Page 1 of Well Aware

PROLOGUE

If you’ve lost your appetite today, I’ve found it.

—Magnolia’s secret thoughts

MAGNOLIA

“Do it, or I’ll blow your head off.”

I closed my eyes as my sister’s on-again, off-again, baby daddy—not that he knew that he was a baby daddy—held a gun to my sister’s head.

I was frozen to the spot, my hand hovering over the tiny baby in the bassinet at my feet, praying that she didn’t wake up and spoil everything.

If Cain knew I was here, he’d lose his shit.

He didn’t like me.

I was a “bad influence” on my sister.

When, in actuality, I was a person who went out of her way to help my sister break free of the chains that Cain had placed around her.

I’d been begging Rose to leave Cain in the dust for two years now, and for two years, he pulled her back at the moment that she got a little too far away from him.

It was a miracle that my sister was able to hide her pregnancy from him.

Thank God for good genetics and loose shirts.

It also helped that Cain was gone doing his civic duty.

Cain’s parents, some of the richest people in the state of Tennessee, had required every male in their line to serve their country.

Sadly for Cain and his family, just because he was a McDuff didn’t mean diddly squat to the US military.

He’d been deployed just like all the rest of them, and Rose had stayed home.

She’d grown their baby, then she’d shoved that baby into my arms and ordered me to pretend like she was my own.

And, because I loved my sister with all of my heart, I’d pretended.

On paper, Iris Rin Baker was my daughter.

Lucky for Rose and I, we looked almost identical.

Meaning, Iris looked exactly like us.

Unluckily, she also had a bit of her father in her.

Iris shared her father’s eyes and hair texture.

Hopefully, our genes won out, though.

Her hair was already getting darker.

With any luck, her eyes would change to a brown like ours.

“I can’t,” Rose said. “I’m at work.”

She was at work.