Page 22 of Vows of Ruin

I rise from my chair with lethal grace, my fingers brushing Hugo’s head. He straightens beside me, ready.

I stare Sebastian down. “I’m not that little girl from those photos.”

His expression stills, just enough to tell me I’ve landed the blow.

“I’m here because I chose to be,” I go on, voice razor-sharp. “Now I’m choosing to leave. We don’t traffic in narcotics, and we definitely don’t traffic in people.”

He smiles again, but it's thinner now. Tighter. “You’ll change your mind.”

I whistle once. Hugo moves immediately.

“Not a fucking chance. Let me be very clear, Sebastian. You run your world. I run mine. I think that’s best for both of us.”

He watches me, still smiling, but there’s something flickering in his eyes now. Something wary. Good. Let him sit with that. Let him feel the chill of someone who’s not afraid of him. Because I’m not afraid. I’m ready. I walk out without looking back. My heels are soft on the stone. My heartbeat isn’t.

“Wren,” Elias cuts in through the comms, calm and clipped. “Exterior’s clear. Bring her home, boys.”

The war room is buzzing, low voices, the scratch of pens, the faint hum of electronics. Max is by the whiteboard with Torque, discussing fallback positions. Elias is working on tracing the courier. I’m still half-steeped in the greenhouse, in Sebastian’s smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes.

The door opens. Margot strides in with her laptop tucked under one arm, her phone to her ear. “Okay, Mom, love you too—talk next week.” She says, and hangs up. She doesn’t even look up as she drops the laptop onto the table in front of Elias. “Julie says hi,” she adds casually, still pulling something up on the screen. “But there’s more.”

Elias’s brow furrows. “More of what?”

“The first photo,” Margot says, looking at me. “The one with the necklace. It’s different from the others.”

My fingers tighten on the edge of the table. “What do you mean?”

“It’s smaller,” she says. “Like it was cut. Like something was cropped out of it. I remembered my mom was there that day—she was Wren’s nanny. I asked her if she had photos of that day.” She taps the trackpad. “She sent me this.”

The image loads slowly, then sharpens.

It’s the same photo. I’m little, wearing that pale blue dress and the tiny spinning compass necklace. There’s a faint smile on my face. Margot’s right beside me, barefoot in the grass. But now… there’s someone else. A boy around ten or eleven years old.

Elias leans forward, Wrecker peering over his shoulder. “Who the hell is that?”

“I don’t know,” I whisper.

Margot turns to me, biting her lip. “Babe…”

My chest tightens.

“That boy,” she says carefully, “Is your brother.”

The room goes dead silent. Like the air’s been sucked out of it. I stare at her like she’s sprouted horns, wings, a second head.

Liam moves fast, crossing to me like he already knows I’m going to fall, but I don’t want to. I won’t.

“I don’t have a brother,” I say, voice flat.

Margot shakes her head, her voice gentling. “There are more. My mom told me things. She worked for your parents for years, Wren. She saw the bruises. She was there the night you almost drowned when you were one. When your arm was broken at three. She said they called it ‘falling down the stairs,’ but she didn’t believe it.”

I can’t breathe.

“There were other incidents,” she continues. “And, a week after this photo, something happened. Something big. My mom wouldn’t give details. Just that you had a traumatic brain injury and she thought you were going to die. After that… she never saw him again. Vivian and Charles never mentioned him. It was like he vanished.”

I turn away, not trusting my voice, not trusting the way the floor seems to be tilting. Max takes a step toward me. I raise a hand. “I need a minute,” I say. I walk out. Out of the war room, out into the garden. The evening air hits my skin like water over an open flame. I walk toward the big oak tree and stop, pressing my hands to my thighs like I might break in half.

I hear footsteps behind me. Liam. But he doesn’t speak. Doesn’t try to touch me. He’s just there. Waiting. In case I fall. And I love him for that. But I won’t fall. Not yet. Not for this. I don’t realize I started trembling until I look down and see my hands shaking.