"So." He leaned back. "You and Harper."
"What about us?"
"Relax, Stone." Brian set down his glass. "We're not ambushing you. We're just... curious."
"We've watched you around her for years," Shane said carefully. "Every time she showed up at a fire scene, every time her name came up in conversation, you'd get this look. Like someone was twisting a knife."
"We never asked," Brian added. "Figured it was your business."
"But you're together now. And you seem happy. Actually happy." Shane paused. "So what happened between you two?"
I looked around the table. Shane and Maya side by side, his hand on her belly like he couldn't help it. Brian and Ava, fingers laced together. Four people who'd fought for the lives they had. Who understood what it cost.
"We were engaged." The words came slowly. "Eight years ago."
Nobody spoke. Maya's hand found Shane's. Ava's eyes softened but she didn't look away.
"Two years together. Moved in, planned the wedding." Like excavating something from deep down. "Then she got pregnant."
Shane went still.
"I was already thinking about names. Picturing what our kid would look like." A breath. "She miscarried."
"Garrett..." Brian's voice was soft.
"She was alone when it happened. I don't even remember asking my captain—I just told him I had to go and I was gone." The memory lived in my body. Breaking every speed limit between the station and our apartment. The front door. The hallway. Finding her curled on the tile, covered in blood. "After that, she changed. Pulled away. I tried to be there for her, but the harder I tried, the more she retreated. I didn't understand it then."
"Postpartum depression," Ava said quietly. Not clinical. Gentle. "After a miscarriage, especially later in the pregnancy, the hormonal crash can be devastating. It's the same mechanism as after birth. The body doesn't know the difference."
Maya's eyes were bright. She pressed her hand against her belly, instinctive and protective.
"We didn't know that. Neither of us had the language for it." A long drink. "She felt broken. Thought being around me was making it worse. So she left. Went to DC."
"And?" Shane asked.
"I waited. Three years. She stopped writing. Stopped calling." I stared at my glass. "By the time I accepted she wasn't coming back, I'd already lost her."
The table was quiet. From somewhere outside, a siren passed. Faded.
"She came back five years ago. Got the job at the Times. We were in the same city for years and I didn't know until I saw her at a fire scene." I shook my head. "Neither of us was brave enough to say anything. So we just... existed."
"Until the arson case," Shane said.
"Until the arson case."
Maya wiped her eyes. Didn't try to hide it.
"I'm thinking of asking her to move in."
Brian almost laughed. "Brother. She has a key to your apartment, half her wardrobe in your closet, and she just helped save your firehouse. She's already moved in. You're just making it official."
"He's right," Ava said. A small smile. "Ask her."
"Don't waste any more time," Maya added, her voice still thick. She looked at Shane. He looked back at her. Something passed between them that didn't need words. "You two have wasted enough."
Sloane was asleep on my couch when I got home.
Laptop still open. Files across the coffee table. Shoes by the door, press credentials draped over the couch arm. My old FDNY t-shirt, the hem riding up over her thighs.
