Until We Fly (Beautifully Broken 4)

I nod, curtly, one time.

“And now he’s trying to bully you into swimming,” she realizes. “One last time.”

I nod again.

But Nora’s confused again. “I don’t get it though,” she says. “You said your mom has hated you ever since. Why would your father think that using her as leverage would work?”

I look away from her. “Because one of the things he used to tell me was that I was weak. That I was too loyal, that I should be colder. Like him.”

Nora stares at me, horrified. “He faulted you for being a good human being?”

I shrug. “I guess. He saw kindness as a weakness. And he always called me weak. I guess he wants me to either show, once and for all, that I am weak, or show that I can be a cold-hearted bastard like him.”

Without another word, Nora throws herself into my arms with enough force to knock me backward. We tumble into the chair behind us and she lands on my lap.

“Is your leg ok?” she asks quickly.

I nod. “Yeah. Don’t worry about it.” My knee is throbbing, but I don’t care. It doesn’t matter.

She looks into my eyes. “You’re not weak, Brand. Being kind is not a weakness. You’re the farthest thing from weak that I’ve ever seen in my life.”

I don’t answer.

She lays her head on my chest, remaining still. After a while, she speaks without moving.

“I can hear your heart.”

I don’t say anything.

“You have the strongest heart of anyone I’ve ever known.”

I still don’t say anything, although that fucking lump forms in my throat again.

Before long, Nora raises her head.

“Don’t compromise yourself for him,” she tells me, her blue eyes staring into my own. “I don’t know what his game is. But don’t let him compromise you. Do what’s best for you. Do what you’re comfortable with. No more, no less.”

She stares at me fiercely for a minute before she kisses me, hard, with passion.

I kiss her back, pulling her into me, my arms wrapped around her.

She gets it. She’s the first person to ever really ‘get’ my situation and the fucked-upedness that was my father. But the sad part is, I know she only gets it through experience of her own.

Because her father is just as fucked up in his own way as my father was.

That only pisses me off more.

But now, instead of only being pissed at a dead man, I’m pissed at someone living, at a situation that I can actually change.

Nora’s dad isn’t going to hurt her again.

Chapter Fifteen

Nora

I put my earrings in, small diamond studs that shine in the lobes of my ears. With a sigh, I look at my reflection.

My hair is pulled into a sleek chignon, I’m wearing makeup, and I’ve got on an evening dress, small and black.