My phone buzzed again.
Callum.
This time, I didn’t even turn it over.
I wasn’t ready to talk to him. I wasn’t sure I ever would be, not in the way he wanted. He didn’t want a conversation. He wanted access. He wanted a crack he could widen, a moment of uncertainty he could slip into and call reason.
I didn’t have any reason left for him.
What I had was a seating chart.
A legal pad.
A list.
A sister with strong coffee and a mind that saw containment where I’d only seen an insult.
A man downtown who had told a potential client the truth without trying to own any piece of it.
And somewhere in the condo I used to call home, in a drawer Callum had probably never opened because he’d never had to organize his own life, there was proof that I had been more than his wife from the beginning.
I stood up.
Sloane looked at me over her coffee. “Where are you going?”
“Not now,” I said. “He might still be at the condo, and I’m not walking into that without knowing where he is.”
“Smart.”
“But tomorrow, I’m going back.”
“For the documents.”
“For everything.”
Sloane nodded once, like that had been the answer she expected. “I’ll go with you.”
I shook my head. “Not this time.”
“Holland—”
“I need to do it myself.”
Her expression tightened, but she didn’t argue. That was another reason I loved her. Sloane would question anything once. If you gave her a real answer, she respected it.
“I’m not going to confront him,” I said. “I’m not going there to fight. I’m going to collect what belongs to me.”
“And if he’s there?”
“I leave.”
“And if he tries to stop you?”
“I call you.”
“And Finn.”
I hesitated.
