Chapter 45 River
River
It feels like I’ve been pacing the penthouse for hours. Back and forth. Again and again. Like a man on the edge of splintering apart, because that’s exactly where I am.
Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, the city blazes in sharp daylight.
Sunlight bounces off glass towers, but I barely register the scenery.
The brilliance blurs together, smearing across the glass like a watercolor left out in the rain.
I’ve stopped seeing the view. Stopped feeling anything but the restless churn inside me.
My phone is clenched in one hand, screen still lit with the glow of the location-sharing app.
I hate that I’ve been staring at it all day like some obsessed asshole.
I hate how badly I’ve needed the reassurance that she’s safe.
More than that, I hate that I’ve reduced myself to watching a blinking dot to know if she’s coming back to me.
This morning, she was at the bakery.
For a few hours, my heartrate slowed and my brain quieted. I told myself she was where she needed to be. Back in the rhythm of her own life. Surrounded by the women who always have her back.
But then the dot moved.
To Zane’s address.
And just like that, my world tilted on its axis. My hand was already on my keys, my body halfway to the door before my brain caught up. The urge to storm over there and rip her away from him nearly swallowed me whole.
Zane fucking Holloway doesn’t deserve her.
Or Nora.
He never did and he never will.
As much as every instinct in me screams to fight for her, this isn’t a battle I can win with brute force.
Not with Callie.
She’s not some problem I can fix or a prize to be claimed. She’s a woman who’s had to be strong for too damn long. Who’s been let down, disappointed, and dismissed more times than I probably even know.
And if there’s one thing I’ve learned since she and Nora came into my life, it’s that the only way this works is if she chooses me on her own.
Not because I begged or showed up with a list of reasons why she should.
But because she feels it and she wants this as much as I do.
So I wait.
Even if it kills me.
Which it just might.
I’ve replayed last night over again on an endless, painful loop. The way she climbed on top of me like she needed me just as badly as I’ve always needed her. The way her eyes stayed locked on mine, filled with everything we haven’t said out loud.
And then she was gone.
No note or explanation.
Just a hollow space where her warmth had been.
The memory of her in my bed still clings to me like smoke. The feel of her skin, the way she moaned my name, the trust in every sigh and arch of her body.
It all felt so damn real.
Although maybe not real enough.
I drag a hand through my hair and turn back toward the window, trying to breathe through the ache inside me, when I hear the arrival of the elevator. The sound slices through the silence like a gunshot, freezing me in place.
A second later, the doors glide open and Callie steps out. Her hair is pulled into a loose ponytail, and her cheeks are pink from the cold.
She looks tired.
Beautiful.
So achingly familiar, it knocks the air from me.
I want to wrap my arms around her and never let go.
Instead, I remain rooted in place. If this is the moment she’s come to say goodbye, I’ll need every shred of control I have left just to stand here and take it.
She meets my eyes from across the distance. There’s hesitation in hers. But also something steadier. A quiet kind of resolve I haven’t seen before.
“Where’s Nora?” I ask.
“With my parents. I needed to talk to you. Alone.”
My pulse stutters.
Well, fuck.
That can’t be good.
The need to be closer wins out, and I take a cautious step in her direction. “Are you okay?”
She nods just once. “I am now.”
Those three words nearly bring me to my knees.
But still, I don’t know where this is going. I don’t know if she’s here to stay or to say goodbye. And that uncertainty guts me.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Adrenaline rushes through my veins. I don’t need her to explain the question. I already know what she means.
I take another step. “I never wanted you to feel like you owed me anything. If you chose me, it needed to be because your heart wouldn’t let you do anything else and the world feels quieter when we’re together. Because being with me feels as natural as breathing.”
Unable to help myself, I close the remaining distance between us. “I wanted it to be because you love me as much as I love you,” I say quietly.
And now I’m standing right in front of her.
When I look into her eyes, I see it.
Everything I’ve been hoping for.
Everything I’ve been afraid to believe in.
“I do love you,” she confesses.
I blink, almost afraid I imagined it. “You do?”
Her lips curve. “Yes. I love you, River.”
She says it like it’s the simplest truth in the world.
And maybe it is.
Maybe it always has been.
Emotion grips my throat. “Say it again, baby.”
She steps closer, pressing her palms to my chest. “I love you.”
I close my eyes as her words wash over me, splitting me open in ways I never knew were possible.
I drop my forehead to hers. “Thank fuck, Callie.”
Her fingers curl into my shirt. “I was so scared,” she admits. “Not of you. Never of you. But of letting someone all the way in and then losing them. Of trusting the wrong person again.”
“That’s never going to happen with me.”
“I realize that now.” She draws in a breath and leans back just enough to look up at me with eyes that shine. “You were always there. Every single time. When I needed help, when I needed quiet, when I didn’t even know what I needed—you showed up. You were already there.”
“Always,” I rasp. “And I’d do it again. A thousand times over.”
She smiles through the tears. “Even when I didn’t deserve it.”
“Don’t.” I cup her jaw, brushing my thumb along her skin. “Don’t ever say that again. You deserve every fucking thing this world has to offer.”
Her throat works on a swallow. “Zane said all the right things, but he’s never shown up. Not for Nora or for me. You have. Every moment and in every way that matters.”
“I will never stop showing up for you,” I promise. “I don’t care how hard it gets. I’m in this. All the way.”
When she launches herself at me, I catch her without hesitation. She buries her face against my neck, her body trembling in my arms, as if the weight of everything she’s let go has finally caught up to her. My hands smooth over her back, wanting to offer comfort.
“I wanted to tell you this morning,” she admits. “But I needed time to think. And I needed to be sure.”
I pull back just enough to look at her, brushing my fingers along her cheek. “And are you?”
Her nod is firm. “I’m done questioning what we have. And I’m done letting fear speak louder than love.”
I press a kiss against her forehead. “Good. Just know I’m not going anywhere.” I can’t help but stare at the woman who’s changed everything for me. My entire world. “Not ever.”