategy, no sibling rivalry sharp enough to draw blood, just this one name that turned Ezra distant and closed off.
I remembered what I was thinking before I came here, and I knew, eventually, she’d have to make peace with it.
Especially if what I was planning for this weekend went through.
Ezra never did anything halfway, and if she decided to accept Val, she’d do it fully. Even if she was just doing it for me.
We’d grown up shoulder to shoulder, less than a year between us, always stationed at the front while the others ran wild behind us. We learned early how to speak plainly, how to call each other out without flinching. Nothing ever festered between us.
Except this.
With Nova and Aniyah swallowed by the dance floor and Riot pacing the edge like a sentry, there wasn’t a better moment. Public. Busy. Safe.
I drew a breath and Ezra’s phone lit up.
The change in her was instant. Her brows pinched, spine stiffened, and jaw locked. Something was bothering her badly, and the words I’d been lining up to say dissolved in an instant.
“What’s wrong?” I asked instead.
