Brody speaks at last. “He’s not going to touch you, Georgie. I won’t let him. I swear to you.”
The tears come again, this time hot and silent. I press my face to my knees and let them fall—but only for a minute. I then lift my head and wipe my eyes. “I don’t want to run,” I breathe out. “But I don’t know how to stand up to him.”
“You won’t have to do it alone,” Emmett says.
“We’re with you all the way,” Miles echoes. “I promise.”
Brody unfolds his arms, crosses the room, and kneels in front of me. He takes my hands and holds them. “Your father doesn’t get to tell you what to do anymore, Georgia. You decide what happens next, and we’ll back you up.”
He holds my gaze, and I feel the smallest flicker of strength.
“Okay,” I say, voice still hoarse but a little steadier. “We’ll face him.Together.”
Because there’s still no way in hell I can do this alone.
Chapter 23
Georgia
Ihave no idea what the fuck I’m supposed to do when he gets here. I mean, yeah, okay, we’re going to stand up to him, but what exactly does that entail? As my mind races, I suddenly hear it.
Footsteps.
Then comes a knock on the door—which is loud as fuck.
All four of us freeze.
Miles sets his phone down, face wiped blank as if he’s prepping for cross-examination. Emmett sucks in a breath, trying for a supportive grin but landing somewhere closer to a grimace. Brody doesn’t move, but I see the muscles in his jaw twitch.
Here we go.
I hear the click of the external latch, and my heart launches into my throat. The cabin door swings open, ricocheting off the wall with a bang. I wince, instantly clenching my hands into fists.
My father—tall, broad-shouldered, in a navy polo and khaki slacks—fills the doorway. His face is full of pure anger, eyes narrowed and mouth set in a line.
I open my mouth to say something, anything, but all that comes out is a squeak.
He doesn’t even look at me. His eyes are locked directly on Brody, and in that split second, I see a flash of something on Brody’s face. It’s not fear and not quite guilt either. It’s more like the resignation you feel when you realize you’re standing in the path of a freight train.
And that’s the perfect freaking analogy for my father right now.
“Un-fucking-believable,” my father says, voice a blade.
I feel Emmett bristle next to me. “Robert,” he starts, but my father steamrolls him with a glance.
“She walked in on thefourof you in bed.” The words are like gunfire, echoing off the glass and stainless. “Seriously… what the fuck is this, Brody? Some kind of sick fantasy you decided to act out? She’smy daughter.”
The heat of humiliation rises in my neck so fast I almost choke. Miles tries to move his chair closer to mine, shielding me with his shoulder, but I wave him off with a flick of my hand.
I want to run.
I want to disappear, to be a thousand miles away from this confrontation, but instead I fix my gaze on the window, watching the way sunlight fractures on the water.
“Robert, this isn’t—” Brody’s voice is gravelly, raw. “It’s not what you think. It’s not just some orgy or something.”
My father laughs, the sound dry and caustic. “Not what I think? Because what I think is that you’re a fucking traitor.” He points a rigid finger at Brody, then wheels around to face the others. “And you two, what’s your excuse? You have nothing better to do than run a train on a girl half your age? What the hell?”
Miles’s face turns to ice. “Georgia’s not a child. We’re all consenting adults?—”
