Chapter 4

Josephine Cole POV:

"She' s hurt, Jax!" Brooklyn wailed, burying her face in his shoulder as he knelt beside her. "My ankle... I think it' s broken."

Jax shot me a look of pure fury. "Are you satisfied now, Josephine? Was this what you wanted?" he snarled, his voice dripping with accusation.

"I didn' t touch her!" I cried, my voice thin and reedy. "She fell on purpose!"

"It was an accident," Jax said, his tone dismissive as he gently examined Brooklyn' s perfectly fine ankle. "She lost her balance. You' ve been through a lot. Just calm down." He was excusing her behavior, infantilizing me, treating me like a hysterical child who couldn' t control her emotions.

A hot, acidic wave of nausea churned in my stomach. My head felt light, the world tilting on its axis.

"An accident?" I repeated, my voice trembling with a rage so profound it scared me. "Like diverting a medevac was an 'accident' ? Like my sister' s death was an 'accident' ?"

Brooklyn flinched, letting out another soft sob. "Please don' t talk about that," she whispered. "It makes me feel so guilty."

"Good," I spat. "You should."

I turned away from them, unable to look at their disgusting tableau of feigned innocence and misplaced loyalty a moment longer. My eyes fell on the scattered contents of my purse, which had spilled when I recoiled. Among the lipstick and keys lay a small, worn, leather-bound book. Kiera' s first sketchbook. It was filled with her childhood drawings of fantastical creatures and smiling suns. I had carried it with me since the funeral, a tangible piece of her I couldn' t bear to part with.

I bent down to pick it up, my fingers brushing against the soft, familiar leather.

A pristine, white designer heel slammed down onto the sketchbook, not two inches from my hand.

I looked up. Brooklyn was standing over me, a cruel, triumphant smirk on her face. She ground her heel into the book, the sound of the spine cracking and pages tearing echoing in the silent garden.

"Oops," she said, her voice a sickly sweet singsong. "Clumsy me."

Something inside me snapped. The grief, the betrayal, the years of repressed anger erupted in a single, blinding flash of white-hot fury. I lunged at her, my hands outstretched, my nails shaped into claws. "You bitch!"

Before I could reach her, an iron grip closed around my wrist. Jax yanked me back so hard I stumbled.

"That' s enough, Josephine!" he roared.

He didn' t see what she' d done. He only saw my attack. He shoved me away from her, a hard, violent push. I lost my footing and fell backward, my head cracking against the edge of the terracotta planter I had been hiding behind.

Pain exploded at the back of my skull. The world swam, black spots dancing in my vision. I lay on the grass, stunned and breathless, the coppery taste of blood filling my mouth.

"Look what you made me do," Jax said, his voice laced with frustration, as if my injury was an inconvenience he was being forced to deal with. He was looking down at me, but his concern was for Brooklyn, who was now clinging to his arm, looking terrified.

"It' s Kiera' s," I whispered, my voice thick with tears and pain. I pointed a shaking finger at the ruined sketchbook lying desecrated on the lawn. "That was Kiera' s first sketchbook."

Jax glanced at the book, his expression uncomprehending. "It' s just a book, Jo. I' ll buy you a new one. A hundred new ones."

He didn' t remember. He had been there when Kiera, age seven, had proudly presented it to me. He had watched her fill its pages. He had praised her drawings. But now, it was just a thing. An object whose value he could measure in dollars. All our shared memories, all the moments that had built the foundation of our life together, had been wiped clean from his mind, replaced by this vapid, cruel woman.

The fight drained out of me, replaced by a profound, soul-crushing exhaustion. There was no point in arguing. There was no point in explaining. He wouldn' t understand. He couldn' t.

Slowly, painfully, I pushed myself to my feet. I wouldn' t give them the satisfaction of seeing me broken on the ground. I turned to walk away, my only thought to get as far from them as possible.

"Where do you think you' re going?" Jax' s voice cut through the air. He grabbed my arm, his grip bruising. "You' re hurt. I' m taking you to the hospital."

"Let go of me," I said, my voice dangerously quiet.

"Get in the car, Josephine," he commanded.

He half-dragged, half-carried me to his car, forcing me into the backseat like a prisoner. Brooklyn slid into the passenger seat, shooting me a triumphant look in the rearview mirror as she buckled her seatbelt. The car was filled with the cloying, sweet scent of her perfume, a scent I knew would be forever linked to the worst moments of my life.

As the car pulled out of the driveway, I leaned my throbbing head against the cool glass of the window and closed my eyes.

My mind drifted to the months after Brooklyn had returned to the country. Her "accidental" encounters at my favorite cafes. Her joining my exclusive gym. Her buying the apartment directly across the hall from ours. It was a systematic, deliberate campaign to invade every corner of my life.

I remembered finding my prize-winning cello, the one I' d played at Carnegie Hall, with its strings slashed. There was no proof, but I knew it was her. I remembered telling Jax, my voice shaking with fear and outrage. He had promised to handle it, to keep her away from me.

And he had. He had kept her away from me by pulling her into his own bed. He didn' t solve the problem. He absorbed it. He became it.

The pain in my head was a dull, constant throb, a physical manifestation of the agony in my soul. I felt a tear escape the corner of my eye and trace a cold path down my temple.

The last thing I remember was the screech of tires and the sickening crunch of metal.

Then, everything went black.