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Hudson came back carrying a tray with glasses and a pitcher of lemonade. He set it down on the coffee table and began pouring drinks for each of us. I accepted but held the glass in my lap. My stomach was too tied up in knots to try and ingest anything. Jeremy sipped at his but left his other hand on my back.

“Is he here?” Micah asked, disturbing the silence and I jumped, nearly spilling my glass of lemonade. I couldn’t remember the last time I was so jumpy. Jeremy gave me a sympathetic look and slid the glass out of my hand, setting both mine and his on top of two coasters on the table next to him. His hand returned to the small of my back and I breathed a sigh of relief.

“They should be here any moment. I called them as soon as I spoke to Landon,” Hudson told Micah.

No sooner had he finished speaking when the front door burst open and I could hear footsteps running towards us across the hardwood floor. I tensed, and Jeremy stood up, instinctually moving in front of me, as if to shield me from whatever was about to happen. I stood too, but Jeremy kept his body angled in front of mine, blocking my view. The footsteps got closer and then stopped. Jeremy gasped in front of me.

“Where is he?” someone asked breathlessly.

I felt the blood drain from my face and I began to shake all over. I knew that voice. I’d heard it a million times in my dreams. It was the most beautiful voice in the world. A voice that, to me, had always meant love and trust and family.

I was afraid to look, afraid that I was about to wake up and realize that this was all just a dream, like I’d done so many times before. Only this time it felt so true, so real that I was sure if I woke up right then, my heart would never recover. There was only one person I could count on to tell me if it was real, one person who I trusted would hold me together if it wasn’t.

“Jeremy?” I whispered weakly.

I could barely hear my own voice over the sound of the blood rushing through my ears, but Jeremy heard me, and he turned. I held my breath when I saw the tears pooling in his eyes, but then slowly, he nodded his head.

I swallowed hard and then peered around his shoulder. There, in the middle of the living room, was the one person I’d loved my entire life, but never thought I’d ever get to see again. His blue eyes, so much like mine, filled with tears when he saw me.

“Zane?” he whispered.

“Isaac?” I whispered back.

We both moved at once, quickly closing the gap between us and holding onto each other as if we were both afraid to let go in case the other vanished into thin air. He was taller, stronger than I remembered. Gone was the skinny, waifish teenager I remembered; in his place was a grown man. I pulled back, but kept my hands on his arms, not willing to let him out of my reach. He looked over my face and I searched his, each of us taking in the changes since we’d last seen each other, me most of all. Tears streamed down both of our faces.

“How is this possible? I thought you were dead,” I breathed.

“What? No, I thought you were dead,” Isaac responded shakily.

“Maybe we all should sit down so we can talk,” Hudson suggested.

I gripped Isaac’s hand in mine and pulled him over to the couch next to me. Jeremy sat on the other side of me. Micah took up the same chair as before. That’s when I noticed for the first time that there was another man in the room. He sat down on the arm of the chair next to Hudson. Hudson laid a hand on the man’s knee and the man reached for him, weaving their fingers together.

“What happened to you after I ran? I know parts of it, but not all,” Isaac said. I turned back to face him.

“So, you did run?” I asked.

“Of course. I didn’t want to, but I promised I would,” he answered. “It was horrible. That night, thinking you had died. I watched him hit you that last time and there was blood everywhere and you quit moving. That’s when he turned on me. I thought it was too late to help you. I thought you were already gone. The last thing you had said to me was to run like I promised, so I did,” he sobbed.

I reached up and cupped the back of his neck, pulling him in close. “You did good, kid. You did exactly what you were supposed to do. All I ever wanted was for you to be safe,” I told him.

“I feel terrible though. I ran and never even tried to look for you because I thought that you were dead. If it weren’t for Hudson and Matt, I still wouldn’t know the truth,” Isaac explained. He gazed adoringly at the two men sitting together. I saw them smile back at him and it was as if I’d walked in on something private. I arched my brow, but that could wait. There were so many other things we needed to clear up first.

“I’m not sure what happened exactly. I was in that kitchen, begging you to run, but then Dad hit me and knocked me out before I knew for sure if you made it out of there. Someone found me a while later, lying outside the emergency room doors. No one saw how I got there,” I explained.

“From what we could figure out, that was your father,” Hudson spoke up. I gave him an incredulous look and then turned to Isaac.

He shrugged. “I don’t know if he had a moment of sanity or grew a conscience or what, but from everything that happened later, we believe that he was the one who drove you to the hospital. Of course, he was too much of a coward to face what he’d done, so he dumped you there outside the doors and took off,” Isaac sneered.

“I was in the hospital for a month. I had a bunch of surgeries to try and fix the damage. When I got out, I went looking for you, just like I said I would,” I told him. “I went to the house first, in case he still had you there. I was going to get you out and get us far away from there. You could’ve gotten your GED or finished high school somewhere else.”

“What happened?” Isaac asked quietly.

“I was peeking through the windows looking for you and Mrs. Sheldon came out. She started going on about how sad it was, and he was too young to die. Those were her exact words. I thought that our father had turned his rage on you that night and killed you. I felt like such a failure as a brother because I hadn’t kept you safe,” I said quietly.

“I took off after that. I felt like my entire world had just caved in and all I wanted was to get away. The nurses had given me some money, so I used it to get a bus ticket and I left town. I’ve been traveling and working odd jobs ever since, until Jeremy found me.” I glanced over my shoulder at Jeremy. He was listening closely, and he gave me a small smile.

“She was talking about Dad,” Isaac said, and I swung my gaze back to him. “The police reports Hudson found said that Dad shot and killed himself not long after that night. Mrs. Sheldon was older than dirt, so to her, Dad was too young to die.”

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