“Are you okay?” Dad asked Ozzie.
“You’re only defending him because you don’t know what I saw the morning after he came here,” I said, voice thick with disgust. “He’s not being faithful to Carter.”
My older brother was a fucking prick, hardly came home, and was intent on splitting up the land, but the audacity of his fiancé to be fucking someone right under our noses was disgusting.
“You’re way out of line, and I need you to apologize to Ozzie right now.”
My brain stalled. What? Didn’t he hear what I just said?
“N-n-no, he doesn’t need to,” Ozzie said, his face pale.
Good. Cheaters needed to be called out on their bullshit, not go on to live happy lives with wives and kids while you had trouble sleeping through the night.
“Yes, he does,” Dad insisted, glaring at me.Me!
“I’m not apologizing.” I rarely challenged my dad, but with this, I refused to back down. “I haven’t done or said anything wrong. In the meantime, Dad, you should consider canceling the wedding.”
“The wedding’s already canceled.”
“What?”
I barely had time to register the blow before Dad grabbed me by the back of my shirt and steered me toward the house.
“We’ll be right back, Ozzie,” he said over his shoulder.
“Dad, I’m not a kid anymore.” I dug my heels in. It’d been a long time since he’d been this physical with me, and in the past, it was usually to break up fights between me and Carter. “You can’t treat me like this.”
He pushed me inside and shut the door hard behind us. “If you don’t stop acting like a kid, I’ll treat you like one.” He jabbed a finger in my chest. “What you said to Ozzie is disrespectful. I didn’t raise you like that.”
“Didn’t you hear a word I said?” I was practically shaking. Why didn’t he listen? “He’s been cheating on Carter.”
“With me!” he cried. “He’s been cheating withme, and I won’t tolerate you calling him a whore for it either unless you’re calling me one too.”
The words knocked the breath clean out of me. I blinked. Once. Twice. Waiting for the smirk, the punchline.Somethingto tell me he was joking. That I’d heard him wrong. That I’d stepped into some messed-up alternate timeline where my own father wasn’t standing there claiming—owning—an affair with my brother’s fiancé.
But it never came.
His face was stone. His voice was calm.Toocalm. Likehe’d already made peace with it and was waiting for the rest of us to catch up.
My throat closed. My brain short-circuited.
“Dad?” I rasped, voice barely holding together. “You?”
It felt like the floor had vanished under me. Like I’d stumbled straight into a nightmare and couldn’t find the exit.
He leaned against the wall, folding his arms, looking at me like I was the one being irrational. “Yeah.”
My stomach turned.
“But… why would you do something like this? Carter’s your son.”
“I could stand here and justify it. Tell you how Carter’s a shitty fiancé who’s left Ozzie to plan everything alone. That he probably cheated on him too. But the truth is, I wanted him. It’s that simple.”
I reeled back like he’d slapped me. My whole body felt cold and then burning hot in waves. There was nothing simple about cheating. His reaction reminded me of Hudson’s. Of how I’d gone to him, expecting some huge disclosure as to why he was suddenly married and expecting a baby. A reason enough for me to forgive him, but all he’d said was “we hooked up one night, and she got pregnant. We’re expecting a baby, Matt.”
Like we were nothing. Like the fire between us, the stolen Friday nights when we lost ourselves in each other, the whispered promises—none of it had mattered enough for him to fight for.
Just like now. Just like my dad, standing there, arms crossed, calm as anything, expecting me to swallow this betrayal like it was a bitter pill I should’ve seen coming.
