Riley went still for just a mont, and then her brightness dimd like soone had turned down a dial. "Elena, I’m not going to be with him."
I steered her gently toward a bench nearby and sat down beside her. The afternoon sun fell warm and unhurried across her face, and I looked at her really looked. There was sothing about Janice’s features that carried two things at once: the openness of soone very young and the quiet depth of soone who had already lived more than one life inside the sa body. That combination, innocence layered over longing, created sothing striking without her even trying. As a woman, I felt it just looking at her. I didn’t believe for a second that Harlan was immune to it. A man didn’t lower his pride the way he had stopping car after car in the middle of the road for soone he felt nothing toward.
Riley dropped her gaze to her hands, turning her fingers over slowly. "I used to genuinely hate him. His coldness, the cruelty he wore like armor. Janice was chosen for him by his grandfather, and he spent years punishing her for it pushing her away, letting Nina make her feel small while she followed him around asking if he’d eaten, if he wanted to shower, crying alone where no one could see. When I ca into this body, I had no patience for any of it. I told myself I was going to get the divorce done and get out." She paused. "But then he started changing. And I’m not an idiot I could see it happening. He started clinging. And I knew, I just knew, that whatever he was starting to feel was going to be a problem."
She pulled her knees up slightly. "When I ca back from the small town, I had already made my peace with dying. I wanted the divorce finalized quickly so he wouldn’t get too tangled up in . Janice’s story was already tragic enough. But then, on Whitney’s wedding day, he completely lost his head. He stopped every single car for , and Elena " Her voice wobbled slightly. "In that mont, I understood every romance I’d ever rolled my eyes at. The hero who shows up at the worst possible mont and does sothing irreversible. I couldn’t avoid the cliché. Over the phone, I told him I wouldn’t go through with the divorce."
She went quiet for a beat before continuing. "And then I saw how badly he was hurt. And I ca back to myself. His pain was because of . Being with doesn’t bring anyone safety it brings them into whatever countdown I’m living inside. Even if none of that were true, we wouldn’t last. So if the ending is already written as tragedy, why walk all the way to it? Better to stop here, before it costs too much."
For soone so young both in this body and in spirit Riley thought with a clarity that was almost startling.
"So the durian, the Limburger cheese, picking fights with Nina, all of it," I said slowly. "You were trying to make him hate you enough to want the divorce himself."
Riley twisted her wrist back and forth, considering. "Not entirely. Nina was genuinely horrible to Janice. I wanted her to get a taste of what that felt like. And Harlan absolutely deserved to be called out for eating that woman’s cereal while I was gone for twenty minutes." She lifted her chin. "I have standards."
I started laughing before I could stop myself. "You are going to be the end of ."
She had her own particular moral code ssy and fierce and completely her own and there was nothing naive about it, no matter what anyone looking from the outside might assu.
"Harlan and I aren’t like you and Lewis," she said, more quietly now. "You two have history woven through everything the bond between you runs deep in a way that took years to build. What Harlan and I have is newer than that. It feels like the beginning of sothing that could beco real, and that’s exactly why I need to stop it now. First feelings don’t always survive. If we end before it goes too far, the damage is smaller."
But love didn’t work on a controlled tiline. It didn’t ask for permission or wait until the conditions were right. The mont Harlan had thrown himself in front of those cars for her, Riley had already crossed the line she was trying to hold. She knew it too, even if she wouldn’t say it out loud.
This was her decision, though, not mine. Just like Whitney and Vito had their own road to walk, Riley and Harlan had theirs. I was a bystander in this particular story, and my job was simply to be present for her.
I exhaled softly. "Even if you want him to pull away he still needs to eat while he heals. Don’t starve the man, Riley. If soone kept without food for a day, I would carry that grudge for a very long ti." I still hadn’t fully forgiven Yael for the situation on Rosbel Island.
Riley stuck her tongue out. "I genuinely like Limburger cheese. That’s not manipulation, that’s just taste."
I laughed and pulled her into a hug. "Then keep eating what you love. Just live enjoy everything you can. Whatever you decide, I’m in your corner."
"Perfect," she said. Then her expression turned scheming. "So can I put you down for wedding photos? Number fourteen on my list. You’re in my pictures, Elena. Your face belongs to ."
I stood up and started walking. "I’ll only take wedding photos with Lewis. That’s my final answer."
"Just one! Don’t be selfish about your own face!"
"No."
She launched herself after , and I broke into a run, laughing before I even got started. The sun ca down through the trees in long warm strips, dappling the path ahead of us, and for a few minutes the whole world felt light and uncomplicated. I had no idea what was waiting around the next corner there was always sothing but right now we were here, breathing, laughing, alive.
I ran straight into Lewis’s open arms, and he caught without even flinching, pulling in. "Slow down," he said, his voice warm. "You’re going to fall." He reached up and wiped the sweat from my forehead with his sleeve, careful and unhurried. Being around Riley’s energy had a way of shaving years off a person.
Behind us, Harlan sat very still in his wheelchair, looking for all the world like a bandaged, thoroughly defeated man. His eyes tracked Riley as she walked past him, and there was sothing in his expression that sat between longing and devastation.
"Darling..."
Riley didn’t even glance at him. She kept walking.
Sothing snapped in Harlan. "JANICE."
The shout sent an entire flock of birds bursting into the sky from the nearby trees in one startled, panicked mass.
I watched them Harlan furious in his wheelchair, Riley pretending he didn’t exist and felt the complicated mix of amusent and quiet sadness that their particular dynamic always seed to produce in . He had no idea about her past, no idea about the future she was bracing against. He was just a man falling and finding no one catching him.
I turned back to Lewis and touched his arm. "Since we’re already here let soone check that wound on your back. Properly. I don’t want it getting infected."
He ran his hand over my hair. "It’s fine. Co with . There’s soone I want to see."
I nodded and fell into step beside him. It had been a few days since everything had broken open, and Lewis had been managing Damian’s situation quietly on the side keeping him confined, cutting off his access to the outside, giving him space to sit with what he’d done. Even knowing about the betrayal, Lewis hadn’t been able to raise a hand against soone who had stood at his side through years of loyalty before that one terrible choice. The bond between them was older than the wound, and Lewis had never been soone who destroyed what he still valued.
Damian hadn’t been deep inside the operation. There was no tracker in him, no leverage held over him beyond the single order Amber had given. That had to count for sothing.
The bodyguard opened the door, and I stepped in behind Lewis.
Damian was sitting on the bed, staring at nothing. His face was hollow the look of a man who had stopped expecting anything good to walk through the door. He didn’t react to the sound of it opening, probably assuming it was the doctor again making rounds.
"Damian."
His head snapped up. He looked at , then at Lewis, and sothing moved through his expression so fast it was hard to na shock, relief, sha, all of it arriving at once. His whole body began to shake. He slid off the bed and onto the floor, crawling toward us before I could move to help him. His fra was too large and too broken for to do anything but watch as he got to his knees in front of us, pressing his forehead to the ground.
"I’m sorry, Mrs. Riley... I’m sorry, Mr. Lewis..."
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