Fighting Our Way (Broken Tracks 2)

“Are you fucking serious!” he thunders, taking a step toward me. “You’ve been living under my roof for the last six years! I don’t even know who you are!”

“You do know me,” I whisper, willing my legs not to move back as he takes two more giant steps across the kitchen toward me and closes the space between us.

“I let you into my kids’ lives! You watched them when… oh, God, did you ever hurt them?”

Tristan has never shut down on me, but right now I don’t get any indication as to what he’s thinking. The Tristan I’ve known for the last six years—the one who has become like a brother to me—is slowly disappearing in front of my eyes, replaced by a man that looks like a stranger.

“What?” I seethe, my eyes widening. How could he think that?

Turning toward Phoebe, she’s now leaning against the refrigerator, watching us with a grin on her face. This is what she wanted—to see my family fall apart and leave me with nothing.

“Tristan!” Harmony exclaims, standing from the table and walking toward us. “You’ve not even let her talk.”

“Seems like the news articles did all the talking for her, unless she has anything to say for herself?” Nate interjects, aiming his statement at me.

My head reels back at his serious tone, and when I finally pluck up the courage to look at him, my breath catches in my throat at the blank, emotionless expression on his face.

“What articles?” I manage to get out.

He stares, assessing me, a muscle in his jaw ticking before he points to a pile of papers on the table. “Tell me we didn’t read them right, Lia—Beth, whatever your name is.”

I take a wobbly step forward, holding my breath as I walk past Tris and pick up the first piece of paper. It shakes in my hand and when I read the fake headline, my head whips toward Phoebe.

“Why are you doing this to me?”

&n

bsp; She raises a brow, a manic, unhinged laugh escaping her again. She really is unstable. “Doing this to you?” She steps forward, her lips lifting up into a sneer. “You killed my baby!”

“You know what happened and it wasn’t that,” I whisper to her.

Her arms fly up and I flinch, thinking she’s going to hit me, but instead she slaps the sides of her head. My eyes widen as she keeps doing it, chanting, “You killed my baby,” over and over again.

“I didn—”

“You did!” she screams, her hands gripped in her hair as she pulls. “You were meant to be watching her! You did this! You!”

I shake my head, my throat burning as I try to swallow, backing away from her now outstretched hand. My mind is screaming at me to run away from the danger—her—as she starts to pace in front of us all. Turning around to face Tris, I say, “You don’t understand—”

“You’re damn right I don’t understand! Things haven’t been right with you for a while. You’ve been cagey for the last couple of months and then out of the blue you move out. And now this?” He watches me for several seconds, his gray eyes searching for something, but I can see the doubts he has loud and clear.

“I was going to tell you everything today,” I murmur, moving my gaze to Nate who is still standing against the counter, watching me like a hawk. I hold up the piece of paper. “These aren’t real, Nate. There were articles, but these aren’t them.”

I can tell he wants to say something to me but he holds himself back, walking over to the table and picking up an article. His eyes narrow and he turns toward Phoebe who now has her arms wrapped around her waist as she rocks back and forth in a standing position. “What dates are these articles from?”

Her head whips around, her dead-eyed gaze not really focusing on him. “You think I’m lying?” She shakes her head, turning her face down and whispering, “I’ll make her pay, Avery.” Her hand comes out, almost as if she’s stroking thin air as she smiles down at… nothing. What the hell is going on? I want to turn to Nate and beg him to believe me, but I can’t take my eyes off Phoebe as she looks back up at us. Her eyes go from loving to hateful. “She’s been telling you she’s Amelia when she’s not, and you think I’m the one lying? Look what she did to my baby!”

Silence rains down on us and as I turn my gaze to the other three people in the room, I can’t tell what any of them are thinking. Tris gathers Harmony in his arms on the other side of the kitchen, and her honey-eyed gaze meets mine. She doesn’t know me well, but I silently plead with her to believe me and the small smile that lifts her lips tells me she hasn’t been swayed by Phoebe.

Movement out of the corner of my eyes has my gaze swinging back to Nate and I stare as he pulls his cell out and starts tapping at the screen with his thumb.

“I don’t think, I know.” He glares at her, holding his phone out in front of him. “Care to explain this?”

I watch with wide eyes as she stays where she is, her lips twisting up on one side. She knows what she’s going to find if she looks at his screen. I don’t understand what her endgame is here, did she really think she’d get what she wanted by coming here and doing this? I can easily explain to them what’s going on and clear it all up, so why do this now?

“Why?” I ask, the word out of my mouth before I realize. “Why now, after everything?”

“You know why,” she says through gritted teeth. “You need to pay for what you did.”