Page 155 of The Exit Strategy

“Juniper, please.” My whole heart gives up. It just ceases to work.

“Do. You. Understand. Me. Cole?”

I nod.

I can feel Natalie’s hatred at my back, but she has no idea what she’s just detonated—she never did learn to account for the blast radius.

Her career was over before we ever stepped into this hotel—she just hadn’t realized it.

Junie doesn’t spare Natalie a single glance. She doesn’t acknowledge Hudson either.

She simply stares at me as if she’s seeing me for the first time and doesn’t like what she sees.

Then she walks away.

She doesn’t run.

It’s the measured walk of a woman still preserving her dignity because the man who loves her wasn’t able to.

She doesn’t pass the ballroom, instead turning toward the lobby.

“I’ll take her home,” Hudson hisses. “Call a car for you and Nana Mae.”

I stand where I am.

I keep this one promise.

And it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done.

“Cole.” Natalie sounds as though she’s underwater. “I—that’s not how I wanted this to?—”

“Get. Away. From. Me.” Of all the shit she threw into the universe, one thing haunts me above all else.

Natalie was Junie’s childhood bully. The one she told me about late at night. She was begging me to see the truth, and I was too blind and stupid to see it.

“You’re the one who tormented her when she was younger? A fucking child, Natalie? A kid who lost her mom slowly over years? That’s who you chose to bully?”

“She always had more of your attention than was right.”

“Get the fuck out of my life, you wretched, conniving bitch. Stay away from my family. Stay the fuck away from Junie. Don’t contact me again. Don’t call. Don’t write. Prepare yourself for the wreckage you’ve just unleashed because I won’t be your safety net anymore. I’ll stand in the fire just to watch you fucking burn.”

I step close enough that the chemical scent of her perfume permeates my nose like the toxic piece of shit she is. “And I will watch you fucking burn, Natalie. You have no idea who you’ve turned me into these past six years, but you’re about to find out. You’ll burn in the fireyoustarted.”

Her hand covers her mouth. I think she’s crying, but I don’t spend another second on her because it’s taking every ounce of my willpower to keep this promise to Junie.

I stand where I am.

Inside, the MC speaks. At some point, The Haven is recognized.

I don’t move.

And that’s where Nana Mae finds me sometime later.

“She’s gone,” I say.

Nana Mae drops the award she had in her hand to the floor. “Hudson just called.”

“She told me not to follow.”