Page 95 of Broken Blades

Not even the controlling, manipulative man who'd trapped me in this arrangement.

Just… Wyatt.

Complicated. Damaged. Kind in ways that contradicted everything I thought I knew.

My hands tightened on the barrier until my knuckles went white.

This man isn't who they say he is.

The thought settled into my chest like a stone. Heavy. Unavoidable. Terrifying.

Because if my father was wrong about Wyatt—if the narrative I'd been fed was incomplete, distorted, deliberately cruel—then what else had I gotten wrong?

A shiver ran down my spine that had nothing to do with the cold.

I watched Wyatt lift another child onto his shoulders, watched him laugh at something she said, watched him transform into someone I hadn't known existed beneath all that armor.

And somewhere deep in my chest, something shifted.

Cracked.

Began to crumble.

Because now I didn't know who should terrify me more. My father, who'd handed me over without hesitation. Or the man I was starting to fall for.

Chapter 18

Wyatt

I stepped off the ice, skates heavy against the rubber matting. My chest felt tight. Wrong. Like something had crawled inside and made a home there without permission.

Barbara's voice still echoed in my skull. Sharp. Cutting. Accurate.

This relationship is a joke.

She wasn't wrong.

Except Chastity had stood there and made it real. Defended me like I was worth defending. Touched me like it was natural—fixing my collar, straightening my tie, brushing my shoulders with hands that didn't flinch away from my scars.

Kissing my cheek.

Kissing my goddamn cheek.

Like she had every right to.

Like I was hers.

I shouldn't have let it happen. Shouldn't have stood there frozen while she claimed me in front of the woman who'd destroyed my life. Shouldn't have felt that ugly, unwanted warmth spreading through my chest when she'd said there was nothing she had to pretend with me.

But I did.

And now I couldn't shake it.

I'd watched her from the ice while skating with the kids. Caught glimpses of her standing at the barrier, face soft with something I didn't want to name. She'd laughed when a toddler spun in dizzy circles around me. Actually laughed—bright and unguarded and devastating.

That sound had done something to me.

Something dangerous.