The cab ride home is a blur of city lights and existential dread, every familiar landmark feeling like a goodbye to a life I'm apparently never getting back.
But somewhere between the venue and my apartment, something shifted.
The tears dried. The panic faded into something colder. Clearer.
I'd warned them. Months ago, weeks ago, over and over — I'd told them Adelyn was dangerous. That she was watching, waiting, building something. And what had they done?
Sent her on a business trip.
A fucking business trip. Not fired. Not transferred. Just... temporarily relocated while I got comfortable, while I let my guard down, while I started believing I was safe.
And the moment she came back, she'd detonated everything. Exactly like I'd said she would.
The brothers had promised to handle it. They'd looked me in the eyes and said they'd protect me. And then they'd done the bare minimum and called it done.
This wasn't Adelyn's fault alone. It was theirs too. And mine, for trusting them to fight a battle I should have fought myself.
The apartment door slams behind me with the kind of finality that feels right.
"Leo!" I call out, my voice steady now. Certain. "Leo, I need you to pack everything. Right fucking now."
He appears in his doorway, and the look on his face stops me cold. Not confusion. Not surprise.
He already knew.
"I saw," he said quietly, holding up his phone. The screen showed a gossip site with my face plastered across it, photos from the press conference already going viral. "It's everywhere, Jas. Twitter, TikTok, fucking memes already."
Of course. The internet worked fast when there was a woman to tear apart.
"Then you know why we need to leave."
He studied my face for exactly three seconds. "How much time do we have?"
"Not enough."
"Scale of one to ten?"
"Eleven. But I'm handling it."
Something shifted in his expression — recognition. He'd seen me like this before. When Mom left. When the foster homes got bad.
"Shit." He disappeared back into his room, moving with purpose. No questions, no arguments. Just action.
My phone hasn't stopped buzzing since I left that bathroom. I finally look at it while throwing essentials into garbage bags.
"Jasmine where are you" - Liam
"Please answer" - Liam
"We need to talk. This isn't over." - Asher
"Bunny please. Just tell us you're safe." - Finn
I stared at the messages, feeling something harden in my chest.
We need to talk. Now they wanted to talk. Now, after the photos. After my career exploded on live television. After Adelyn had done exactly what I'd warned them she would do.
Where was this urgency when I'd begged them to take her seriously? Where was this concern when they'd patted my head and promised to "handle it" while doing nothing?
I turned the phone off and kept packing.
This wasn't running away. This was walking away. If I was going to rebuild, I was doing it on my own terms — without waiting for three men who'd had every chance to protect me and hadn't.
Within an hour, we're loading our hastily assembled life into a rental car. Leo climbs into the passenger seat, looking at me with that expression that says he's worried but trusting me anyway.
"Where are we going?"
"Away."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only one I've got right now. And it's my choice." I gripped the steering wheel. "For once, I'm making the call. Not reacting. Choosing."
He was quiet for a moment. Then: "Okay."
"Okay?"
"You've got that look," he said. "The one you get when you've decided something and God himself couldn't change your mind. So yeah. Okay. I'm with you."
I pulled onto the highway, watching the city shrink in the rearview mirror.
"You know, whatever happened, we'll figure it out," Leo said after twenty minutes of silence. "We always do."
"This is different. This time I trusted people who didn't deserve it."
"The memes are brutal," he said quietly. "But they don't know the whole story. I don't either." He glanced at me. "Whenever you're ready."
"Tonight. I'll tell you everything tonight."
Near sunset, we pull up to a place I found during one of my late-night panic drives when Leo's debt was eating me alive. A small farm about two hours outside the city — the kind of place that exists in gentle anonymity.
An older woman is feeding chickens in the yard when we arrive. A man, presumably her husband, looks up from repairing a fence post.
I approach them like a refugee seeking sanctuary.
"Excuse me," I start. "I know this is weird, but my brother and I... we need somewhere to stay. Just for a while. We can help with chores, pay rent, whatever you need."
The woman studies us with kind but shrewd eyes, taking in our garbage bag luggage and my obvious exhaustion.
"The barn's got a clean loft," she says finally. "Warm enough, and there's space for your brother. We could use help with the morning feeding if you're serious about working."
"We are." Relief flooded through me. "Thank you. God, thank you."
"Martha," she says, extending a hand. "This is my husband, Frank."
"Jasmine. This is Leo."
Frank tips his hat. "You look like you've had a hell of a day, young lady."
"I've had a hell of a year."
Martha nodded like she understood. "Hell years end too. Always do."
For the first time since the press conference, something warm flickered in my chest. Small. Fragile. But there.
That night, I'm sitting outside the barn on a hay bale, surrounded by the peaceful scents of horses and pine. The sky stretches endlessly above us.
"The memes don't know the half of it," I finally say. "There's more. A lot more."
Leo waits.
"Remember that debt you had? The loan sharks threatening to break your legs?"
"Hard to forget."
"You said I got a bonus at work to pay them off. I lied." The words feel like swallowing glass. "There's this website, Virtue Exchange. Rich guys bid on... experiences. I auctioned off my virginity to save your life. The Blackwoods won."
Silence. The kind that makes you wonder if the earth has stopped rotating.
"Jesus fucking Christ, Jas." Leo's voice cracked. "You did that for me?"
"They were going to hurt you."
"I would rather have let them break every bone in my body than—" He stopped, jaw working.
I tell him the rest. How the brothers transformed what should have been a transaction into something real. The music. The way they'd made me feel wanted for myself.
And then: the warnings I'd given them about Adelyn. Their promises. Their failure. The press conference.
"They had every chance to protect you," Leo said when I finished. "And they didn't."
"No." I stared up at the stars. "And the worst part? I think they actually care. But caring isn't enough when you don't do anything with it."
"So you left."
"I chose to leave." The distinction mattered. "I stopped waiting for someone else to save me."
He was quiet for a long moment. Then he reached over and took my hand.
"I'm so fucking sorry my debt put you here."
"Don't. I'd do it again. You're my brother."
"And you're the strongest person I know." His voice was fierce. "Walking away when they failed you — that takes more guts than most people have in their entire lives."
"I don't feel strong."
"Strong people never do." He pulled me into a hug. "We'll figure this out. And this time, I'm the one protecting you."
I held onto him and let myself believe it.
Tomorrow I'd figure out how to rebuild. Tonight, I just needed to remember I wasn't alone.
And that leaving wasn't weakness. It was the strongest thing I'd ever done.