Page 90 of The Exit Strategy

Not yet.

Fine.

I look at my hand in the mirror one more time, the diamond winking at me in the low light of the vanity with the smugness of something that knows it’s won.

Then I turn off the light before the glimmering, shimmering lie can make me believe anything else.

18

RESONANCE

COLE

HavingFenway Jones in your house is like releasing a golden retriever into a shop that sells handblown glass. He’s not exactly destructive, but he does operate at a frequency that rattles everything in the room until it finds its natural resonance, and then he looks around at the vibrating chaos like he’s personally responsible for the harmony.

At least Nolan operates on a frequency closer to mine. He stands in the kitchen with silent amusement, watching Fen’s chaos unfold like a friend who’s spent a lifetime cleaning up his wake.

This is the most normal my house has felt in a long time. Begrudgingly, even I admit it’s because we’ve basically transplanted Junie’s Brookline house here.

My house has never felt like a home because it was missing my family.

Which is why I keep waiting for it to all collapse around me at any moment.

Nolan sighs and puts down his coffee. “You’re still doing it,” he says so quietly that my armor clicks into place.

“Doing what?”

“Holding everything in. Keeping yourself apart from the rest of us. You have to…give a little.”

When I don’t respond, he releases an annoyed grunt that’s typically saved for Junie. The problem is, I don’t exactly know where I stand with Nolan these days. With any of them, really.

This is the consequence of trying to cut everyone out. Something they’ve never allowed, and something I still don’t understand to this day. I don’t know if I would’ve continued to put in the effort these guys have when I’ve so blatantly tried to push them away.

“She slept.” He grunts. “At least she said she did, and the dark circles that were under her eyes last night appear less prominent too.”

I keep my gaze averted. “Good.”

I’m struggling to maintain any semblance of normalcy when everything in me is screaming to make Juniper Mercer mine, knowing that I can’t yet.

“Yeah.” Nolan’s gaze bores into the side of my face, and I’m forced to make eye contact. “It is.”

There’s something underneath the words that I don’t want to excavate this early in the morning, so I refill my coffee, planning to fix the motion sensor on my side gate that’s been blinking since Tuesday.

“Don’t fuck this up too, Cole.” Nolan’s words land at my back, causing a hitch in my step.

I don’t know what he’s talking about. There are just too many fuckups vying for top spot in my head these days—it could be any one of them.

Raising my mug in the air without turning around, I say, “I’m trying.”

It’s as ambiguous as his warning, but it’s 100 percent my truth.

Hudson lands at 12:43.

When I asked why he didn’t arrive with Nolan and Fen, I got a vague answer about helping his sister River’s direct support professional. Helping is not organically part of Hudson’s disposition, so I have a feeling there’s a story there.

I’m crossing the driveway with my toolbox in hand when the door to his rental car opens. The second his gaze hits mine, I have the distinct impression that I’m fucked.

He knows something.