Chapter 31
Thirty-One
Colter
It was late by the time rehearsal ended.
The second half had been rough. Swayze made it through, but the performance had been hollowed out—the energy that usually came off her in waves simply gone.
I hustled her out to the truck before our castmates could close in with their well-intentioned questions.
She sat silent the whole short drive, her hands folded in her lap like she was holding something fragile between her palms.
We hadn’t thought to leave a light on. The porch was dark.
I escorted her into my side of the duplex and tugged her back to the kitchen. I didn’t know what she was about to say, but I wanted to be on my own turf when she said it. Unfair of me. But I’d had a long time to worry about whatever it was and what it might mean for her. What it might mean for us.
I pulled a bottle of bourbon down from above the fridge and held it up. “Want one?”
She shook her head and dragged out a chair.
I poured myself a small glass and joined her at the table. She looked diminished somehow—shoulders drawn in, the brightness that lived in her face extinguished. Her eyes moved to a scarred spot in the wood and stayed there.
Everything in me wanted to haul her close. I waited instead.
“I haven’t been entirely honest with you.”
My gut tightened.
“Okay.”
“I am a graphic designer by training, and I’ve always done a lot of that kind of work in my travels. But that wasn’t my primary job.”
She still hadn’t looked at me. Her thumbnail pressed into the scar on the table, pale against the wood.
Where was she going with this? What kind of job could hollow a person out like this, make her sit like someone waiting for sentencing?
She drew in a long breath. “I was an influencer.”
I blinked at her. “An… influencer.”
She glanced up. “On social media.”
“Yeah, I know what an influencer is. I’m not clear why that’s a big deal.”
Her huff of laughter wasn’t amused at all. “Well, in my old circles, my over ten million followers were considered a bit of a thing.”
“Ten… million. That’s… a lot of folks.”
“Yeah. I didn’t set out to do that as a career.
I was just posting about my travel experiences, sharing my legitimate opinions about places and gear and the causes I found important.
I didn’t do the influencer thing the way a lot of people do.
It was always important to me that my platform be one of authenticity.
People responded to that. I started getting sponsorships from various companies.
That allowed me more freedom to see and do more things, and bring attention to more causes. ”
“Causes like what?”
“Fundraisers for natural disaster relief. Spotlighting marginalized artisans in remote communities so they could sell their work to a global market. Raising awareness about endangered species and habitats. Things that mattered. Things that could make a real difference if enough people paid attention.”
Something shifted in her as she said it. Her spine straightened a fraction, her voice picking up a thread of heat. I could see what it had been to her. How much she’d built and how much she’d believed in it.
“That sounds amazing.”
“It was. For years, it was everything I’d hoped it could be.
I vetted every brand I worked with, every cause I promoted.
I turned down sponsorships all the time because they didn’t align with my values.
” The heat went out as fast as it had come.
Her fingers knotted together on the table.
“But apparently I missed something. Or someone lied really, really well. One of the companies I’d been partnering with for environmental initiatives turned out to be a front.
The scandal broke just a few days before I left New Zealand.
The company was using the positive PR to cover up some horrific labor practices overseas.
” She swallowed. “Children working in truly horrendous and dangerous conditions. And I’d backed them. ”
My chest tightened. “That wasn’t your fault.”
Swayze shook her head. “I made the choice. I put my name out there to support the company. I did it in good faith, thinking I’d done my due diligence.
But no one cared. I suddenly looked like a fraud.
A sellout. I made an apology. I donated money to verified charities dealing with child labor and exploitation.
I did everything I could think of to make amends.
But the internet decided I was complicit.
That I’d known all along and only cared about the paycheck. ”
She scooped a hand through her hair. Her voice had gone flat the way voices go when someone has rehearsed a thing so many times the feeling has worn off—but her hands told a different story, white-knuckled now, pressed to the table like she needed it to hold still.
“I started losing followers in droves. The ones who stuck around were lambasting me with the worst sort of accusations on my feed and in my DMs. My other sponsors dropped me without even asking for my side of the story. Because I’d been canceled, and nobody wanted to stick around in case it was catching.
So I decided to walk away. I left it all behind and came here to disappear instead.
And I hoped—God, I hoped—that here in Gibson Hollow, I could just be Swayze.
And I thought I’d managed it. But that woman from the theater blog…
She knew who I was. Knew about the scandal.
Wanted to know why I’d gone silent and what I was hiding. ”
No wonder she’d looked so haunted when she’d first arrived. The woman I’d pulled out of that burning house had been fleeing more than just a fraudulent rental. She’d been running from an entire life that had gone up in flames.
I thought about those first few days. The exhaustion that had gone beyond jet lag. The way she’d flinched from any kind of spotlight, even as she’d thrown herself into the library fundraiser behind the scenes. How she’d resisted the musical until I’d basically begged her.
She’d built something that mattered over years.
A platform that actually moved money and attention toward people who needed it.
And it had been stripped from her in days.
Not because she’d done anything wrong, but because she’d trusted the wrong people.
Because she’d tried to do good and someone had weaponized that.
And she’d carried it alone this whole time. Waiting for the moment someone here looked at her differently.
Which had now come.
My chest ached for her.
When she lifted her face, her eyes were bright with tears she hadn’t let fall. The effort of holding them back showed in the set of her jaw, the slight tremor she was working to control. She looked like someone who had learned the hard way that crying in front of people cost you something.
“I’m so sorry for not telling you.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“At first, because I worried how you’d react.
What you might see if you looked me up. And beyond that, in case any of this shit came back on me here, I didn’t want that to splash onto you.
Or, God forbid, Oakleigh. So I’ve kept a low profile, trying to avoid making waves and just…
let the world move on without me. Except it’s still out there.
And it’s found me, even here. So if you want me to move out and keep my distance from Oakleigh, I understand. Protecting her is the first priority.”
“That’s what this has been about? Why I’ve had this feeling you’re two steps away from having one foot out the door? Because you think all this is going to somehow blow back on us?”
The tear she’d been holding back escaped. She didn’t wipe it away, just let it go, like she’d run out of the energy to manage even that.
She nodded.
“Swayze.” I grasped her hand and tugged her into my lap, finally wrapping her in my arms as I’d wanted to all night.
“I don’t give a shit about any of this. Not beyond the fact that it hurt you.
That it’s still hurting you. I’m not going to judge you for the actions of a company that lied to you.
And I don’t for one minute believe that this is going to come back to hurt us. ”
She went rigid for a moment—not pulling away, but bracing, like she’d trained herself not to lean in before she could be sure the thing supporting her would hold. Then something in her gave, and she pressed her face into my neck. Her breath came out unsteady against my collar.
“That’s sweet, Colter, but you don’t understand. You don’t understand how vicious it can be.”
“I think I can get a clue from what you did to get away from it. But leaving here, leaving us, isn’t going to solve the problem. And you shouldn’t be going through all this alone.”
“Why would you want to risk it?”
I tucked a lock of her hair behind her ear. “Because I love you. And you’re worth it.”
She was still for a beat—long enough that I wondered if I’d miscalculated.
Then her lips trembled, and the composure she’d been holding onto all night finally came apart.
Not loudly. The tears came in a quiet rush, and she pressed closer instead of pulling back, both hands fisting the fabric of my shirt like she needed something to hold.
“I love you, too,” she rasped.
“Good. Then it’s settled. You’re not going anywhere, and you’ve got all of us as backup. We’ll handle whatever comes together. Okay?”
She wiped at her cheeks. “Just like that?”
“Just exactly like that.”
The exhale she let out seemed to empty something that had been coiled in her for weeks. She relaxed against me by degrees, her head tipping to my shoulder, the rigid line of her spine finally releasing. I pressed a kiss to her temple and held on.
Eventually, I asked, “Do you miss it?”
She considered the question. “Yes, and no. I miss making a difference. I miss having that platform and the ability to effect change. Because I was good at it. It’s why I wanted to come here in the first place.
I saw what Alia did with her platform as an author—I mean, obviously, I didn’t realize she was Kella Harmon at the time, but still, I saw the campaign and the need here.
I wanted to use my platform to help continue the rebuild and revitalization of the town. ”
The grief in her voice was real—not the raw kind from earlier, but older, worn smooth. I remembered what she’d said once about her brother making it on Broadway, her sister becoming a well-known author, and how she’d still been searching for her thing.
She’d found it.
And lost it. Or at least lost the version of it that had felt like hers.
“You can still help. You are helping and bringing attention to the cause. It’s just on a different scale. Smaller doesn’t mean the help is less valuable. It doesn’t mean you’re less valuable. You’re amazing, Swayze Parish.”
She swallowed and reached up to cup my face, her thumb tracing the line of my jaw.
The look in her eyes had changed—steadier now, the shadows still there but no longer the whole story.
“You know, I didn’t come here intending to stay.
I didn’t come here expecting to find you.
But I did, and I’m so damned grateful. And I’m not foolish enough to walk away from this. From you.”
“It’s a good thing. I’m pretty sure Ludo’s decided to keep you.”
I kissed away her laugh as I silently added, and so have I.
She settled more fully against me, her fingers curling into the fabric at my chest, and for a while neither of us moved. The kitchen was quiet. The bourbon sat untouched at my elbow.
I turned my head and found her already looking up at me.
So I kissed her. Slow, and without agenda.
Just my mouth on hers, my hand open against her back.
She made a small sound and kissed me back the same way, none of our usual urgency to chase the flame for more, more, more.
Nothing to prove. Just the two of us breathing the same air in my kitchen at midnight while the rest of the world stayed outside where it belonged.
When I pulled back she didn't move away, only rested her forehead against my jaw.
I held her there until her breathing evened out, and the last of the tension left her hands.