She looks at it.
Then puts hers in it.
Two wins left.
I sit in the tunnel with her hand in mine and the Post-it on the crate and don’t say anything else. The ghost came back tonight because the room got loud. I know what to do with that.
What I don’t know is what comes after. After the story settles. After the world stops having opinions about us.
What she decides when there’s nothing left to manage.
That’s the part I can’t read yet.
But she’s still here.
So am I.
Chapter thirty-one
Nova
Thestoryiseverywhere.
My phone hasn’t stopped buzzing since midnight, and I’ve read exactly none of it.
Don’t need to.
I already know what it says. I know the framing. I know the angle Webb ran with, which outlets picked it up, and what the comments look like. Reading it at seven a.m. won’t change any of that.
So I don’t.
I make coffee. I stand at the counter of my apartment and look at my phone on the table and think — one notification. Just one. To know how bad it is. Then I think about every time I’ve done that and how it never helps, and I pick up my coffee instead.
Aurora: I’m not reading it either. Call me when you’re ready.
I put the phone down. Drink my coffee.
The bowl by the window has Dina’s food in it. It’s been there since last night. She ate some of it. She always comes. She just never comes all the way in.
I know the feeling.
Riley’s office smells like burnt coffee and damage control.
I’m there before anyone else. Notebook open. Coffee untouched. Phone facedown because if I look at it one more time I might throw it through the window.
The door opens.
Jax walks in.
And because my life is rude, he looks good. Not polished-good. Not camera-good. Worse. Tired-good. Jaw rough with a night he probably didn’t sleep through. Black training hoodie stretched across his shoulders. Hair still damp from a shower, curling slightly at the ends.
His eyes go to me first. Not Riley’s chair. Not the table. Me.
He doesn’t smile. I know him well enough now to know what that means. I know what his warmth looks like — I’ve had it — and the absence of it is its own conversation. Not cold. Not angry. Just contained. Holding something carefully.
That’s the part that sits in my chest.
He crosses the room and takes the chair beside me. Nothing about Jax Mercer is accidental.
