Rhett called for everyone to find a seat,and the motion was instinctual, fluid—Delilah reached for the pot holders, Willow passed the baby to Rhett without missing a beat, and June looped her arm through Silas’s on their way to the table like they were the couple on top of a wedding cake. Whit grabbed plates. Holden was still chewing. Everyone moved around each other like they were dancing a routine they’d practiced a thousand times, and I?—
—I followed.
Sat down next to Beau because I knew it would be weird not to.
Accepted a plate from Delilah without thinking.
Let Willow refill my wine glass.
And smiled back at Hazel when she reached for my necklace with sticky fingers and a gummy grin.
The domesticity wrapped around me like a weighted blanket. Safe…familiar, addictive.
Terrifying.
Because this was exactly how it happened, wasn’t it? Not with ropes and force and cages—but with casserole and clean towels and someone remembering how you take your coffee. With Beau’s hand on my knee under the table, steady and sure, like he already knew I was going to stay.
Shane would have said this is how you get inducted into a cult, and it was a cult I was more than happy to join.
“Silas and I were actually just talking about this,” June said, nodding toward me. “How the town has a way of pulling people in.”
“Like quicksand,” Whit added helpfully.
“Or Venus flytraps,” Delilah offered. “Pretty and sticky.”
Beau glanced at me, brow furrowed. “You okay?”
I smiled, but I could feel it wobble. “Yeah. Just…thinking.”
Because they didn’t mean it to sound sinister. I knew that. These were good people. Beautiful people. People who’dsurvived enough bad that they clung to the good with both hands.
But it was starting to feel like everyone was waiting for me to take my place.
Like the puzzle was nearly finished and they’d just been missing one last piece.
Me.
They kept talking, comfortable family banter filling the room…but a spooky sensation was crawling up my spine, like fingers curling around my neck. I looked from Willow, Rhett, and baby Hazel…to June and Silas, making gaga eyes at each other like they were fucking brainwashed.
And I remembered.
Beau was the middle brother.
Beau was thethird oldest.
And I’d been dropped in his lap just like these other two women—like a fucking gift from whatever fertility god this family seemed to worship.
Beau looked over at me, frowning. “You good?”
I nodded too quickly. “Yeah…yeah, I just…I just need some air.”
I felt every set of eyes on me as I abruptly pushed my chair out, leaving a full plate behind and a less-full glass of wine. The walk to the front door was short enough that I didn’t melt down before I got there, and then I was pushing it open, stepping onto the porch, met with?—
—the woods.
The deep, dark, deadly woods.
It was yet another reminder that this place…it wasn’t for me. I was supposed to go back to the city, surround myself with cement walls and pavement. My apartment was waiting. My life.
