Page 182 of Silver Sweet

Spots dance in my vision, and I’m trying to focus back on Phoenix. I can’t until he’s inches from my face.

“Tom?” His palm hovers near my jaw, and his voice carries alarm. I think he looks distraught? At least, I’m going with that.

“I’m fine—” I start.

“Repeat it,” Ben snaps at Justin, cutting our attention to him. “Repeat what you fucking said.”

Is Ben worried I’ll think he overreacted if I don’t know the exact details? Because anyone going after Harriet is justification enough to lay them on the floor. And yeah, this is coming fromme. I’m the only one who gets to pick on her.

Justin’s muscles flex. His skin purples on his jaw and cheek, and his lip has been badly busted open. He wipes at his bloody mouth with the back of his hand. His shredded shirt dangles off his shoulder. Ben’s tee didn’t fare any better. I can see my brother’s left pec and all six abs. Some reddened spots mar his torso, but his face isn’t beat up like Justin’s.

“I made a joke about the short blonde with the big rack,” Justin admits. “It was ajoke.”

Ben glowers. “‘Put her on the counter and she’s at the perfect height to motorboat me.’That’swhat you said, you motherfucker!” He has to scream the words because the Wreath brothers are pulling Justin out of my bedroom. They’re trained to deescalate. I can’t tell who wants to kill Justin more—Ben or Eliot.

Probably Eliot. He’s the one who follows our bodyguards out and threatens Justin’s entire Dupont lineage.

Ben stays in the bedroom.

Phoenix is breathing hard, his glare pinned to Justin’s back. But he isn’t abandoning my side. The commotion dies down as more of our guests leave. I collapse on the foot of my bed.

My eye waters, throbs, and it hurts to blink.

“Tom?” Ben’s chest caves in a heavy breath.

I sit up lightning-fast so he doesn’t think I’m mortally wounded. “I’m fine, dude,” I say with a raised hand. “All in one piece.”

He looks around our bedroom, blinking a ton like he’s coming out of an angry fog. He has the shortest fuse of allmy brothers. Ironic, really. Since he wouldn’t hurt a fly. People aren’t off-limits, though. At least people who deserve his wrath.

He picks up glass shards on the floor. From my painting. The ornate frame is bent, and the canvas is clearly ripped. I don’t care as much as I care about him.

“Hey,” I call out to Ben. “It’s not a party unless something gets broken, Ben Pirrip. You should have seen when we burned our couch.” I laugh. “Good times.”

Phoenix might be doing an eyeroll. I can’t tell through the hazy vision. “Your friends are pieces of shit.”

“Ex-friend,” I say. “He is permanently banned from every guest list from now until eternity. And inmydefense, Justin had a girlfriend last I remembered. So maybe they broke up and he megamorphed into a monster-size asshole.”

Ben places all the glass shards on the dresser.

“Leave it, dude,” I say. “I can sweep it up, and we have a cleaning service coming in the morning.”

“Your painting?—”

“It was meant to be destroyed,” I cut in. “It’s calledDestruction.You don’t need to get me another one.”

He nods, but his shoulders look painfully constricted. His continued panic is a shotgun blast to my sternum.

He’s fine, I tell myself.

My pulse quickens.

“Ben!” Harriet tries to come into the room, but a couple bodyguards are blocking her. She kneels, then crawls through a gap between their legs.

I don’t see her reunite with Ben because Phoenix is cupping my jaw with a strong hand and turning my face to his. He’s inspecting my injury, and it sucks that he’s so blurry. He has a good face. One that doesn’t deserve to be out of focus.

“Open your eye, Tom,” he encourages.

I didn’t realize I had it closed. I blink through the sharp pain.