“Okay,” he says. “Fine. I’m just gonna say it.”
He leans forward, forearms on the table, hands clasped like he’s trying to hold himself still.
“What is going on with you and Logan?”
The question is simple.
It detonates anyway.
My heart stutters. Heat crawls up my neck like I’m fifteen again and caught doing something I wasn’t supposed to.
I stare at the plate so I don’t have to look at Cameron’s face.
“Nothing,” I say automatically.
Cameron’s laugh is short. Humorless. “Sloane.”
I flinch at the way he says my name.
Not angry.
Not loud.
Just…brother.
Like he’s asking me to be real with him for once.
I lift my eyes to meet his.
His face looks different now. Sorrow has carved itself into him. His eyes are dull, like someone took the brightness out. There’s anger there, too, simmering under his skin. Not directed at me. Just…in the room. In the world. In the fact that Pops is gone and Cameron couldn’t stop it.
He’s trying to keep me alive the same way he tried to keep Pops alive.
By controlling what he can.
And apparently, what he can’t control right now is Logan Brooks.
I swallow.
“What do you mean?” I stall, because if I can keep him talking, maybe I won’t have to.
Cameron’s jaw flexes. He lifts a brow. “Don’t do that.”
I exhale shakily. “Cam.”
“Just tell me,” he says, quieter now. “Because I’ve been watching. And I’m not stupid.”
My stomach rolls.
I want to say,You are stupid. I want to deflect with sarcasm, with bite.
But the truth is—I don’t have the energy to pretend.
Not today.
Not when every part of me already feels like it’s been peeled raw.
So I inhale. Slowly.
