Prologue

I can’t breathe.

I can’t speak.

I can’t see.

I can’t move.

“Don’t fight me, baby.”

I try to turn my head away from the voice. It’s no use.

What is happening to me? Why can’t I move?

I feel movement against my body and my shirt being pulled. This is wrong, all wrong.

“I’m going to make you feel so good.”

This can’t be happening. I have to do something.

“Play nice and I’ll make this real good for you.”

I’m disgusted. The sound of his voice makes my skin crawl and I want to escape the moment; retreat, go numb, be anything but here. I can’t. I’m stuck, feeling and being in this moment again, trapped against my will.

My mouth opens and at first nothing comes out, but then, off in the distance I hear my name being called. Something inside me comes alive and I find my voice.

“Cooper!” I scream, my body and voice shaking with the sound. I give that scream everything I can, more than I ever have before, begging for him to rescue me from this.

“Jaylinn, baby wake up.”

“Fuck!” The guy says before slapping me across the face. I can’t feel it, I just see it. A nightmare I’ll never wake up from.

“Jay, wake up. You’re dreaming.”

“Don’t do this, please.” I beg; a plea that goes unheard, a plea that holds nothing against the strains of this.

“Shut the f**k up!” He roars, vibrating my bones with the sound.

I shake and then I open my eyes and blink a few times, still in a confused haze of reality and this f**ked up nightmare. I want to wake up but I can’t, I can’t make myself.

“Jay, come on, wake up. It’s just a dream.”

“Please don’t do this. Please.” I’m begging until I have nothing left and then I’m moving, my body being jostled.

My eyes snap open and I gasp for air, but it’s not enough, I can’t breathe.

“Jay,” Cooper says. “You’re alright, just breathe.”

I look over to Cooper and see that it is indeed him. I take in my surroundings, trying to get my bearings and my breathing under control.

It was just a dream.

I’m okay.

I’m really not okay and I may never be.

I may never breathe right again.

I may never speak what needs to be said.

I may never see what I really need to see.

I may never move the way I should.

1

What the hell did I just walk into?

My heart is beating so hard and fast, I feel like I can’t breathe. I came over to Hailey and Mason’s to keep her company so that the boys could go out Christmas shopping, I didn’t come here for some kind of confession. As I look around¸ it seems that’s exactly what I’m getting.

“Come over here.” Cooper says to me, his voice gentle and slow, drawing me in to his words.

My problem is that I can’t walk. My feet have grown roots and are trapping me in place. Shaking my head, I stay exactly where I am. Trying to release the pressure building inside me, I raise my hand to rub at my chest. I know that if I do go to him I’ll be weak and vulnerable.

“Jay,” Hailey twists her body so she can see me. “It’s alright, come in here please.”

I look over to Cooper, his blue grey eyes are pleading with me to just listen, to understand, to give him a chance. I take one step forward and in the corner of my eye I see Mason shift on the couch. Every step that I take feels like I’m pounding a nail in my coffin. I think the worst, I always have. It’s in my nature to automatically assume this conversation isn’t going to end the way I want it.

Cooper reaches for my hand as I get closer, his big mitten of a hand envelopes mine and I let him guide me to his lap. I don’t want to be in his lap right now but I need his shield, even if he’s the one causing this uneasy feeling. Cooper would never hurt me, not on purpose anyway.

“Jay, I need to tell you something but I want you to listen to everything I have to say first. Don’t tune me out like you do when you don’t want to hear something, okay?” Cooper says firmly to me, watching my reaction to his words.

“Whatever.” I roll my eyes. “Just tell me already.” My stomach is in knots and I summon all my strength to fight the shaking of my body. I keep my breathing nice and steady so he won’t see how I really feel right now.

Cooper looks over to Hailey and Mason, both smiling, giving him the courage that he’s looking for. “A few years ago I made a mistake. A huge mistake. I didn’t know it back then but I know it now.”

My stomach drops. My strength is ripped away. I start to shake from what he’s about to drop on me. I don’t want to know what he has to say but I need to.

“Mason and I went to Hunter’s house in Virginia Beach for spring break the first year we were all away at school. There was a party if you remember.” I nod, recalling that I got upset because he wasn’t coming home when he promised me that he would. “Everyone was pretty smashed. Logan was there.” Cooper looks over to Mason again, and then back to me. He looks nervous, an emotion I barely recognize on his so-familiar face; this must be big, Cooper doesn’t get nervous about anything. Along with Mason and my brother, he’s the most the laid back and confident guy I know. “Logan brought his cousin, Brittany,” he said, snapping me back into the room, “I didn’t have a clue who she was back then.”

I see everything so clearly and do exactly what Cooper said not to. I tune him out. He’s talking, I can hear him mumbling but I can’t hear the words coming out of his mouth, all I see are his lips moving. It sounds like I’m under water; a suffocating silence is taking over. Cooper slept with Brittany at that party, my f**king trashy tramp of a half-sister. He didn’t need to say the words to convey his message. Part of me doesn’t want him to say those words.

Cooper lifts a hand to my face, guiding my eyes back to his. “I didn’t know who she was, Jay.”

I swallow the lump down in my throat. “I know you didn’t.” I whisper.

Cooper’s face twists in disgust. “It meant nothing. You know I would never do anything like that to you Jay. Just thinking about it makes me sick to my stomach.”

“When did you figure this out?” I hope that Cooper has learned a lesson or two from my brother and his. Keeping secrets to protect one another in this family doesn’t work.