Page 17

Maybe that’s why I’ve been terrified to touch it.

Jacob keeps going before I can argue. “You help everyone else first, like taking care of people is the only kind of wanting you’ll allow yourself.”

Asshole is aiming for the ribs today.

He glances toward Lyla’s maroon Trailblazer, his face changing the way it always does when he looks at her. Softer. Younger. Less haunted.

“I was afraid to let someone else in too. After Sheila, I thought being alone was what I deserved. Like if I let myself be happy, it meant I’d failed her all over again.” He shakes his head and turns back to me. “But Lyla taught me something I probably should’ve figured out sooner. We don’t honor the people we lost by refusing to live. We honor them by fighting for whatever light we can still find.”

Fuck.

As little brothers go, I lucked into mine.

Even if he was a little shit in the beginning.

But he doesn’t understand the whole shape of it. Clair doesn’t need that part of me right now. She needs a trainer. Someone steady. Someone who won’t turn her trust into pressure. Someone who won’t make her regret saying my name after the word need.

I will give her that.

I will give her whatever she asks from me.

And nothing else unless she asks for that too.

I open the driver’s door and slide behind the wheel. Jacob stays planted beside my truck like a persistent rash with decent cheekbones.

“Just don’t close the door on this.” He leans closer, one hand on the door, and grins. “Look at us. For once, I’m giving you advice on love. Mom would cry.”

Yep. Had to go and ruin the moment. I press the window button. The glass starts sliding up.

Jacob bends to keep talking through the shrinking gap. “Just remember, I’ll always love you. Even though you’re chicken shit.”

I flip him off through the glass.

He laughs, stumbling back toward the ER van as the window seals shut.

Dickhead.

Engines rumble across camp.

One by one, our little caravan wakes up.

Clair’s silver Outback sits two vehicles behind me, packed tight with supplies, blankets, weapons, and everything we have left to carry from one temporary home to the next.

My gaze goes to her in the rearview mirror.

Always does.

Her shoulders sit too tight beneath her jacket. Her knuckles have gone white around the steering wheel.

I’ve seen that look before.

High school bleachers. Friday nights under stadium lights. Russ leaning in close, voice low and sharp, saying things no one else could hear. Her smile stayed in place because Clair learned early how to make a mask look pretty, but her hands always gave her away. Fingers curled into her sleeves. Body folding smaller by the second, inch by inch.

Trying to disappear without anyone noticing.

Now it sits in the set of her shoulders. In the way she looks at herself like she’s still waiting for someone to tell her she failed.

This shit ends tomorrow.