Page 137 of Hide From Me

“I’m not staring,” I mutter defensively.

“You’re burning holes in her skull,” he says, deadpan. “People are gonna start thinking you developed laser vision. Or had a stroke.”

I take a slow sip of champagne and try to act like it doesn’t taste like longing and panic. “Appreciate the medical concern.”

Jon leans in, that smug grin never leaving his face. “So… you two back together yet, or are you still practicing your professional level emotional constipation?”

I shoot him a look. “Why do you always sound like you read one therapy book and never emotionally recovered from it?”

He shrugs, unbothered. “Skimmed a pamphlet once in a vet’s office. Had diagrams.”

I snort, but it dies quick. My gaze drifts back to her like it has a mind of its own. “I don’t know. She came for the wedding. Not for me.”

There’s a pause. The kind that sits heavy between two people who’ve already survived the kind of silence most others never hear.

Jon watches me for a moment longer, the amusement softening into something unspoken. Something heavier. He opens his mouth—probably to say something halfway decent—but his phone buzzes across the table before he can get it out. He glances at it and goes still.

“Problem?” I ask, already knowing the answer.

“Fuck,” he mutters, pressing the phone to his ear.

King appears out of nowhere, a cupcake in one hand and a belt knife in the other. How he even functions as a real person, I’ll never know.

“What?” he asks gruffly.

Jon ends the call and jerks his chin toward the trees. “We’re going. Now.”

King sighs like the universe personally inconvenienced him. “Knew it was too damn quiet.” He wipes frosting on his pants, hands the cupcake to a stunned lieutenant. “Hold this. Don’t eat it.”

They’re already moving, shadows swallowed by the trees at the edge of the lights. Jon shoots me one look—something between an apology and a promise—and I give him the barest nod. We’ve found our balance. It’s not father and son, not exactly. But it’s enough. The kind of enough that neither of us expected but both of us needed.

I glance at the lieutenant who dares lift the cupcake. I smack it out of his hand just as it reaches his mouth, grinning when it hits the sand.

“He said don’t eat that,” I remind him with a grin. Let King come back mad. Let him wonder what happened to his damn cupcake. Let me feel just a little bit in control.

Caspian’s the next shadow to approach.

He doesn’t speak at first. Just stands there in his slightly wrinkled tux, looking more like himself than he has all night. His tie’s already loosened, hair slightly messy, face tired but soft. It’s the quiet kind of peace—the kind you only find after war.

“You good?” I ask him.

He nods, then returns the question. “I am. Are you?”

The question catches me off guard. I blink. “Yeah… I think I am.”

He exhales slowly, like he’s been holding something in. For how long, I don’t know.

“You know,” he starts, voice lower now, almost hesitant, “when you were a kid—when we both were—I was confused. I didn’t understand. Not when they took you in, not after Mom and Dad... you know.”

My chest tightens. “Don’t get sappy on me, Cas. My best man speech is supposed to make people cry from laughter, not trauma.”

He chuckles, but it fades. “I didn’t get it. I didn’t know how to handle it. They gave me a brother I wasn’t expecting. One who didn’t come from our world, who didn’t speak like us, act like us, think like us. So yeah, I stuck you in front of the TV with horrible American cartoons. Let you pick up that damnaccent. Tried to keep you hidden from the real stuff. Not because you were weak. But because I didn’t know how else to protect you.”

He says it like it’s been his weight to carry all this time. Like he thought I didn’t see it. Like I didn’t feel it.

I grin faintly, heart aching in a way I wasn’t prepared for. “Great. Thanks for the lifelong identity crisis.”

“I suck at this,” he mutters. “But just listen, alright? The night I woke up with my hands around your throat, the night I realized I could’ve hurt you... something changed. I always thought I had to protect you. That it was some job I didn’t ask for but couldn’t say no to. But I was wrong. I didn’t have to protect you. Iwantedto. Because you were my little brother, even when I didn’t know how to say it.”