The building comes into view long before we arrive. Penn Publishing House rises clean and bright against the night, its glass catching light like a held breath. The rooftop glows. Music lifts faintly on the wind. There are people already gathered outside, cameras angling upward, flashes popping like distant lightning.
My stomach drops.
Dane reaches for my hand then. Not dramatic. Not performative. Just there. Solid. Warm.
“I’ve got you,” he says.
“I know,” I answer. And for once, the knowing doesn’t hurt.
Peter pulls to the curb. The door opens. Sound rushes in. Applause. Voices. My name, spoken like something celebratory instead of something sharp.
I step out.
The night meets me with open hands.
Inside, the building thrums. Citrus and champagne and fresh ink. The elevator ride up is crowded, laughter ricocheting off glass walls, strangers smiling at me like we share something intimate. The doors open onto the rooftop and the world explodes.
Lights. Music. People. My face everywhere. The cover framed large against one wall, my words frozen mid-breath. Carrie spots me instantly, cutting through the crowd like she was born for rooms like this. She grabs me, hugs me hard, laughs into my hair.
“You did it,” she says. “You cracked the damn thing open.”
“I lived,” I reply, and she understands the difference.
Dane stays just behind my shoulder, a quiet gravity. Watching. Measuring. Protecting without claiming. I catch him scanning exits, clocks, faces. His world never fully rests. But when he looks at me, it softens. Every time.
We slip away together briefly, tucked into a quieter corner near the glass. Carrie leans in, voice low.
“Did you see him?”
I don’t need to ask who.
“Yes,” I say. “Earlier. Today.”
Her eyes search mine. “And?”
“And I left,” I answer. “Still standing.”
Carrie smiles. Fierce. Proud. “Good.”
A ripple of attention moves through the crowd then. Applause building. Someone taps a glass. My stomach flips again.
“They want you,” Carrie says.
I look once more through the glass, down to the street below.
And there he is.
Blake.
Standing across the road, small beneath the building, looking up like he’s searching for something already lost. Our eyes do not meet. Maybe they can’t anymore. Maybe that’s mercy.
Carrie’s hand slips into mine, squeezing once. “Come on,” she says. “Dance first. Read later.”
She pulls me into the music, into motion, into light. We move. Laugh. Breathe. Cameras flash. Cheers rise. For once, the noise doesn’t swallow me whole. The night air is sharp, crisp, carrying the tang of salt and the faint sweetness of the city below. Lights strung across the rooftop twinkle like a constellation drawn just for us, and the warm glow of the venue spills up from the floors below, bathing the party in honeyed amber. Music threads through the crowd—a slow, steady rhythm that hums in my chest, vibrating beneath my skin, curling around the tension I’ve carried for months.
Dane finds me before I even notice him, the way he always does, as though he has a built-in compass for my presence. His hand finds mine instantly, fingers curling around mine like gravity itself has shifted toward him. I feel the pulse in his wrist, thewarmth in his palm, the quiet certainty of him that has followed me through every shadowed hallway of my life.
He leans close, breath ghosting between Carrie and me. “Can I interrupt??”
