Chapter 3

Aiden was halfway through the door before he noticed me standing in the entryway, suitcase in hand.

He paused.

His eyes moved between me and the suitcase:

"You saw in the group chat that I was bringing her back, and now you're going to make a scene about it?"

Group chat?

Oh. That group chat.

The one I'd spent half a month begging him to add me to.

Nobody noticed when I joined. Nobody noticed when I left it walking out of that room tonight.

He shook his head with a furrowed brow.

"Is this really necessary? You're a woman too. She's had too much to drink. I can't leave her on the street just to avoid looking inappropriate."

"There are no hotels?"

I hadn't meant to ask.

After all, who my ex brings home or lets spend the night is none of my business.

But I couldn't help it.

I'd lived in this apartment for five years. I'd filled it piece by piece. It was the place I thought I'd stay forever.

It was all the proof that I'd gone from being a guest to the woman of this house.

"A hotel?" His voice was tinged with exasperation. "You'd be comfortable letting a drunk woman stay in a hotel room alone?"

"And if I went along to stay with her overnight, you'd throw an even bigger fit."

He made it sound so logical.

As if this whole thing were simply a matter of how to properly accommodate an intoxicated woman.

And my objection was nothing more than paranoia, selfishness, pettiness.

But I remembered there'd been more than one woman at that gathering tonight.

I remembered there were single men too — his best friend Marcus, for one.

And I remembered that Selene's apartment was hardly on the other side of the world.

I couldn't out-argue him, so I stopped trying.

I was about to walk straight past them when Selene suddenly grabbed my arm, her eyes unfocused:

"Ivy, where are you going in the middle of the night?"

"Is it because I'm here? Are you upset? I — I can leave..."

She actually reached for the cardigan draped over Aiden's arm as if to go.

Her movement was clumsy — she stumbled, and her whole body tilted into Aiden.

He instinctively caught her by the elbow.

"Stay still," he murmured.

Then he turned to look at me.

That look. I knew it by heart.

Wrapping a decision he'd never change in a thin layer of sorry — then waiting for me to say "okay."

I believed the apology in his eyes was real.

But I also knew that from the moment he'd sat down next to her at the gathering, every seemingly unavoidable choice he made had tilted toward her.

"Aiden."

He looked at me, waiting for me to continue.

"When you said 'she won't mind' — did you ever actually ask me?"

"What if I told you I do mind?"

The smile on his face stiffened.

"...I didn't think it through."

He sidestepped the question entirely: "Just come inside. It's cold out. We'll talk about it tomorrow."

Tomorrow?

He didn't know that my tomorrow was no longer on the same page of the calendar as his.

I exhaled, and took a step forward.

He instinctively called after me:

"Wait —"