I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, my chest aching with a pain that refused to go away. My pillow was damp from the tears I had tried to stop, but they kept coming, burning hot trails down my cheeks no matter how many times I wiped them away.
Everything felt like it was falling apart.
My own family—the people who were supposed to love and support me—were keeping secrets from me, treating me like a child who couldn’t handle the truth. My parents’ voices echoed in my head, their warnings, their demands, their refusal to explain why they were so afraid of Michael.
And then there was Kody.
My brother—the person I had trusted more than anyone else—had looked me in the eye and told me nothing. He had lied to me. Or, at the very least, he had withheld something huge. I could see it in his
