MasukBLURB Lena Hale thought heartbreak couldn’t get worse until she walked into a luxury restaurant with a Christmas gift in her hand and found her boyfriend on a date with another girl. Broken and humiliated, she flees home for the holidays, hoping her mother’s new marriage will give her a quiet place to recover. Instead, she walks straight into a nightmare. Her cheating ex, Bryce Carter, is waiting at the mansion… as the beloved nephew of her new stepfather. And her new stepbrother, Cassian Ward, the cold, quiet son who sees too much and says too little can’t seem to look away from her. Trapped together for Christmas, Lena is forced to face the boy who broke her and the man who’s slowly undoing her in ways she doesn’t understand. Bryce wants her back. Cassian wants her safe. And Lena wants to forget she still feels anything at all. But secrets run deep in the Ward family… and desire runs deeper. And this Christmas, falling for the wrong brother might be the most dangerous mistake she’s ever made.
Lihat lebih banyakCHAPTER FIVELENADinner felt like sitting inside a pressure cooker.Holiday candles flickered. Soft instrumental Christmas music played in the background. My mother smiled too hard. Senator Ward asked polite questions. And Bryce… Bryce stared at me like he expected me to magically forget everything and fall back into his arms.But the worst part wasn’t the tension.It wasn’t Bryce’s swollen ego.It wasn’t my mother’s whispers of “just hear him out, sweetheart.”It was Cassian.Sitting directly across from me.Silent.Sharp.Watching everything.He didn’t speak muchmaybe five sentences total but every time Bryce’s hand twitched toward me, Cassian’s jaw tightened. Every time Bryce tried to slip a comment in my direction, Cassian’s eyes darkened another shade. And when Bryce “accidentally” brushed my arm reaching for the butter?Cassian didn’t move. Didn’t make a sound.But his stare was lethal.“Lena,” Bryce said suddenly, leaning in with a smile that used to make my stomach flutter. N
CHAPTER FOUR;Lena's PovSilence.Not the peaceful kind.The heavy, suffocating kind that squeezes your ribs tight and whispers, Run.Bryce stood in the doorway holding his gift bags like some twisted Christmas angel, blinking between me and Cassian like he couldn’t understand the hostility radiating off his cousin’s body.My mother, of course, broke the silence first.“Oh, wonderful!” she said brightly. “You boys know each other already family should arrive any minute!”Family.Family.The word kept stabbing the same place in my chest.Bryce my ex was Cassian’s cousin.Meaning he was part of this household.Meaning he wasn’t just visiting.Meaning…I wasn’t escaping him at all.“Lena,” Bryce tried again, stepping forward.Cassian’s arm shot out not touching me, but close enough that I could feel the warning in his body.“I said don’t.”His voice was calm. Too calm. The kind of calm that meant someone was barely holding their own temper back.Bryce scoffed. “Cass, seriously? Stay out
CHAPTER THREELena's PovI didn’t sleep much that night.New houses always made me restless, but this one felt… different. Too big. Too quiet. Too aware of me. Every creak in the hallway made my nerves jump. And every time I closed my eyes, I saw two things:Bryce leaning across that fancy restaurant table and Cassian Ward at the foot of the stairs, looking at me like he could see through every lie I’d ever told myself.By sunrise, I gave up on sleep entirely.My room was beautiful soft cream walls, a view of the snowy backyard, a massive bed with pillows that could smother a cow. But comfort meant nothing when your heart felt like it was made of cracked glass.I dragged myself out of bed, brushed my hair into something vaguely human, and headed downstairs.Voices drifted from the kitchen.“Lena! Good morning,” my mother chirped the moment I stepped in. She was dressed already hair curled, lipstick on, looking like she was ready for a photoshoot.“Morning,” I said, rubbing my eyes.Se
CHAPTER TWOLena's PovAirports always smell like coffee, cold air, and goodbyes.Today, they smelled like something else too:Escape.I needed distance from Bryce, distance from that restaurant, distance from the version of myself who let her heart get stepped on for two straight years. So the moment my flight began boarding, I shoved my emotions into my carry-on bag and prayed they wouldn’t burst open midair.As I settled into my window seat, I let my head fall back and exhaled.Tomorrow I’d pretend Bryce Carter didn’t exist.Tomorrow I’d be the girl who survived the worst kind of heartbreak.Tomorrow I’d step into a new house, a new family, a new “chapter” at least that’s what my mother called it.But tonight?Tonight I felt like a cracked ornament someone dropped on Christmas morning.The intercom crackled. “Flight attendants, prepare for departure.”I closed my eyes, hoping sleep would take me.It didn’t.Instead, every detail from last night sharpened again: Bryce’s lazy smile a






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