Maggie’s expression turned serious. “Will you come back? After your shift?”
“Do you want me to?” Evie asked.
“Yes,” Maggie said without hesitation. “I want you to come back. And tomorrow. And the day after that. I want—” She stopped, looking uncertain.
“What?” Evie prompted gently.
“I want this,” Maggie said. “You. Us. Not just for tonight. For real.”
Evie felt warmth bloom in her chest. “Then I’ll come back. I promise. Can you get dinner? I’ll be hungry, I’m sure. I’ve worked up an appetite.”
“Whatever you like.”
Evie reluctantly extracted herself from Maggie’s embrace and started gathering her scattered clothes. Maggie watched from the bed, propped up on one elbow, sheet pooled at herwaist in a way that made Evie want to crawl right back in beside her.
“Stop looking at me like that,” Evie said, pulling on her jeans.
“Like what?”
“Like you’re memorizing me.”
“I am,” Maggie said simply. “In case this is a dream.”
Evie crossed back to the bed and kissed her—slow and deep and full of promise. “Not a dream. I’ll prove it when I come back tonight.”
At the door, fully dressed and ready to face the world, Evie turned back.
Maggie had followed her out, still wrapped in the sheet, hair sleep-mussed and eyes bright.
“The worst already happened,” Evie said. “The investigation. The transfer. The suspension. We survived all of it.”
“We did,” Maggie agreed.
“So everything from here is just... living,” Evie said. “No more waiting for disaster. No more preparing for loss. Just us, figuring it out as we go.”
Maggie smiled—that real, unguarded smile that Evie was already addicted to. “I can do that. Or I can try.”
“That’s all I’m asking,” Evie said.
She left before she could change her mind about going to work, but she carried the warmth of Maggie’s smile with her all the way to the hospital.
13
MAGGIE
The apartment felt different with Evie’s presence woven into it.
Small things, mostly. A coffee mug left on the counter—not Maggie’s usual precise placement, but casual, lived-in. A hair tie on the bathroom sink. The faint scent of Evie’s shampoo clinging to the pillows. The sound of her key in the lock at odd hours, coming home from shifts that stretched long into the night.
Maggie stood at the window on day eight of her suspension, watching the city wake up below, and felt something she hadn’t experienced in years: contentment without control.
And it felt uncomfortable. So uncomfortable.
But she was learning to sit with that terror instead of running from it.
Her phone buzzed on the counter.
Evie:Stuck in morning report. Patel’s going long. Miss you as always.
