Making Nice.

Making Nice.
Alina
The silence had weight to it. It was heavy and uncomfortable. Everyone tried to pretend like it wasn’t there, but you could feel it pressing down. Hunter kept glancing toward the stairs. Kaiden’s jaw had been locked for ten minutes straight, and even Mason was suddenly fascinated by the bubbles in his champagne. I set my fork down and exhaled slowly. This tension wasn’t doing anyone any good, and if there was one thing I’d learned, it was that running from the problem only made it fester. I might not have family like theirs, but I could recognise what they were holding onto. Isla wasn’t just Kaiden’s sister; she was his twin flame in a way. His tether to childhood. Hunter’s too. And I knew, I knew, how much it would mean to both of them if I could somehow… make this work.
I pushed my chair back quietly. “I’m going to go and see if I can make nice with your sister,” I said, forcing a calm I didn’t feel.
Every male head at that table snapped up. Kaiden blinked. Hunter froze mid-reach for his glass. Even Mason stopped breathing.
Nico was the one who found his voice first. “Are you sure about that?” he asked gently, like he was trying not to spook a wild animal.
I nodded and managed a small smile. “Yeah. I’m sure.”
They didn’t look convinced, but they didn’t stop me either. So I stood, smoothed down my dress, and headed for the stairs, pretending I didn’t feel all their eyes following me.

Isla had been gone too long. I wasn’t surprised to find the upstairs hallway empty, the bathroom door wide open, and the light off. A quiet prickle crawled up my spine. I walked further down the hall, my heels barely whispering against the floorboards, and that’s when I saw it. Bean’s door. Wide open. And inside, standing perfectly still, her back half-turned toward the cot, was Isla. Her arms were crossed, her head tilted, and even from the doorway, I could feel it. That thick mix of curiosity and grief and anger rolling off her like a storm cloud about to break. I stayed there for a beat, just watching her. The dim light from the hallway pooled over the nursery floor, glinting against the display case on the wall, the soft edges of the new furniture, the little pieces of peace I’d built for Bean.
Then, I took a breath, stepped forward, and said quietly, “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

Isla turned, her face twisted in rage, eyes wild and glistening with tears she refused to let fall. She pointed a shaking finger straight at the cot.
“That’s Mia’s,” she spat. Then at the folded clothes, the toys, the tiny shoes lined neatly on the dresser. “Those. All of those are hers. First, you come in and take her husbands. Then you get pregnant with the baby that should’ve been hers. And now, now you’re stealing her things too?!”
“I—Isla, that’s not how it—”
I didn’t even get the words out before she moved. Her hand snatched the little framed elephant print off the wall and threw it with a guttural cry. It shattered against the floor, glass scattering across the rug.
I gasped, my hands rising instinctively. “Isla, stop—”
But she wasn’t done. Not even close. With a yell that scraped raw from her throat, she grabbed the edge of the crib and ripped it from its place. The whole thing lifted, then slammed sideways into the wall with a crack that made my stomach drop. The wood splintered, the frame cracked clean through.
“Stop! Stop, you’re ruining everything!” I shouted, stepping forward, but she was tearing through the room like a storm.
She grabbed the tiny blanket I’d folded, the soft toys I’d lined up, even the delicate little mobile I’d hung from the ceiling and she threw them all, every single one. A stuffed rabbit hit the splintered wood of the crib and burst a seam. A stack of onesies fluttered like surrender flags to the floor.
“Isla, please!” I screamed, backing away as she kept coming. “There’s going to be nothing left!”
“Good!” she shouted back, her face red, her eyes blazing. “There shouldn’t be anything left! This—” she gestured around wildly “—this was never supposed to be yours!”
My back hit the corner of the room. There was nowhere left to go. I put my hands out as she lunged forward, and we collided. For a second, it was chaos, hands, nails, hair, adrenaline. Then her fist connected with my jaw so hard my vision went white. Pain exploded through me. I stumbled back, head spinning.
“Isla—”
She came again, screaming something I couldn’t even make out, and I kicked out instinctively, my foot landing square in her sternum. The impact sent her stumbling back a few steps, breath hitching, and I dropped to my knees among the wreckage of broken toys and splintered wood. My hand landed on something cold...metal, half-buried in shards of glass. The small gun that had fallen from its mount. My fingers curled around it without thinking, the weight of it grounding me for a heartbeat. I looked up. She was still coming.
“Stop!” I screamed, holding the weapon up between us. My hands were shaking, the edges of my vision blurred with panic, but I didn’t lower it. “You’ve destroyed the one thing she wanted most! She wanted this!” My voice cracked. “She wanted to see a baby here, with these things, in this room, this was meant to be her sanctuary, and mine!”
I could hear Hunter and Kaiden’s voices thundering up the stairs, but Isla wasn't stopping. She was in a fit of rage and grief, and her foot was coming straight for my stomach. The whole world slowed around me. All I could think of was Bean, Bean's safety above all else. The voices in my head chanted, Protect, protect, protect, protect! My fingers moved on instinct, flicking off the safety, my vision tunnelling, aiming true to my mark, and I took one long, deep breath in and then...