Security materializes at the side door like the wall learned to walk. One opens it with a soft hydraulic sigh. The hallway beyond is lit too bright, too clean, the kind of corridor where things are decided and then written up as if they were inevitable.
“Now,” the official repeats, and though he keeps his tone even, there’s no space in it for negotiation. The room’s microphones keep humming like a hive we’re about to step out of. Phones rise higher, hungry for whatever they can get before the door shuts on their access.
I lean into the mic one last time, not for a statement—just so the soundboard records the truth. “Riley,” I say, without looking away from the official, “we go together.”
There’s a rustle in the wing. Then her voice, calm and hard as edge steel: “Together.”
I step back from the podium. The lights feel hotter for a heartbeat, then useless, the way arena lights do when the horn has already sounded. The moderator says something about reconvening; no one hears him. The sponsor backdrop blares logos that look like another language.
As we cross to the side door, a reporter blurts, “Jason—are you still willing to sit?” It’s instinct to answer, to control thenarrative with one more clean sentence. I keep walking. Control isn’t in here anymore. It’s in the hall with the bright lights and the rules written by people who don’t lace skates.
We hit the doorway. Security stands aside. The official holds the clipboard like a summons. Julia slips in behind me, a human shield in a blazer. Nolan’s shadow cuts across the threshold first, long and cold.
I feel Riley at my shoulder—the exact distance of a promise kept.
The door begins to swing shut, cameras straining, questions piling against the glass.
The last thing I see before the room disappears is the red tally light on a camera winking out like an eye closing.
And the chapter goes dark with the latch clicking home.
Chapter 27
Fight for More
Riley
By the timewe make it up the stairs, adrenaline has curdled into something thin and sour in my veins. The apartment is dim—only the streetlight leaking around the edges of the curtains, rain pattering a steady metronome on the sill. The city sounds far away, like someone turned the volume down on the world and left us in the quiet between stations.
I close the door and my hands won’t cooperate. The deadbolt misses once, twice, my fingers slipping like I’ve forgotten fine motor skills are part of my job description. The third try it catches with a blunt metal thunk I feel in my teeth.
Jason doesn’t talk. He just steps in behind me and covers my hands with his. Warm. Steady. His palms dwarf mine in a way that should make me feel smaller, but tonight it makes me feel anchored. He slides the chain into place, tests it gently, then doesn’t move away. His breath is warm on the side of my neck. I realize I’m shaking only because the key ring trembles against the door.
“It’s over for tonight,” he says, voice low, threaded with that calm he uses right before a faceoff. “They don’t get in here.”
The room smells like rain and lemon dish soap and, stupidly, a ghost of clinic gel I can still feel in my wrist bones. This afternoon’s ultrasound was supposed to be ordinary—check the rhythm, measure the curve, print a grainy keepsake the size of a postcard. Leah, the tech with soft shoes, angled the wand and said,There,and Dr. Hassan nodded like a lighthouse. I signed the HIPAA form with my neat trainer signature and watched the watermark bloom at the bottom of the print like a stamp that meantsafe.I tucked the photo face-down in my bag and walked out the back because PR had texteduse the east stairwell.Ordinary. That was the plan.
I nod because my throat is playing goalie with my words. The kitchen hums—fridge, vent fan, pipes clicking like old knees. He turns me by degrees until my back meets the door and my front meets his chest. Streetlight paints his cheekbone and the bridge of his nose, the rest of him in soft shadow. His eyes are searching without interrogating.
“You’re shaking,” he says.
“I can’t seem to stop.” I try to laugh and it catches on the way out. “I keep thinking if I list everything I can control, the list will become a ladder out of my head.”
He nods. “Then list it. I’ll spot you.”
I breathe. In for four, hold for two, out for six. When I can trust my voice not to splinter, I start where it hurts. “I’m scared of my body changing faster than my brain can keep up,” I say. “I’m scared of losing my job and all the years I built to get it. I’m scared of walking into rooms and being a scandal instead of a professional. I’m scared of being a headline you have to apologize for.” The last one scrapes.
He doesn’t flinch. He slots his fingers between mine like he’s stitching skin. “Okay,” he says, like a plan. “Body changes: wemake them ours. You tell me what feels good, what doesn’t, and we map the new terrain together. I learn your cues like I learned the rink. We ask the doctor every question. We hire a doula if you want one.” His mouth twitches when he sees my eyebrows go up. “Yes, I know what that is.”
I almost smile. He keeps going.
“Job: we fight with counsel, in writing. Not vibes, not optics. Contracts, clauses, precedent. I’ll sit if I have to. I meant it.” His thumb strokes the back of my hand once, steady as breath. “Public vs. professional: we build a wall. PR speaks to PR, not to us. We answer to our people and each other. Anyone else gets the boundary.”
The list doesn’t fix the ache. But it gives it corners. “And the apology?” I ask, quieter.
His jaw softens. “I’m not sorry for loving you,” he says. “I’ll never be sorry for that. I am sorry for every hallway you had to walk alone. That part changes.”
The shake in me shifts—not gone, but different. Contained. I curl my fingers in the fabric of his shirt and let my forehead rest against his sternum. His heartbeat is a promise made in biology.
