"You don't know that." Her voice splinters. "Because that's still not the worst part."
I go still.
"When Candace came in," she says, and her voice changes. Smaller. More ashamed than anything she's said so far. "When you told me what her father did. That he tried to sell her to Donovan." My hands tighten on her knees. "I recognized every part of it, Knox. How the debt works. How the family justifies it. I recognized it because I used to be on the other side of the intaketable." The room tilts. "I sat with her. Held her hand. Told her she was safe. And the whole time I knew I'd done the same job as the people who hurt her." Her voice breaks open.
"Then Darla. An auction. I knew the format. Knew the setup. Knew how those rooms worked because I'd prepped girls who went into them." She's shaking so hard her teeth chatter. "And the names. The ones Malachi's been pulling from the investigation. I've been hearing names I recognize for months. People from my father's circles. Alice's people." She looks at me, and the guilt in her eyes is so deep I can barely hold the gaze. "I didn't say a word. I had a map to every corner of this thing, and I kept my mouth shut."
"Why?" My voice is raw.
"Because the second I open my mouth, I'm not Sloane Turner. I'm not your wife. I'm not the nurse who patches up your guys." Tears spill over. "I'm Sloane Mercer. The girl who signed the forms. And I was so sure that if you saw that, if any of you saw that, I'd lose everything. The club. The girls. You." She presses her palms over her face. "I couldn't lose you. So I stayed quiet while your people fought a war I had a map for. And that makes me exactly what I'm afraid you'll see."
The stove clock ticks once, twice, into the gap she's torn open. I pull her hands away from her face. Gentle. Firm. Hold them against my chest so she can feel my heartbeat under her palms.
"Look at me."
She does. Wrecked. Waiting for the verdict. "You were twenty-four years old and your father put you in a room with a syringe. You dropped it and you ran. That's the part that matters."
"Knox—"
"The silence. The names you kept to yourself. We'll deal with that. Together. With Malachi. With everyone who needs to know." My thumb moves across her knuckles. "But you are notthe same as the men who built that system. You were a girl they used, then you were a girl they tried to sell. And you got out."
Her breath comes in jagged pulls. "I signed the forms," she whispers. "I checked the boxes."
"While your father stood over your shoulder and told you it was care. While Alice Brighton told you that you were good at it." I hold her gaze. "Nobody hands you the truth when they need you to keep signing."
She breaks. Full, wrenching sobs that shake her whole frame. I pull her into my chest and hold on, one hand in her hair, one arm locked around her back. She cries the way someone does when they've been holding a door shut for two years and finally let go of the handle.
I press my mouth to the top of her head and breathe her in. We stay there on the floor of our living room, her fists twisted in my shirt, my back against the wall, until the shaking eases and her breathing evens out against my chest. She doesn't pull away. I don't let her.
Chapter 29
Sloane
Thecryingstopsbeforethe shaking does. I have no clue how long we've been on the floor. Long enough that the heater has kicked on twice. Long enough that my throat feels scraped raw and my eyes have swollen half shut.
Knox hasn't moved. His back is against the wall, one arm locked around me, the other hand steady and careful in my hair. His heartbeat is the only clock I trust right now.
I said it. All of it. The private wing. The forms. Girls I examined and cleared. Anna. The syringe I dropped. Candace. Darla. The names I recognized and kept to myself for months.
He's still here.
I keep waiting for the shift. The stiffening. The careful way a man untangles himself from a woman he's decided is too much. I've rehearsed this moment a hundred times. In every version, he stands up.
He doesn't stand up.
His thumb traces the curve of my ear, absent and unhurried, as though he's thinking about ten things and this is the only one his hands know how to do.
"You're quiet," I whisper.
"Processing."
"That's terrifying."
His chest moves under my cheek. Almost a laugh. "Yeah. Fair."
I pull back enough to see his face. The lamp throws weak gold across his jaw, the bridge of his nose. His eyes are red-rimmed. I've never seen that before.
"You've been crying," I say.
