Page 123 of Vegas with my Ex’s Best Friends

“I’m not asking you to trust it yet,” I say. “I’m asking you to stop trying to pull me out of it.”

He drags a hand over his face.

“You’re really doing this.”

“I really am.”

He looks out the window. On the sidewalk outside, a couple is walking with a kid between them, one hand each, swinging her on the count of three. Connor watches them.

“I still think it’s insane,” he says.

“Yeah,” I say.

“Sarah’s been on my case about meeting them properly.” He says it like this pains him.

“She’s usually right,” I say.

“Yeah.” He picks up his coffee. Sets it down. “I’m not promising anything.”

“I’m not asking for promises.”

A pause. “I’m not fighting you anymore,” he says. His voice is rough around the edges. “I don’t know if I can get all the way there from here. But I’m done fighting.”

I reach across the table and put my hand over his.

He looks at it. Turns his hand over and squeezes once. Lets go.

We sit there a while longer, not needing to say much. The café noise fills in around us. When I finally stand to leave, he doesn’t stop me. He just looks up.

“Tell Liam to stop texting me memes,” he says.

I laugh—watery, imperfect, real. “He’s not going to stop.”

“I know. Tell him anyway.”

It isn’t fixed. Not even close. But when I step back out into the hall and feel the warmth of the lobby hit my face, it doesn’t feel impossible anymore.

I can work with that.

Chapter forty-four

Chapter Forty-Four—Ethan

I’m awake before five.

The suite is dark except for the thin line of light under the curtains. I sit at the table with my laptop open and the screen untouched. Through the bedroom door I can hear Andrew’s breathing. Liam is wherever Liam ends up—probably sideways across the mattress, one arm off the edge. Riley is between them, curled under the blanket she pulled from the closet two nights ago because the hotel one is too thin.

I’ve been looking at the door for twenty minutes.

I’m not cutting Connor out.

I’ve run every version of this twice over and I keep landing in the same place. Harrington’s offer is clean. Controlled. Exactly what I spent years positioning for.

And it would cost Riley her brother.

I close the laptop.

I wake the others just after six. Andrew is up first, sitting on the edge of the bed before I’ve finished saying his name. Liam takes thirty more seconds and arrives at the couch with his eyes half-open and his expression already alert—he reads the room before I’ve said a word. Riley stirs, and I start to say she can keep sleeping, but she sits up and shakes her head.