Page 41 of Breaking His Exile

Rainey heard it coming, the weight in the spaces between his words.

“My spotter asked if I was sure.” Evander’s jaw tightened. “Nate Holloway. Closest friend I had. I told him yes⁠—”

The rain hammered the tin roof, relentless, filling the silence he left when he broke off.

“What happened?”

“I was positioned outside the primary kill zone. Elevated overwatch.” He said it like he was reading from a report, but his hand had curled into a fist again, the knuckles white. “They were funneled into a kill zone while I watched. Communications disrupted almost immediately. I engaged. Tried to reach them. Continued fighting after ordered to withdraw. Couldn’t get to them.”

Rainey’s breath came shallow. She thought of the five skulls on his chest, the names beneath them. She thought of a man watching his friends die through a rifle scope, close enough to see but too far away to save.

“By the time support reached the area, they were dead.” Evander finally looked at her, and his eyes were empty and full at once, a contradiction that made her chest ache. “Nate. Cooper. Rory. Caleb. Dez. All of them. Because I was sure. Because I trusted my own judgment over the order that would have saved them.”

“You made one terrible decision,” she said softly. “And you decided you never get to want anything again? You don’t get to kiss anyone? You don’t get to wake up in the morning and not hate yourself for still being alive?”

His brows drew together. “That’s not⁠—”

“Isn’t it?” She released his arm but didn’t retreat, her body still angled into his space, close enough to feel the heat coming off him despite the shed’s chill. “You made a mistake. A catastrophic one. You were overconfident, you stopped listening, and people died. I won’t pretend that’s small, Evander. I won’t pretend you can just forgive yourself and move on. But you’ve turned one failure into a life sentence. Every good thing that happens, you punish yourself for. Every time you start to feel something, you come out here and remind yourself what happens when you forget. That’s not accountability. That’s annihilation.”

“Accountability would mean what?” His voice had gone rough, the flatness cracking. “Pretending it didn’t happen? Letting myself believe I’m safe to be around?”

“Accountability would mean learning the right lesson!” She hadn’t meant to raise her voice, but the shed was small, and the rain was loud, and she was tired of watching him disappear into himself. “The lesson isn’t that you’re poison, Evander. The lesson is that certainty isn’t leadership. That you were wrong once and it cost everything. That doesn’t mean you’re wrong about everything forever.”

“It wasn’t only once.” He turned away. “I almost killed your brother, too.”

Rainey went still. “What?” she breathed. “How?”

“My second day at the ranch, there was a fallen pine blocking an access road. I rigged a winch system to move it. River asked if I was sure it would hold.” He laughed, but it was dark and bitter. “Same question Nate asked me. Same answer. I checked the rig twice. Told him yes. Then the chain snapped.”

He stopped. His hand had gone to his left forearm, fingers tracing the old burns without seeming to notice.

“River was unconscious when I left. Dislocated shoulder, cracked ribs, deep leg wound. I heard him screaming before the pain meds took hold. I packed what I could carry and left before dawn. I couldn’t face the idea that I’d done it again.”

Rainey stared at him. The shed seemed to tilt, the lantern flame dancing in her peripheral vision. She thought of River, her wild, manic brother who’d spent nine years not calling her, and knew without a doubt the accident wasn’t one hundred percent Evander’s fault. River was reckless. Always had been.

But she also knew Evander wouldn’t listen if she told him that, so she settled on, “It was an accident.”

He shook his head. “Every time I start believing my judgment might be safe, I need something to remind me. Before someone else pays for my confidence.”

“So you burn yourself.”

“Yeah.” His fingers still traced the old scars, automatic, unconscious.

Rainey reached out and took his hand. His fingers were cold, stiff, and he resisted at first, a slight tug-o-war that she didn’t let him win. She turned his palm up and traced the older, silvered circles with her thumb.

“Come back inside,” she said.

“Rainey—”

“Evander. Come inside. Let me clean this.” She didn’t wait for agreement. She pulled him toward the door, and after a beat of resistance he followed. Tilly stood as they emerged, rain still falling in steady sheets, her dark coat gleaming. The dog fell in beside them without a sound, and the three of them crossed the muddy clearing to the cabin’s yellow glow.

Inside, the woodstove had burned low. Rainey added two logs, working the damper until the fire caught and threw heat again. Evander stood near the door, dripping, his eyes tracking her movements with that wary alertness that never fully left him.

“Jacket off,” she said. “Shirt too. I need to see what you did.”

He hesitated.

She waited him out, arms crossed.