Our eyes connect.
Father’s returned.
We both rush to the end of the hall and lean over the banister. Father stands in the foyer, hands on hips, staring down at his feet with his two soldiers by his side. Like he can feel our presence, his head lifts, focus locking on me. When our eyes connect, the air in the entire house shifts. He shakes his head,and the look of disgust painting his features makes my stomach drop.
His frozen gaze moves to Breaker, lingering long enough to let me know that he knows.
Everything.
“You disappoint me, son,” Father says, pointing at me. “You’re a vile boy. You always have been, and now you’ve dragged my sweet, youngest son into your sickness.”
I grind my teeth, that old shame flooding my chest, coiling so tightly I feel the second it breaks.
Every single moment of my life burns through me like wildfire. Thirty-two years of bowing, bleeding, begging for scraps of his approval. It’s all meaningless now. The loyalty I’ve choked on, the twisted love he’s force-fed us, the bitter resentment I’ve swallowed down with each “Yes, Father”, all ruptures inside me. Something dark and poisonous drains from my body, leaving me hollow, weightless. Free.
Breaker snarls, moving forward, but I grip his arm to stop him. “Don’t. He’s trying to rile me.”
But it won’t work. I love my brothers. Our girls. What we share isn’t vile or sinful. His opinion doesn’t matter. It never has. I carried it around, let it burn slightly brighter when I discovered he demolished the school and the sisters who allowed my abuse, but it never really mattered.
And it never will again.
Raising a hand, Father swirls his pointer in the air. Unease sticks like a thousand ice picks along my back. 48 glances our way and then steps to the door. He opens it and a man dressed in an all-black uniform, rifle in hand, steps inside. Then another.
And another.
They continue filing in, boots thudding in unison, rifles at the ready, suppressors attached to quiet their invasion. Soldier after soldier enters the house like a silent, deadly shadow. Andwith each new soldier filling the foyer, lining up in a neat line along the wall, that worry eating my gut slowly turns to ice.
A million thoughts race through my head:Get her, find a weapon, we can overtake them, but the more soldiers that file in, the thoughts die, my fear darkening, and turning sour in my stomach.
“Who are they?” I whisper, scanning the rows of soldiers, trying to sort through my memories. Father never mentioned another school. Both of the ones he ran have been closed for years, and it’s obvious these men aren’t like us. Not even like Father’s new soldiers. They aren’t as rigid. Each one a tad sloppy in their movements as if they didn’t receive proper training. But it doesn’t take a genius to see that where they lack in precision, they make up in sheer number.
Breaker takes a step back, toward Delilah’s room behind us, the same moment I do.
“Move an inch and I’ll kill her,” Fallon barks. “The Julian girl too.”
We both freeze. Breaker’s hand finds my forearm.
“You wouldn’t,” he says, betrayal lining every word.
He would. Father will use any tool, sink to any depth to control us. To weaken us. Breaker knows it, but he’s always wanted so desperately for Father to be different. We all have. Refusing to see him for what he is.
But I see him clearly now.
“He will,” I whisper, then clear my throat and say to Father, “Why all the fuss?” I motion to the soldiers below. “You picking up random men off the streets now? These guys are sloppy.”
“These men are paid to listen,” he barks. “Unlike my sons, who can’t take a simple order.”
“These men lack discipline,” I retort. “Obviously untrained.” I grip the railing, leaning over next to Breaker. “I’m disappointed in you, Father.”
“Cash buys loyalty quicker than discipline ever could,” Fallon says. “My sons are evidence of what happens when you coddle a boy instead of forging him into a man.”
My laugh has his shoulders stiffening.
“I gave you everything—wealth, a solid foundation, my fucking affection—and you repay me by defying me.” Fallon turns to the soldier closest to him standing in the doorway. “Retrieve them.”
More soldiers flood the foyer and march toward the stairs. I step back, heart hammering against my ribs. Every instinct screams to get to her, but Father’s voice slices through the air, and my body freezes in that old familiar way. My muscles remember the lessons. The cutting belt, the nights without food, the cold and blood. One command from him and years of conditioning take over, no matter how much I hate myself for it.
My chest tightens. We’ve pushed him to this. Refusing to listen to him. Disobeying every order. Jeopardizing the mission he painstakingly planned by taking Cora, refusing to hand her over until he marched in and stole her back.
