Page 62 of From the Wreckage

Everett

Every moment I’ve spent with Bri flashes through my mind as Grayson’s voice thunders through the cabin, a storm flashing in his eyes. What I see there guts me.

I betrayed him... Now I’ve lost them both.

Bri’s sobs claw through the air, shredding me from the inside out. She moves, clinging to her father’s sleeve, her voice shaking. “Dad, please. Give us a chance to explain.”

Grayson rips his arm free. His chest heaves, his face carved into stone.

“Don’t tell me I don’t understand, Brielle.

I see it plain as day. He’s been circling you all summer, waiting for me to leave, sliding into places he doesn’t belong.

” His eyes cut to me like knives. “Christ, I trusted you with my daughter.”

The word trusted twists like a blade.

Bri’s voice is pleading. “He’s not like that. You don’t understand?—”

“I’m not—” The words scrape my throat, raw and desperate, clawing for escape. I love her. I’d die for her. They burn the back of my tongue, but I swallow them like poison. Because if I say them, if I admit it, I’ll only ruin things more.

My silence damns me.

“Get out,” Grayson snarls, pointing toward the door. His voice shakes with fury, grief, and betrayal. “Get the hell out of my house before I do something I regret.”

Bri gasps, stumbling between us. “No! Don’t do this, Dad, please?—”

“Bri, move!”

She doesn’t. Her small frame plants like a shield between us, trembling but fierce. “You don’t get it. He—he makes me happy. He makes me feel safe.”

Grayson’s face crumples, anguish cutting through the rage.

His voice breaks, splintered and raw. “Safe? With him ? He’s too old and broken.

Too—” He cuts himself off, shoving a hand through his hair, the motion ragged.

“He’ll ruin you, Brielle. Just like he’s ruined everything else in his goddamn life. ”

He turns to me, betrayal etched in the lines of his face. I thought—” His voice fractures, a hollow sound. “I thought you were better than this, Everett.”

The words knock the air out of me, mainly because they’re true. Every failure, scar, and mistake I carried like anchors, and now they’re tied to her, weighing her down.

Bri turns to me, desperation on her face, tears streaming down her cheeks. “Tell him, Everett. Tell him he’s wrong. Tell him we?—”

I can’t. My jaw locks, my chest a hollow pit. The words rot inside me, unsaid.

My silence confirms it all. Shame radiates off me, and I see the moment Grayson accepts it as truth. He drags in a breath that sounds like it’s killing him and steps back.

“Stay the hell away from her,” he says, his voice low and final. His eyes blaze, not with rage now, but with something worse—disappointment. “I thought you were my friend. But you just used me to get closer to my daughter.” He grits his teeth and snarls, “You’re dead to me.”

“Dad, no!” Bri sobs, spinning around and clutching my shirt. Her voice breaks as she pleads, “Why won’t you say something? Anything? Fight for us.”

Her words carve me open, but I don’t bleed. I’m already empty.

She collapses against me, sobbing into my chest. All I can do is hold her and hate myself, as the heart she repaired fractures into pieces too sharp to ever mend.

Because Grayson is right. My silence is an answer. And it’s the only one I can give.

Grayson stomps over, his boots thundering across the floor. His hand clamps onto Bri’s arm, yanking her back. She cries out, fighting to hold on to me, but he’s stronger.

“Enough!” he roars.

His fist slams into my jaw, pain exploding white-hot across my skull. The world tilts, Bri’s scream slicing through the ringing in my ears. My back hits the counter, the copper tang of blood flooding my mouth.

“This ends NOW!” he snaps, his grip like iron around her. His voice is venomous, loathing blazing in his eyes. “Get the fuck out of my house—and our lives. I never wanna see you again!”

My steps are wooden as I move toward the door, a hollow shell of the man I was when I was with her.

I push through the door, moving toward my truck. The door slams behind me, cutting off her broken sobs.

But they echo inside my head, along with the taste of blood and the wreckage of the only thing that ever made me whole.