Page 177 of The Exit Strategy

Nolan: She slept. Ate some eggs. She’s working at her kitchen table. That’s ALL you get.

I read Nolan’s text three times.

She slept.

She ate.

So I allow my brothers to fix the shit I cannot control while I mentally draft plans to fix my relationship with Junie.

Around five,Hudson appears at my side in his natural state of angry.

“Get up,” he barks.

“Go away.”

“I swear to Christ, Cole. If you don’t get your ass up and into a shower, I’m going to hose you off where you sit. You can’t sit vigil in a destruction you caused.”

I bristle at the truth in his brutal assessment.

“Jesus,” he groans. “What I mean is, get your shit together. You’re not doing anyone any good sitting out here like a sad fucking puppy. Get inside. Get yourself cleaned up. And get. Your. Shit. Together. Before Nana Mae calls the fire department. She’s already threatened it, so don’t test her.”

That almost makes me chuckle. And I do need to use a bathroom that isn’t a bush, so I stand, swaying slightly on my feet, probably from dehydration as much as exhaustion.

“For fuck’s sake.” Hudson opens the screen door, then holds out an arm as though he expects me to fall. “Listen, Cole. I know sitting on the sidelines goes against everything in your nature—it would mine too—but you’re doing the right thing. The only thing. Trust us to untangle this mess, and in the meantime, decide what you can do to stabilize your future.”

My future is only a future if Junie is by my side, but I bat his arms away and head inside.

The house instantly feels…wrong. Unused, barren, lonely. Like I’ve been gone a month and the rooms have started making decisions without me.

Nana Mae is murmuring with Fen somewhere in the belly of the house, so I move in the opposite direction and head for my upstairs office.

The moment I enter, my gaze jumps to the window for any signs of life across the way, but nothing has changed.

Not yet.

Those words have been my crutch for years. The thing Itold myself every time Ialmostlet her in,almostasked Hudson for help,almostconfided in Nolan.

Not yetwas a door I kept locked because I was afraid of the room behind it.

There’s no door there anymore though, and now it’s time for me to walk through it.

31

ARE YOU OKAY?

JUNIE

Nolan is still passedout on my couch in a way only doctors and soldiers sleep—fully, instantly, with the assumption that someone will wake them in case of emergency.

He got up to use the restroom at one point when I was working. Then he forced me to eat with him before saying he was just going to rest for a few more minutes. He’s been out most of the day, and the only place in this entire apartment I should not be is at this window.

Yet here I am, staring straight into Cole’s office.

I’m stuck in a war inside my head. There’s a version of me who wants to charge across the driveway in my pajamas, demanding answers, and another version of me who wants to file the questions under quarterly review and never address them.

And somehow, in this battle, everyone is losing.

So instead of picking a lane, I open my curtain—an olive branch.