20. Logan
LOGAN
After our quick trip to the store, Sloane heads straight for her room like her ass is on fire, with some mumbled excuse about needing to go over new plays and watch film, but I know what she was actually doing.
She was running. Hiding.
From me. From the way I make her feel things that she can’t explain.
How do I know?
Because she’s doing the same damn things to me.
Riding in a car with a girl is all fun and games until your eyes seem to be stuck on her.
How soft her hair looks, how she bites her lip when there are too many cars close to her.
The way she turns down the music when she needs to turn into the parking lot, even though she’s been to the same store hundreds of times.
I lean my forehead against the wall next to my bedroom door, breathing in and out slowly, trying to erase the image of her from my mind. I swear to God, she’s starting to make me feel a little insane.
Then I hear it.
A soft shuffle from down the hall.
Pops.
I go still.
His door opens wider, and he steps into the hallway like he’s trying not to make noise in his own house. His shoulders are slightly rounded, blanket still draped over him like he brought the nap with him.
He pauses when he sees me standing there.
“Where’s Sloane?” he asks, voice quiet.
“Her room,” I answer, keeping my tone casual. “We ran out of applesauce, so we had to run to the store really quick.”
Pops’s mouth twitches. “Of course we did.”
Pops shuffles forward, and I’m immediately on alert—not hovering, but ready. My body moves before my brain can decide what’s appropriate.
“You good?” I ask.
Pops gives me a look. “I’m not eighty-seven, kid.”
“Could’ve fooled me,” I mutter before I can stop myself.
He snorts, then winces and quickly rubs his temple once. The motion is subtle, like he’s embarrassed by it.
I clock it anyway.
My chest tightens.
Pops catches my gaze and raises his brows like he’s daring me to make a comment.
I don’t.
I just nod toward the table. “Want to sit?”
Pops moves to the table and lowers himself into a chair slowly. Not dramatic. Just…careful.
I hate careful. Careful feels like the opposite of him.
He watches me for a second, then nods toward the kitchen. “You’re not icing.”
“I did it earlier,” I lie.
Pops’s brow lifts. “Mm.”
He’s calling my bluff without saying it.
Getting up, I grab my ice pack out of the freezer, hobble back over to the couch, and set it over my knee like a teenager caught not doing his homework.
Pops looks satisfied.
Then he settles back in his chair and studies me with those steady eyes that have seen too much of my life—my wins, my injuries, my tantrums, the quiet stuff I never said out loud.
“You and Sloane fighting again?” he asks, casual on purpose.
My stomach drops.
I keep my face neutral. “We’re always fighting.”
Pops hums. “True.”
I shift my leg slightly, pain sparking. “She’s…on edge.”
Pops’s expression softens a fraction. “Yeah.”
Silence stretches.
Not awkward—Pops doesn’t do awkward. Just…heavy.
The house keeps humming around us, like it doesn’t know the rules have changed.
Pops clears his throat. “She spent some time with Jade and Blakely today.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Seemed like it helped.”
Pops nods slowly, then taps his fingers on the table once. “Good.”
Another pause.
Then, quietly, “She doesn’t like leaving me.”
I blink. “What?”
Pops’s mouth twitches, fond and tired. “She’ll do it because she’s stubborn, and she thinks she can outwork the universe. But she doesn’t like leaving me. Like if she steps out for one second, something bad will happen.”
My throat tightens.
“That’s…” I start, then stop, because saying insane feels wrong when I get it. When I’ve been thinking the same thing every time Pops coughs.
I swallow. “She won’t let anyone help.”
Pops gives a quiet laugh. “Oh, I know. That’s why I’m telling you, not her.”
Heat creeps up my neck. “Pops—”
He holds up a hand. “Not a lecture. Just…a request.”
I stare at the ice pack like it has answers.
The request isn’t new, but it seems impossible in a way it didn’t before.
Because helping Sloane means being close, and being close means the kiss, and the kiss means Cameron, and Cameron means losing my place in this family if I step wrong.
I force myself to breathe. “I’m here,” I say finally. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Pops’s eyes soften. “Good.”
He leans back slightly, blanket still around his shoulders like a cape he refuses to admit he needs. “Now. Since you’re up and functional…”
I lift a brow. “Oh no.”
Pops’s mouth curves. “Can you make me tea?”
I blink. “You want tea?”
“Yes,” he says, deadpan. “Shocking. I’ve entered my tea era. Coffee seems to make my headaches a little more powerful, so we are moving on to tea.”
I snort, moving toward the kettle. “What kind?”
“The one Sloane buys that tastes like tree bark,” Pops says.
“That narrows it down to all of them,” I mutter.
Pops chuckles softly.
And for a few seconds, the house almost feels normal again.
I fill the kettle, set it on the stove, and move carefully—because my knee hates me, because the brace is stiff, because everything takes longer now.
Pops watches without speaking, but I can feel his eyes on me.
When the water starts to heat, he says quietly, “How’s the leg?”
I shrug. “Hurts.”
Pops nods like that’s fair. “You getting stronger?”
“Jason says I am.”
“Jason’s a good man,” Pops replies.
“He’s a psychopath,” I correct.
Pops’s mouth twitches. “Sometimes both can be true.”
I smile faintly at that, then look away before it can turn into something softer.
Sloane’s door opens, and my pulse jumps instantly, just at the idea of seeing her.
I am so fucking fucked.
She pauses when she sees Pops at the table.
“Hey,” she says, her voice instantly gentler.
Pops’s eyes soften. “Hey, kiddo.”
Sloane sets the bag onto the counter and leans down to kiss Pops’s cheek. “You being social?”
“Against my will,” Pops says.
Sloane snorts softly, then glances at me. Her eyes flick to the kettle, then to the tea box, then to my ice pack sitting nearby.
She takes it in like she takes everything in.
Then she narrows her eyes. “Are you making tea?”
Pops answers for me. “He is. Apparently, he has hidden domestic talents that he hid for the last decade.”
Sloane’s mouth twitches. “Shocking.”
“I’m just full of surprises.” I lift a brow. “Don’t sound so disappointed.”
She rolls her eyes and starts unpacking the bags we got from the store. Applesauce, tea, a couple bananas, crackers—things she didn’t have to buy but did anyway, because that’s what she does. She plans for every possible need like it’s her job.
She holds out something I didn’t see in the cart.
“Here,” she says, handing me a bag of peanut butter M&M’s, which happen to be my favorite. “Figured you might deserve these as an award for being less annoying today.”
My chest tightens, and I have to look away. My gaze flies to Pops, who has a brow raised at me, a smirk causing the lines around his eyes to crinkle just a little more than usual.
Meddler.
She sets the applesauce onto the counter with a firm little thunk, then turns to me like she’s doing a formal report.
“There,” she says. “The world is saved.”
I smirk. “Thank God. I was worried.”
Sloane’s eyes flash. “You’re welcome.”
“I didn’t say thank you.”
“You don’t have to,” she snaps. Then her face tightens like she realizes what she just said.
Because she did it.
And she cares so much it leaks out as anger.
Pops clears his throat, amused. “Do I get tea, or are you two going to do whatever this is all night?”
Sloane’s cheeks flush. “Tea.”
I turn back to the kettle, because focusing on water boiling is safer than focusing on her.
The kettle whistles. I pour carefully, hands steady, and drop the teabag into Pops’s mug.
Sloane watches me like she’s waiting for me to mess it up.
I glance at her. “What?”
She lifts her chin. “Don’t scald him.”
I huff. “I’m not incompetent.”
Sloane’s mouth twitches. “Debatable.”
Pops chuckles, taking the mug when I slide it across the table. “Thank you, son.”
The word hits me so hard my throat tightens.
Son.
He says it casually, like it’s natural. Like I’ve always been here. Like I belong.
My vision blurs for a second.
I blink quickly and clear my throat. “Yeah.”
Sloane freezes, too, just for a beat.
Her gaze flickers to Pops, then to me.
Something passes across her face—too fast to name, but it feels like understanding.
Like she knows Pops wasn’t just thanking me for tea.
He was claiming me.
Reminding me—and her—that this house is mine too.
Sloane looks away first, busying herself with opening the applesauce and setting it in the fridge like she needs a task to hold onto.
Pops sips his tea with a satisfied hum. “Perfect.”
I glance at Sloane, smug. “See?”
She rolls her eyes without looking at me. “Don’t get cocky.”
Pops laughs softly and starts talking about something on TV—another commentator he hates, some team that keeps disappointing him. Normal things. Familiar things.
Sloane answers him, nodding, smoothing the edges of the conversation like she always does. She keeps it light because Pops likes light.
I watch her while she talks.
The way she leans closer to Pops without thinking. The way her shoulders only relax when he’s in her line of sight. The way her smile is real with him and guarded with everyone else.
I want to reach across the kitchen and pull her into something that feels safe.
I also want to give her space because she asked for it.
I have no idea how to do both.
A vibration on the counter makes me glance down.
My phone.
Cameron: be home in 10. grabbing ice.
My stomach twists. Cameron’s coming back, which means the temperature in the house is about to change.
Sloane notices my glance. “Who is it?”
“Cameron,” I say.
Her shoulders tighten slightly. “Okay.”
She says it like it’s nothing.
But her eyes flick away, and I can see her brain doing the math—what she can say, what she can’t, how to act normal when she feels anything but. Was she jealous?
Pops pushes back his chair, tea mug half-finished. “I’m going to lie down again.”
Sloane is up instantly. “Do you need—”
“No,” Pops says gently. “Just rest.”
He pats her hand as he stands, and Sloane’s face softens in a way that makes my chest ache.
Then Pops shuffles down the hall, leaving the kitchen quieter.
Sloane turns to the sink, starts rinsing the teaspoon that doesn’t need rinsing, hands moving too fast.
I shift my weight, brace creaking.
Sloane’s eyes flick to my leg automatically.
“You should ice longer,” she says.
I blink. “What?”
She scowls. “Your knee. You always cheat the timer.”
“I don’t cheat,” I argue.
“You cheat,” she insists, like she’s observed it personally.
Heat creeps up my neck. “And how do you know that?”
Sloane stills.
The question lands in the space between us like a trap.
Because the answer is simple: because she pays attention.
She doesn’t look at me as she mutters, “Because you’re loud about it.”
I huff a laugh. “I’m not loud.”
“You complain like it’s a sport,” she snaps.
“That’s rich,” I say. “You complain like it’s a personality trait.”
Sloane whips toward me, eyes sharp. “I do not complain.”
She glares, and the tension crackles—not hateful, not soft, something in the middle that feels like friction and gravity.
Her gaze drops to my mouth for half a second.
My heartbeat thunders in my ears, and I go completely still.
Sloane’s breath catches, almost imperceptibly.
For a moment, it’s just us in the kitchen again. The same charged quiet from the hallway earlier. The same inch of space that feels too dangerous to close.
Then headlights sweep across the front window.
Cameron.
Sloane jerks back like she’s been snapped by a rubber band. “I’m going to my room,” she blurts.
I lift a brow. “What, are you allergic to your brother now?”
Sloane’s eyes flash. “Shut up.”
She stalks down the hall before I can say anything else, bare feet silent on the floor.
The front door opens.
Cameron walks in with a small bag of ice and a carton of something—milk, maybe—like he’s trying to contribute in the only way he knows.
He pauses when he sees me alone in the kitchen. His eyes flick down the hall toward Sloane’s room, then back to me.
“Where’d she go?” he asks, suspicious but not accusing.
I keep my expression neutral. “To her room.”
Cameron narrows his eyes. “Why?”
I shrug. “Because she’s Sloane.”
Cameron exhales like he’s exhausted by the answer. “Fair.”
He tosses the ice bag into the freezer, then glances at my knee. “You icing?”
“Yes, Mother,” I say quickly, because Sloane will haunt me if I lie.
Cameron’s mouth twitches. “Good.”
He leans against the counter, rubbing a hand over his face. He looks tired—real tired. Not gym tired. Soul tired.
“Pops up?” he asks.
“Was,” I say. “He went back to lie down.”
Cameron nods slowly, then glances toward the hall again. “Slo good?”
My chest tightens.
I could lie. I could say yes.
But I don’t, because Cameron deserves truth—even if it's a small truth.
“She’s…trying,” I say carefully.
Cameron’s jaw tightens. “Yeah.”
He looks at me for a beat like he wants to ask more.
Like he senses something in the air that doesn’t have a name yet.
My stomach knots, then Cameron blows out a breath and shifts the conversation like he’s choosing not to poke the bruise.
“Thanks for being here,” he says quietly.
My throat tightens. “Always.”
Cameron nods once, then claps my shoulder gently—careful of my leg, careful of everything these days.
“I’m gonna shower,” he says, then adds, “Text me if you need anything.”
He disappears down the hall.
The house quiets again.
I stand there for a long moment, staring at the hallway where Sloane vanished, feeling the ache of wanting her like it’s a physical thing lodged under my ribs.
Because it’s Sloane.
She’ll strip herself of comfort before she lets anyone else go without it.
Even me.
Even when she’s angry.
Even when she swears she doesn’t have space.
I exhale slowly, then limp back to the living room couch and reset the ice pack on my knee.
And somewhere down the hall, behind a closed door, Sloane Rhodes is pretending she doesn’t care.
But I’m starting to learn her tells.
So maybe she’s wrong.
Maybe she does have space.
She’s just terrified of what could happen if she admits that to herself.