LIAM
I kept my composure until I reached my room.
The walk from the front porch felt like miles, each step requiring a conscious effort to maintain the easy smile, the amused demeanor, the casual nonchalance of someone who had just shared a ridiculous moment with his stepsister.
I even managed a genuine-sounding laugh when Ella glanced back at me before disappearing upstairs, but the moment my door closed behind me, the mask crumbled.
I leaned against the wood, my chest heaving with breaths that came too fast and too shallow. My heart was pounding, but not from exertion.
It was pounding because it was breaking and shattering into pieces so small I wasn't sure they could ever be reassembled.
The disgust on her face.
I couldn't stop seeing it. That visceral, instinctive revulsion ha
