Chapter 122. Shadows of a Broken Vow

I stood in the garden with my back against an old oak, trying my best to calm the pounding in my chest. Dawn had turned the sky into a wash of soft oranges, but none of us felt any serenity from it. The overnight drama and then the issue with Connie had left an acrid taste in my mouth, and I couldn't rid myself of the image of her theatrically crying in Chase's arms while the rest of us hovered in the kitchen.

Kane and Liam drifted a few yards away, close enough that I could hear the occasional shuffle of their feet on the manicured lawn. The atmosphere was raw, quiet, but it was the heavy, suffocating kind of silence that had tension coiled inside it, ready to detonate at the slightest spark. I exhaled. I needed a moment to breathe, to steady my nerves. Instead, I felt my mind tugged in a thousand directions, each memory more painful than the last.

"Chase is only pretending," Kane muttered, his voice tight. "We told him to act like he cares about Connie, t