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“I’m not going anywhere. You can yell at me. You can tell me to leave. You can be angry all you want, but I’m still going to be here,” I told him. His lips pressed together tightly, his expression barely wavering. “You don’t have to be okay for me. You don’t have to calm down just because I’m here. If it hurts, then let it hurt. If you’re angry, be angry. And if you need to fall apart, Rhodes, it’s okay. I’m right here.”

He stared at me. The anger drained from his expression, leaving only devastation and raw pain with nowhere left to go. My heart broke. I hated seeing him like this. I hated knowing there was nothing I could say or do that would make this hurt less.

Slowly, I reached out and let my fingers brush against the back of his hand. He flinched at the contact, but he didn’t pull away. Instead, his fingers loosened, and I slid my hand into his. His grip closed around mine so hard it almost hurt.

That was all the permission I needed.

“I’m going to be here for all of it,” I promised, stepping closer. “I’m not leaving you, Rhodes.”

He squeezed his eyes shut and blew out an unsteady breath. I brought my free hand carefully to his forearm, testing how far he’d let me go. He didn’t move as I slid my hand up his arm. One tear slipped from his lashes, and then another. His breath hitched as a broken breath escaped him.

“I’m not leaving you, Rhodes,” I whispered one more time, and his face crumpled. I barely had enough time to open my arms before he was in them. He buried his face against the crook of my neck as his entire body folded into mine. His fingers dug into my sides as he dragged me closer. I wrapped both my arms around him immediately.

The first sob tore through him, and I felt it in every fiber of my being. I closed my eyes and pressed my cheek against his hair, holding him tighter as his shoulders shook beneath my arms. Everything he’d been fighting came pouring out of him all at once—the grief, the anger, the guilt. All of it broke free in a way that felt almost painful to witness.

Watching Rhodes fall apart would forever be branded on my heart in an ugly, painful kind of way. There was absolutely nothing I could do to fix any of the pain losing his mother or dealing with his father had caused him. I couldn’t take back what had happened, couldn’t make his father’s words hurt less, and couldn’t give him one more goodbye with his mom. And I didn’t try. I just held him and let him break, giving him somewhere safe to fall apart.

CHAPTER 79

Rhodes

Dawn had barely broken when I gave up pretending I could sleep. The house was silent as I dragged my ass out of bed, making sure I didn’t disturb Theo. Pale morning light leaked through the curtains as I wandered into the living room and caught on a piece of broken glass on the floor. I picked it up as guilt knotted my stomach.

I remembered throwing everything I could get my hands on. I remembered the rage. I remembered Sariah watching me come completely unhinged—something I hadn’t done in years—and remembered Theo refusing to walk away. The memories came and went in ugly little flashes, each one making me feel worse than the last.

And even though I knew Theo had gotten through to me, embarrassment still burned through me. I hated that he’d seen me like that. I’d spent years working through my anger so that I wouldn’t unravel like that again. That was a version of me he didn’t need to know.

I forced the thoughts out of my head. I couldn’t focus on them too long, or I’d spiral all over again. I felt hollow—too exhausted to function well and too wired to sleep.

Coffee felt like the only reasonable decision my mind could manage.

I filled the machine, measured the grounds with more concentration than the task deserved, and started. The familiar hiss and sputter filled the quiet room while I braced against the counter and stared down at nothing.

But as hard as I tried to zone out on the countertop, a quiet knock on the back door drew my attention away. I frowned as I froze, wondering if I’d imagined it. A second knock came a moment later, just as quiet as if they were trying to avoid waking the whole house.

I pushed away from the counter and shuffled toward the door, rubbing a hand over my face as I did. Whoever the hell was showing up this early would just have to deal with the fact that I looked and felt like death.

I unlocked the door and pulled it open. Every trace of exhaustion disappeared at the sight of Jude on my doorstep with a duffel bag at his feet. He still wore his suit from the funeral. The jacket and shirt were wrinkled, and there were blood stains on the collar. The skin beneath his left eye had already begun to darken with what promised to be an ugly bruise, and his lip was raw and split open.

For one painfully long moment, neither of us moved. I just stared at my little brother standing on my back step, beaten up and exhausted, and felt something hot flare to life in my chest. While I was absolutely going to ask who had done this to him, I already knew the answer.

“What the hell—”

“Mom knew,” Jude cut me off, his voice rough and strained. “Mom knew you’re gay.”

Whatever I’d been about to say disappeared abruptly as those four words overtook every thought in my head.

Mom knew.

For all the effort I’d put into hiding it, Mom knew.

“How?” I managed to ask. “When? What?”

The questions tumbled out of me as I stared at him.

“When she went to Florida to tell you she had cancer,” he explained. “She was there a day earlier than she told you. She went to your house and saw you with some guy—I don’t know the specifics. She wasn’t willing to share that.”

Heat crawled slowly up the back of my neck. Unfortunately, I had just enough information to fill in the specifics she wouldn’t share. The only guy around that time was Sloane. Whatever Mom had seen, I sincerely hoped it had been one of the more respectable moments in our relationship—or whatever the hell Sloane and I had back then. The bulk of our thing had ended years ago, but neither of us had ever been particularly good at keeping it ended. Plenty of nights, old habits won out.