41. Sloane
FORTY-ONE
Sloane
I pace the length of my apartment for what must be the hundredth time tonight.
There are seven steps from the kitchenette to the bedroom door. Turn. Repeat.
The single lamp casts long shadows across the hardwood floors, making the space even smaller than it is.
I grip my phone harder than necessary as I check it again. The screen illuminates my face with its harsh glow as I re-read my message from last night.
Maybe we'll run into each other again.
God, what was I thinking? So vague. So middle school.
I cringe at myself, stopping to take a sip of the Pinot Grigio that's been sitting on my coffee table long enough to lose its chill. The takeout container from dinner, some sad pad thai I barely touched, still sits on the counter.
I open my work calendar, scrolling through next week's appointments, then close it again.
Then, I flip to Instagram. But I quickly close that, too. Anything to keep my fingers busy, to prevent them from typing what they want to.
"This is ridiculous," I mutter to the empty room. "I'm an adult.”
But responsible women don't typically fall apart over men who've completely upended their lives. Men who show up unannounced in black SUVs with declarations of love and promises of better futures.
My thumb hovers over the message field. Before I can stop myself, I type out a message.
Still up for that drink?
My heart hammers against my ribs as I hit send. The little BLURP sound of the text going through tells me it's done, no going back.
One second passes. Two. Three.
My phone dings with his reply.
Always.
The single word shoots through me like electricity. I drop onto my couch, staring at the screen, at the period following that one loaded word. No hesitation. No qualification.
"It's just a drink," I tell myself, already moving toward the bathroom. "Just clearing the air."
But as I swipe on lipstick and add an extra dab of perfume to my wrists, the woman in the mirror knows better. Her eyes are too bright, her cheeks too flushed. This isn't casual.
Nothing about Pope Carrigan has ever been casual.
I slip into my coat, grab my keys, and take one last look at my apartment. The safety of my carefully constructed new life seems to shrink behind me as I step toward the door.
I grab my bike and head towards King Street.
I know I'm heading straight toward danger. I know this could shatter everything I've rebuilt.
I know, and I'm going anyway.
I spot him immediately on the rooftop bar of Hotel Bennett.
Even among Charleston's well-heeled weekend crowd, Pope stands out. He's broad-shouldered, jacket draped over his chair, sleeves rolled up to reveal tanned, perfectly strong and veiny forearms.
Two glasses already wait on the table. One is clear and sparkling with lime, and one is amber. He hasn't seen me yet.
My heart hammers so hard I wonder if the couple beside me can hear it. I could still turn around. Walk back to the elevator. Pretend I never suggested this.
Then his eyes find mine across the sea of tables, and the choice evaporates.
He stands as I approach, his gaze holding me with unnerving intensity. The city skyline spreads behind him, but it's Pope who takes my breath away.
"You came," he says simply.
I sink into the chair opposite him, half wanting to bolt, half unable to move under the weight of his eyes.
"I said I would." My voice sounds steadier than I am currently.
He pushes the wine toward me. "I ordered a bottle of La Crema for you."
"You remembered." I take a small sip, welcoming the burn. "How's Lennon?"
Pope's face softens. "He's good. I just talked to him. He's taken up a new hobby: teaching my mom's parrot to talk in Spanish."
"That's so cute. He loves animals."
"He does. Someone at this table helped foster that as a way to help him heal. And that person isn't me."
The honesty catches me off guard. I study him, the tightness in his knuckles around his glass of sparkling water, the careful way he's holding himself.
"I just followed his lead," I challenge.
"That's what makes you so special." His voice drops.
"Are you nervous at all about the adoption? That's a big change in a short amount of time, to go from bachelor to a temporary guardianship, to deciding to adopt him forever."
"I'm terrified. But Warren has been amazing. He handles the hard stuff.”
My heart stops and then jumps into my throat. The glass nearly slips in my damp hand, and I set it down before I drop it.
“Did you say Warren?”
“Yeah. Warren Carter. He’s my family law attorney who has been with me since Chris showed up and challenged my temporary guardianship. He is the one who convinced me that adopting Lennon was best for him.”
How did I miss this? Warren Carter, the attorney I met at the bar that night with Angela, the one I flirted with, is Pope’s attorney. Holy. Fucking. Shit.
My mouth is dry, and I don’t have words as my brain tries to make sense of these two worlds colliding. I swallow hard, but it does nothing to ease the tight knot in my throat.
“Are you okay, Sloane? Your face is looking a little pale.”
I force a nod, even as heat prickles across my skin like my body can’t decide if it’s frozen or burning.
“Yeah, sorry. I met Warren once. It was brief, it’s nothing. It just caught me off guard.”
“He’s a great guy, right? How he could have done anything and chose to be a family attorney says everything you need to know about him.”
I remember his warm smile, his quiet confidence. And then I remember how he excused himself to take a call and never came back. My stomach twists, the same sharp drop I felt that night when I realized he wasn’t coming back.
Yeah. A real stand-up guy.
“Yeah. Great guy,” I say, even though the memory of him walking out mid-sentence still burns. “I don’t really know anything about him, but I’m so glad he’s been a good guide for you.”
I shove the whiplash aside, reminding myself Warren was there for Pope, not me. What matters is that Lennon had someone fighting for him.
I unclench my hand from around my glass, easing my fingers one by one. We move on to the details, the home visits, and things settle back down.
Every word between us vibrates with something unsaid. He leans closer when I speak, like each syllable matters. The string lights overhead cast golden reflections in his eyes, and I remember how it felt when those eyes looked down at me in the darkness.
A silence stretches between us, heavy with possibility. I test the distance with a sharper edge.
"You tracked me down, Pope. What if I told you I don't forgive you?"
He doesn't flinch. "Then I'd keep showing up until you did."
The breeze turns sharp across the rooftop, carrying salt from the harbor. Goosebumps rise along my arms, but I don't reach for my jacket draped over the chair.
"That's the problem, Pope. You'd keep showing up." I wrap my fingers around my glass. "But showing up isn't the same as staying."
His eyes never leave mine. "Fair point."
"You know what else wasn't fair?" The wine has loosened something tight inside me.
“I know a lot of this wasn’t fair to you. I wanted to help Lennon, and you got hurt in the process.”
“That. And you deciding what I could handle and shutting me out when things got complicated. It wasn't fair that only you got to make choices for both of us without giving me any say. I can handle taking the heat to help Lennon. What I couldn’t take is you abandoning me without telling me anything.”
Pope doesn't argue or defend himself. He just nods, once, acknowledging the truth.
"I was wrong." His voice is low, steady. "I thought I was protecting you. But all it did was hurt you and make me lose you. I know now I handled it all wrong.”
He says it without defense, without excuses. No corporate spin, no careful language to minimize liability. Just raw truth.
It rattles me, because this is what I wanted all along—honesty, not walls. Not the calculated distance he put between us when things got hard.
"I can't go back to secrecy and half-truths." My voice cracks. "I won't survive it a second time."
Pope reaches across the table, his fingertips brushing mine. "No more secrets. Ever."
The contact burns. My breath hitches, caught between the instinct to pull back and the need to feel him. His words hit something raw. It's the part of me that wanted him to fight for me, not protect me from afar.
My chest aches with the force of it.
"You say that now." I shake my head. "But when things get messy?—"
"Things are already messy." His fingers remain, barely touching mine. "And I'm still here. I know now."
I push my chair back, needing air, needing distance from the gravity of him. The wooden legs scrape against the concrete as I stand.
But Pope rises too, following me as I step away from the table.
He follows me to the edge of the rooftop, where the string lights end and the shadows deepen. I can't outrun him here. There's nowhere to go except back through the crowded bar or down sixteen floors in an elevator.
My breath comes fast and shallow as I stop near the entrance, gripping the metal railing.
The city sprawls below us, twinkling and oblivious. I can sense him behind me, close enough that his warmth radiates against my back.
"Sloane."
I turn to face him, my name on his lips like a plea. The dim light catches his jawline as he leans down, his eyes searching mine. The noise of the bar fades to a distant hum.
"I haven't stopped thinking about you. Not one single day. Not one night."
My throat tightens. Five months of building walls, of convincing myself I was over him, and he shatters it all with one sentence.
"Pope, we can't just?—"
His hand slides down my arm, deliberate, until his fingers lace with mine. My body betrays me, leaning in even as my brain screams caution. I'm trembling, but I don't let go.
"Can't what?" he asks, his voice barely audible over the thrum of blood in my ears.