Page 16 of Beautiful When He Breaks

He holds my gaze for a beat, then nods once. “Yeah.”

When he leaves, the room feels immediately emptier. I hate how much I need him. I hate that I lost months with him because I didn’t want to hear the truth about Celeste. I hate that he was right. I hate that I’m still too scared to ask who gave him those bruises because some selfish part of me knows once I ask, this morning will get even darker, and I don’t know how to carry one more thing.

I sit there with my daughter asleep on my chest and the first pale wash of morning creeping into the room. I don’t go back to sleep. I just stay there, listening to her breathing, and try not to think about too much at once.

My parents. Celeste. The DNA test. The legal papers. The possibility that this child is mine. The possibility that she isn’t. The possibility that if she is, the way she got here says something I’m still not brave enough to look at straight on for more than a second.

5

Eli

By the next morning, the Sin Bin feels different. Not quiet—this house doesn’t know how to be quiet—but altered somehow.

Somewhere downstairs, Ryan is swearing at the coffee machine, Thorn’s voice carries from the kitchen, low and irritated, followed by Roman telling him to stop standing in front of the fridge with the door open because he isn’t communing with the fucking leftovers. Someone drops a pan. Liam says something sharp. Damien laughs once, but even that sounds careful. He’s leaving today, and I’m sure this isn’t how he thought he’d be spending it.

The baby is asleep in the bassinet beside my bed, one tiny fist poking free from the blanket, her face turned slightly toward me. I’m sitting on the edge of the mattress in sweatpants and a wrinkled shirt, elbows on my knees, watching her breathe because I still don’t fully trust the silence. Every soft inhale feels like a miracle I’m responsible for keeping alive. Every quiet second feels loaded, and she’s waiting for me to prove I know what the fuck I’m doing.

She looks too peaceful for the amount of damage she has done to my life in less than forty-eight hours.

No, that’s wrong. She hasn’t done damage; adults did that. Celeste did that. Her parents did that. Maybe something worse did that, something my brain still refuses to touch directly because the second I look at it too long, my stomach turns cold and my skin feels tight.

The baby just exists. She breathes, and I lose my mind a little more.

I’m still staring at her when there’s a soft knock at my open door. It’s not Julian; I know that before I turn my head. Julian doesn’t knock like that—he knocks once and comes in. This knock is controlled, quieter, and somehow more intimidating.

Killian is standing in the doorway with two cups of coffee from the cafe close to campus. He’s already dressed for the day—black jeans, Henley, and an expression carved into that calm, unreadable look that makes half the campus step out of his way without knowing why.

“Can I come in?” he asks.

I almost laugh, because this is Killian’s house, and he can walk into any room he wants. He still asks, and for some reason, that makes my throat tighten.

“Yeah,” I say, my voice rough. “Sure.”

He steps in and sets one coffee on my nightstand. “Liam said you haven’t eaten.”

“Liam needs to find a new hobby when Nate isn’t around.”

“Liam’s hobby is pretending he doesn’t care while caring hard enough to piss everyone off,” Killian says, taking the chair from my desk and turning it around before sitting on it backward. “Drink the coffee before it gets cold.”

I reach for it because arguing feels like a waste of energy. The first sip burns my tongue, and I welcome it. Pain, I can understand, because it has rules. It starts somewhere, does damage, and fades if you wait long enough. This thing in my chest doesn’t fade. It just shifts position every few minutes and finds a new place to press.

Killian’s eyes move to the bassinet, and his whole expression changes almost imperceptibly.

“She sleep okay?” he asks.

I look at her too. “I think so. She woke up once. Jules handled most of it.”

He nods. “Julian’s good with her.”

The words hit in a place already bruised. I look down into the coffee because it’s easier than looking at him. “Yeah. He is.”

Killian doesn’t comment on whatever he hears in my voice. He’s too smart for that, or too kind in his own fucked-up way. He doesn’t say the thing everyone in this house has been thinking since yesterday afternoon, that Julian knows what the fuck he’s doing, and I keep moving like I’m afraid my own hands are weapons.

He leans his forearms across the back of the chair, coffee hanging from one hand. “I need to talk to you about today.”

My stomach drops at the thought.

Lawyers. DNA. Child services. My parents. Celeste. The ugly blank spaces in my memory. The baby who is currently sleeping in a bassinet I didn’t own forty-eight hours ago.