By the time I went back downstairs, dragging the suitcases behind me, the house was eerily quiet. The kitchen was empty, but on the counter was a thin, stapled pile of paper, folded in half, but with my name at the top.
I swept it up with trembling hands, shoving it into my purse without knowing what it was. I would read it later. For now, I had to get out of here. This house was like a poison, and for the first time, I could feel it creeping into my bones.
I had to leave, and this time, I was going without knowing when I would ever be back.
CHAPTER 44
ALEX
Iwas about two seconds away from burning Chicago to the ground when my doorbell rang. I’d been pacing my living room with my phone in my hand, rereading the same unanswered texts to Jane like they might suddenly rearrange themselves into something better.
Every awful scenario possible had already played out in my head, her deciding she was done with me, with all of it, and her choosing her family over us or simply walking away because the fallout of that vote was just too unimaginable.
So when I opened the door and she was there, suitcases at her feet and her eyes red and glassy, my brain stalled. I could barely register the luggage and what it meant as I stared at her, relief slamming into me with so much force that I almost couldn’t stay upright.
“Hey,” she said, her voice barely there.
I didn’t ask a single question, not why she hadn’t used her key or where she’d been. Not if we were okay now or if she believed me about what’d happened with Mallory at the club. I just pulled her inside, into my arms, and shut the door behind her with my foot.
As soon as she sank into me, she started coming apart. Not quietly or neatly but folding into me like her bones had finally given up holding her upright, her fists twisting into the front of my shirt as she cried.
Her sobs nearly tore me apart, coming from somewhere deep and feral as her body trembled and shook. I wrapped myself around her, holding her close with one hand pressed to the back of her head and the other anchored around her waist.
“I’ve got you,” I murmured into her hair, over and over. “I’ve got you, Jane.”
“I didn’t know where else to go.”
“You’re home,” I said without hesitation. “You’re here, baby. You came to exactly the right place.”
She cried harder and I just stood there with her, letting the dams break and everything she’d been holding back pour out while I took the weight of it. Minutes passed. Maybe more. I didn’t check, but I didn’t care.
She was here now, she was safe, and that was all that mattered. After the doomsday scenarios that had been on repeat in my head for the last few hours, this was the best I could’ve hoped for. She wasn’t gone, wasn’t lying in a ditch somewhere, and she wasn’t alone.
Eventually, her breathing evened out and she slumped against me, exhausted and not trying to hide it. I pressed a kiss to her temple before I eased my eased my grip on her, making sure she was steady enough to stand on her own before I let go.
“Come sit,” I said gently. “I’ll make you something to eat.”
She nodded and let me guide her to the couch, where she curled into one corner, pulling her laptop out of her bag like it was muscle memory. Without missing a beat, she opened it up and woke it, her fingers moving across the keyboard a moment later like work might still be the thing that saved her.
While I had no idea what she could be working on that was so important that she had to get it done right now, I didn’t ask. I just left her to it, going into the kitchen and immediately overestimating myself.
I burned the chicken so bad, it set off the smoke alarm. By the time I remembered to check the pasta and had stopped the chicken from literally bursting into flame, it was so overcooked, it was basically paste.
For a second, I just stood there with my hands on my hips, staring at the mess. Then I shook my head at myself. “Okay. We’re ordering in.”
About twenty minutes later, I set takeout containers and a glass of wine down on the coffee table in front of her. She didn’t really react, just staring through the screen of her laptop with her eyes tired and unfocused.
“Jane,” I said softly, but nothing happened until I sat down beside her, closed her laptop, and gently moved it off her legs.
She didn’t protest, so I picked up the remote and put on the ridiculous reality show she loved. Personally, I thought it had too much yelling and too many people pretending their lives weren’t disasters, but we’d watched it together a few times and she’d always enjoyed it.
Finally, she turned to me, blinking like she was coming back into her body. Those gray eyes were flat when they met mine though, haunted. “I lost everything today. Everything except you.”
I slid an arm around her hips and tugged her closer. “You will never lose me.”
Her lips wobbled. “I lost my company. My mom. My house. Wyatt still won’t talk to me.”
I reached for her hand, wrapping my fingers around hers when her gaze dropped again, her shoulders shaking just a little bit. “Hey. Look at me.”
