“What do you mean, you’ll leave?”
“Leave,” I cried out. “Leave Amber. Leave so this stops, and you won’t do what you’re about to!”
Disbelief stole across his face before suspicion returned. “And how does that not destroy you and my brother?”
I sagged against the wall as grief overwhelmed me. Clutching my stomach and chest, lips parted as muted cries escaped me.
When I remembered how to make my lungs work, I sucked in a jagged breath and said, “Hunter will still have you. Savannah will have you. You’ll have them. Otherwise? Beau, I can feel it . . . this is destructive. We’ll all end up without each other.”
His expression sobered as he realized the depth of what I was saying—what I would do. “That wasn’t an answer.”
“Because you already know it will,” I said miserably. “But I would do it for him. I would do it for her.”
His eyes searched mine, the slightest hint of sympathy rolling through their dark depths. “You’re going to crush them.”
I nodded jerkily, a sob climbing up my throat. “Which of the two do you think they can recover from?”
After a while, he dipped his head in the slightest nod and started walking away again.
“Beau, if I—”
“I won’t,” he said softly. “You leave?” He swallowed thickly, his stare falling in shame. “I won’t say a thing.”
I sagged to the floor when he walked away as if in a daze, swinging open the door and not even bothering to ensure no one was in the hallway before stalking out. After I’d gathered myself as much as possible, I followed and slipped out of the side door, leaving the party and the house.
Desperately struggling to prepare for what was sure to be the worst moment of my life.
Wondering how badly I would come to regret that agreement and what I was about to do.
Knowing I would do absolutely anything to save those two from the debilitating nightmare I’d been living in the past two months.
Sometime during Madison’s fucked-up confession of that spring break and our graduation night, she’d ended up a handful of feet in front of me, pacing. I’d stumbled back to the porch steps and fallen to them, where I still sat.
Arms hanging between my legs.
Hands curled into fists.
Body trembling with a rage I hadn’t known existed inside me. Seeing red as if it had happened the night before and not nearly half our lives ago.
“Were you?” I asked after long minutes had passed in suffocating silence. At her confusion, I clarified, “Pregnant.”
Madison’s head began shaking, but I continued before she could verbally respond.
“Because I told you I thought that.” A cruel laugh fell from me as I roughed a hand through my hair. “That first night we talked, I said I’d thought that could’ve been why you left. Thought your parents had freaked and forced you to leave. And I just realized you never denied it. You only responded to the part about your parents.”
She lifted her hands and let them fall heavily.
Everything about her seemed heavy now. As if telling me hadn’t released a weight, it had added one.
“I ended up starting a few days after I left,” she said softly.
“A few?” A harsh breath left me. “So, what, you were three weeks late then? Did you ever take a test?”
“No,” she whispered. “No, and before you say anything, yes. I have wondered for so many years. But I never knew, Hunter.”
“And it would’ve been mine,” I said doubtfully.
Her body bowed as if my words were physical attacks. Understanding and guilt and sorrow weaving through her voice when she said, “Yes.”
“You’re sure? Because, apparently, you were fucking my brother.”
“I wasn’t—” she cried out and then buried her face in her hands. “Hunter, I didn’t know!”
“How the fuck do you not know?” I demanded.
“Do you remember how blackout-drunk we all were?” she yelled back. “I still only remember fragments of that night. Hazy flashes that barely fit together. You didn’t even remember past a certain point.”
“I would’ve known you,” I shouted. “I would’ve known your body, Madison.”
“You think that, but you can’t know,” she tried to reason. “When you kiss me, my body knows yours. My heart responds to yours. But that night . . . when I think back on it, I still cannot see Beau. It’s still you. Beau and I only pieced together what happened because of where the four of us passed out.”
“Yeah, except you’re wrong about that.”
Madison’s head jerked back. “Excuse me?”
Every word was lined with a rough edge when I explained, “Beau has a self-imposed one-drink rule because of his anger. There’s no way in hell he was even tipsy when that happened.”
“Since when?” she demanded.
“Forever,” I shouted, unable to keep calm with all the rage and adrenaline pumping through my veins. “He knew exactly what he was doing with you.”
“No. No, you didn’t see his face when he realized what happened, Hunter,” she argued vehemently. “He looked wrecked. Sick in the worst kind of way. And, one drink?” She waved her hand out to the side as if our past would be right there for us to see. “He passed out naked on the floor and woke up hungover as hell. Don’t you remember that?”
“Madison, he has a—” I went utterly, alarmingly still as memories flashed through my mind.
I’d always tried to keep up with Beau when Madison and I had started going to parties with them. Wanting to be like my older brother, who had also been my closest friend. But Beau could go harder than anyone.
Drink harder. Fight harder. Crash harder.
That’s why it’d been so staggering when he’d started limiting himself to one drink only.
“I don’t wanna lose control,” he’d said, and that had been that.
We’d all assumed he meant his anger. Because Beau and anger went hand in hand. But the first time he’d said that had been at the end of that spring break trip.
“He has a one-drink rule because of you,” I realized as acid rose in my throat.
I dragged my hands over my face as I stood. Pacing away before turning back. Not sure where I was headed, just knew I needed to walk. Leave.
Go anywhere to get away from the knowledge that the girl who owned my soul had slept with my brother.
I turned on Madison, my eyes narrowing. “Knowing my goddamn brother has touched you makes me . . .” The mental image had my words gathering in my throat, choking me.
“Hunter—”
“Does Savannah know?” I asked abruptly when the thought crashed into me like a tidal wave.
Madison’s entire being seemed to crumple as her head slowly shook.
“Are you gonna tell her?”
“Of course not.”
“Why?” I demanded, the question lashing out like a whip.
“Because—” She fumbled for a second before saying, “Because Beau is her husband. It’s his decision to tell her. Not mine.”
“You don’t think she’d wanna know?”