“Yeah. Your car still out front or will Ben have taken it?”
“Ben has the keys for the car and my flat,” she says. “But I meant for us to leave together. I want to go back to yours. I just want a moment where no one’s judging us. Where we don’t have to talk about contracts or clauses or bloody statements.”
My heart softens. “Let’s get the hell out of here, then.”
Back at mine, the silence is different. There’s no tensionor sharp edges to it. Just her feet tucked under my thigh as we sit on the couch, takeout spread between us, and a rerun of some mindless show playing low on the TV.
She hasn’t let go of my hand and I love it. “I feel like I could sleep for ten years,” she mumbles, tearing a piece of naan bread in half.
“You deserve it.”
She glances at me, with brows raised. “So do you.”
I shake my head. “You took the bigger hit.”
“Not sure about that,” she says softly. “They came after us both. You just handled it in your own way.”
“Yeah. Punched some walls. Got benched by Jonno. Shouted at a vending machine.”
She laughs, then sobers. “We’re okay, right?”
I set my food down. Then take her face gently in my hands. “We’re more than okay,” I say. “We got through something massive. And I know it’s not over, not completely. But I’d fight this whole thing all over again if it meant keeping you.”
Her eyes fill, but she nods. “I don’t know what I’m going to do next,” she admits. “Part of me wants to stay. Part of me wants to walk away on my own terms, just to remind them I had that power all along.”
“I’ll back you either way,” I say. “No pressure. No expectations. You get to choose.”
She leans forward and kisses me, soft and slow and full of everything we’ve both been carrying.
When we pull apart, I rest my hand on her knee. “I missed you.”
“I was only gone a couple of days.”
“Still missed you.”
She smiles. “I think I started missing you before I even left.”
I don’t know what will happen next. Whether she stays orwalks. Whether the club puts out a perfect statement or some watered-down half-apology. I don’t know what the fans will say tomorrow or what headlines will run next week.
But I know we’ll be together, and right now, her head is on my shoulder, and her hand is warm in mine. And for the first time in what feels like forever it’s quiet and it’s good.
EPILOGUE
MIA
Six Months Later
It’s strange how fast chaos turns into calm.
Six months ago, I was in the boardroom defending my relationship, ready to throw away the job I’d fought tooth and nail for. Now I’m standing in Dylan’s kitchen, wearing one of his t-shirts, sipping coffee from a mug that saysHockey Players Do It On Ice, and watching him try to assemble an IKEA bookshelf using nothing but willpower and too much upper-body strength.
“I don’t need the instructions,” he mutters.
“Famous last words,” Sophie says, perched on the counter, legs swinging. “This is how serial killer documentaries start. First, it’s ‘I don’t need instructions,’ then it’s three bodies in a shallow grave behind a flat-pack wardrobe.”
Murphy walks in carrying a box labelledMIA’S BOOKS DO NOT DROPand dumps it with a dramatic grunt. “Right,” he says, wiping imaginary sweat from his forehead. “That’s the last of them. You officially live here. No take-backs. Dylan now owns your book collection, five different brands of herbal tea, and whatever the hell is in that weird vibrating face roller thing.”
“It’s called skincare, Murphy,” I say dryly.
