“You never have to apologize,” I whisper, kissing her hair.
I feel hollowed out.
My legs shake as the adrenaline drains, replaced with bone-deep exhaustion.
My mind keeps replaying the image of her limp on that couch.
“Cohen.”
I look up.
Sloane stands in front of me. She shrugs off her coat and wraps it around Grace.
I want to tell her not to be an idiot, that she’ll freeze, but… I’m in a T-shirt. I have nothing to give my sister.
Sloane does.
“How can I help?” she asks.
Not:What happened?
Not:Is she high?
Just:How can I help?
I try to speak, but my throat locks up. I’m wrecked. I’m a man who just lived his worst nightmare and has no strength left to fake being tough.
“I… I can’t…” I swallow hard, clutching Grace tighter. “I can’t drive, Sloane. My hands won’t stop shaking. Can you… can you take us to Elm Hollow? To Dom’s place?”
It’s a massive ask.
I know it.
But she doesn’t even blink.
“Give me the keys,” she says, palm out.
I stare like an idiot. “The keys? But your SUV—”
“The keys to the Porsche, Cohen. Come on.”
I jerk my chin toward my jeans pocket—I can’t reach with Grace in my arms.
Sloane doesn’t hesitate. She slips her hand into my pocket—quick, efficient—and fishes out the keys. Her knuckles brush my thigh in the process, sending a shock through me even now.
“We’re taking your car,” she says as she unlocks it with a sharpbeep. She opens the back door so I can settle Grace inside.
“Why?” I ask stupidly.
She turns to me with herLet me explain how the world worksexpression.
“Because if we leave Cohen Becker’s Porsche abandoned outside the Velvet Room all night, by tomorrow morning the press will have invented three different stories about who you slept with, how much coke you did, which fight you started.”
She looks straight at me.
I can read a thousand questions in her eyes, and I know she’s starting to wonder how many of my so-called scandals are actually true.
“I’ll get my SUV tomorrow. Now get in. You sit with her. I’ll drive.”
