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He shouldn’t hate someone he’s never met before.

But when he walks in on his boss, his friend, crying, he finds he can’t help himself.

Contrary to how I imagine most people feel when waking up in a hospital, I do not feel overjoyed to be alive.

Maybe because most people aren’t handcuffed to the damn bed rail.

Or because I’ve clearly been under-prescribed pain meds and my ankle hurts like a bitch beneath the boot I discover it’s trapped in.

My lack of gratitude could also come down to the rage that engulfs me as I slowly remember how I ended up here.

Most of all, though, I think it’s the woman dozing in the armchair in the corner of the room that makes me wonder whether a cold hole in the ground would be a welcome alternative.

Briefly, I consider a hasty self-discharge. Ripping out the IV sticking out of my hand, somehow slipping my cuffs, and making a run for it. Sneaking out is kind of a special skill of mine. A dormant skill, granted, but I still think I could make it out the door.

If it was anyone else curled up in that chair. If it was anyone but my older sister. Because Lux, she’s always had this freaky, incredibly annoying sixth sense when it comes to me and sneaking out. I swear, any of the times I ever did manage it, it was only because Lux let me.

This is not one of those times.

It’s like as soon as the thought even enters my mind, she senses it.

Her eyes fly open. They land on me, as unreadable as the even expression flattening features I’ve always thought look nothing like mine—I’ve always been told look nothing like mine.

Something that gutted a younger version of me who wanted nothing more than to be just like her big sister.

Who’d steal her clothes and style her hair in the same way, who always thought we were pretty damn alike—in personality, at least, if not anything else.

Until, of course, I learned that a hard head and snippy wit and a generally scathing disposition are only desirable qualities in whatever way Lux presents them. Not so much when it comes to however I do.

Lux doesn’t look all that scathing right now. She looks pretty damn serene as she stretches her arms above her head and yawns. Sounds it too as she ever-so-nonchalantly says, “You look like shit.”

I grunt. “Rude.”

But I can hardly dispute it, can I? I probably do look like shit. I sure as fuck feel like it.

Sighing, I prop myself up on my elbows and throw a longing glance at the closed door. “Can you get a nurse in here? I want some of the good shit before you get your lecture on.”

Eyes a couple of shades darker than mine blink slowly. “What could I possibly have to lecture you about, Charlotte?”

Right. So that’s how we’re doing things; diving right in to the bitter sarcasm and government names. “Fuck off, Alexandra .’

Lux’s lips thin, a muted laugh fighting its way from between them as she tilts her face towards the ceiling. “Jackson was right. I shouldn’t have come.”

A throb behind my ribcage matches the one in my ankle. “Then why did you?”

Head rolling forward again, Lux cocks it to one side. “I got a call in the middle of the night saying my little sister was in a car accident. Of course, I came.”

Of course , she says. As if she didn’t just admit that, “Jackson wouldn’t have.”

“Yeah, well, he wasn’t too pleased about the whole felony part of the story.”

The subtle reprimand almost makes me wince.

I catch myself before I can, steel myself against the inherent shame I feel at disappointing my siblings, remind myself that it’s inevitable because I have never, ever been able to please them.

Still, though, I feel the need to quietly clarify, “It wasn’t my idea. ”

Lux scoffs, plastic creaking as she slumps in her seat. “It never is.”

“I was just meeting some friends,” I insist even though I know it’s futile, it’s always been futile to try to convince people that I’m not the root of all evil. “I didn’t know they’d broken in.”

“It’s your car embedded in someone’s wall, Charlotte.”

“I wasn’t driving.”

“Well.” Lux sighs as she stands. “At least I know that’s the truth.”

I watch her warily as she moves to the end of my bed. As she gets closer, it strikes me that she looks… old. Not, like, wrinkly and grey, but older than the twenty-five she is. She looks weary, like the weight of the world is on her shoulders.

She still looks like Lux, though. No, God , she looks like… “You look like Mom.”

It’s her turn to wince. I meant it as a compliment—what our mother lacked in maternal instincts, she made up for in beauty—but I guess I should’ve known it wouldn’t be taken as one.

I should’ve known that even though Mom is gone, even though she’s been gone for years now, she’s still a touchy subject.

It still pains Lux to share any resemblance to the woman who birthed us—ironic, considering she’s always shared the most.

Expression harsh, she crosses her arms over her chest, squaring her shoulders. “I don’t care whose idea it was. I care that you did it. I care that there’s a police officer stationed outside your room right now. I care that you’re hurt.”

I scoff without really meaning to.

Lux arches a brow. “You think I don’t?”

I’m not sure. Maybe. I think that she cares in the same way you care about a nuisance endlessly bothering you.

I think she used to care until I made it too hard.

I think Jackson was probably right and she shouldn’t have come because I’m not her responsibility anymore.

I haven’t been for a while. “You kicked me out.”

“Out of the house , Lottie. Not out of town. Not out of my life. No one told you to drop off the face of the Earth.”

No. I just read between the lines. Made the executive decision to leave before someone inevitably made me. Seriously, what the fuck else was I going to do? Hang around Haven Ridge, pining for their forgiveness? Yeah fucking right. “You could've found me.”

“I have better things to spend my money on than a PI for someone who clearly didn’t wanna be found.”

I snap, “Gone bankrupt in the past two years?”

“You don’t get to do that,” she snaps right back. “You don’t get to walk away and then be pissed no one followed you.”

“ You don’t get to be pissed I left when you’re the one who told me to go.”

“What else was I supposed to do, Lottie? Dropping out, getting arrested, doing drugs… You were off the rails. I thought getting off the ranch, getting away from us and having your own space, would be good for you, but clearly, I was wrong. I…” Lux pauses.

Exhales with a huff. Stares out the window and continues, quieter now, a little less steady.

“I didn’t look for you because at first, I thought you were gonna come back.

I really thought I was gonna wake up one morning and you would be there, sitting at the kitchen table, acting like nothing had happened. ”

“And then what?” I sneer because all I hear is I didn’t look for you .

The confirmation of what I already suspected, of the very reason I never broke and went home even when I really, really wanted to.

All I can think about is the last time a Jackson ran away and no one went after them, never to be seen again until they found their way into a coffin. “Were you hoping I’d end up like Mom?”

Lux sucks in a breath so sharp, it whistles through her gritted teeth. Red flushing her light brown complexion, she hisses, “Don’t you ever say that.”

As that furious gaze turns my stomach, I avert my own, staring at the frayed seams of the blanket covering my lower half instead. “What, then? You just forgot about me?”

“Of course not,” she says like it’s obvious, like I’m unhinged for thinking otherwise. “I didn’t look right away, but I did look.”

A hefty dose of dread whacks me upside the head because fuck if I don’t know exactly what she found. “I’m fine.”

“Court-ordered rehab is not fine .”

Fuck . I shift uncomfortably, fisting the bedsheets tightly. “It wasn’t a big deal.”

A scoff disagrees. “You’re an alcoholic, Lottie.”

“I was ,” I correct defensively, jaw locking with irritation. “I recovered.”

“You work in a bar. You were drunk when they brought you in here.”

“I had two glasses of wine.” And I never claimed to be sober. I never wanted to be sober—I just didn’t want to go to fucking jail. I didn’t want to wake up every morning anymore and reach for alcohol instead of coffee.

I didn’t want to be the kind of person who gets behind the wheel wasted out of my fucking mind.

And I’m not anymore. I suffered my sober sentencing, I passed every single one of those mandatory sobriety tests in the first couple of months after I left rehab, and I earned myself a pretty purple chip that I traded in for a celebratory glass of merlot.

I can admit I had a problem, but that’s the key word; had . I don’t anymore. I drink like a normal person drinks. I can control myself.

Last night wasn’t a slip. I wasn’t blackout drunk, I wasn’t behind the wheel, I wasn’t the problem.

But Lux is never going to believe that. It’s real fucking clear she doesn’t as she stares at me with that hard, solemn face, all disappointed and judgemental and sad , and where the fuck does she get off, looking me like that?

“Don’t,” I demand—I might even beg, if I was willing to admit such a thing. “That was a year ago, Lux. You’re a little too late for an intervention.”

“Yeah,” she agrees with a humorless laugh. “That’s what I thought when I called the facility and they told me you completed your treatment. I thought that meant you were okay. I thought that barging back into your life would only hurt you, that you’d relapse and run away again.”

I can’t even deny it—that’s exactly what I would’ve done.

“Obviously,” Lux continues, swiping her palms down her jean-clad thighs before propping them on her hips. “I was wrong. I chose wrong. I’m not gonna do that again.”

The foreboding promise I don’t quite understand makes me squint. “What’s that supposed to mean?”