Prologue
The moment the front door opened, I already knew it was him.
“If you’re looking for one of my brothers, they’re all upstairs. Probably hiding in their rooms,” Brittany said, her voice flat, uninterested.
Nathan Huxley paused just inside the doorway. He studied her for a second longer than usual, like he was trying to read something she didn’t want anyone to see.
“I heard about the breakup,” he said carefully.
Her fingers tightened slightly at her sides. “I… don’t want to talk about it.”
He nodded, respecting the distance she was building between them. “You deserve better. He wasn’t it.”
For a second, she looked at him—really looked at him—and forced a small smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “Thank you.”
Silence settled between them, heavy and familiar.
“I’ll go upstairs,” Nathan said, stepping past her.
She nodded, letting him leave.
The second he disappeared, Brittany exhaled a breath she didn’t realize she had been holding. Her shoulders dropped, her eyes closing as if that alone could hold everything together. But it didn’t. Nothing ever did.
Because the truth was—
You could think I was heartbroken because my boyfriend of two years cheated on me.
But you would be wrong.
My heart didn’t break today.
It broke a long time ago.
The day I realized Nathan Huxley would never look at me the way I looked at him.
My name is Brittany Solace—Bri, if you’re close enough to matter. I’m twenty-one, in college, the youngest and only girl in a house full of chaos—three older brothers: Peter, Jimmy, and Ken. Loud, protective, impossible to escape.
And then there’s the Huxleys.
They’ve always been there. Before me. Before everything.
Our parents were friends long before we existed, which meant we grew up side by side—holidays, summers, dinners, sleepovers. Every memory I have seems to include them somehow.
Alice, the eldest, now my sister-in-law after marrying Peter. Alexa, my best friend, my other half. And Nathan…
Nathan, who was never really mine to begin with.
He’s twenty-four. Close to my brothers. Always around. Always just there.
And somehow, he became everything.
I don’t even know when it started. Maybe it wasn’t love at first—maybe it was just habit. Growing up with him. Seeing him every day. Letting my world quietly revolve around his without even realizing it.
But somewhere along the way, it became real.
Too real.
He was kind to me. Protective in the way he thought was harmless. The kind of attention that means nothing to the person giving it—but everything to the one receiving it.
To him, I was just Brittany.
To him, I was just… like a sister.
And that was the part that hurt the most.
Watching him laugh with other girls. Talk about them. Choose them.
While I stood there, pretending I didn’t care.
So I tried to move on.
I really did.
I told myself I needed to look somewhere else, feel something real with someone who could actually feel it back. And I found someone. I stayed. Two years.
Two years of something soft. Something almost right.
And for a while, I thought maybe that was enough.
Maybe I could forget him.
Maybe I already had.
But standing there, in the quiet after Nathan walked past me like I was nothing more than someone he’d always known—
I realized the truth.
I never stopped loving him.
And maybe…
That’s exactly why everything was always meant to fall apart.
