41. So Ready
SO READY
MORGAN
Philadelphia looked different than she remembered.
That was her first thought as the familiar skyline became visible. The city hadn’t changed in the weeks she’d been up north, but she had.
She’d spent five weeks looking at mountains and trees and colors other than shades of gray. Smelling pine and leaves and dirt instead of concrete and exhaust and trash. Being the only car on the road instead of slowly creeping along foot by foot, bumper to bumper.
They’d barely crossed into the city limits, and the familiar tension was already preparing her for the constant fight-or-flight readiness that came with being surrounded by the one-point-five million people occupying the city at any given time.
In contrast, Pine Ridge had five thousand. Maybe. And a lot more open space.
Morgan glanced to the side. Patrick looked out the window at the passing streetscape with the same attentive quiet he brought to everything. She tried to imagine him living and working here and couldn’t.
“Have you ever been to Philly before?”
“Once, when I was a kid,” he said. “Class field trip.”
“Let me guess. Franklin Institute?”
“Yep.”
“Did you like it?”
“Didn’t get to see much of it,” Patrick said.
“Why not?”
“There was a shooting nearby and we had to shelter in place.”
“Oh.”
Morgan grew up in the city. Violence, particularly gun violence, wasn’t unusual. But for a boy from Pine Ridge visiting for a day? That had to have left a mark.
“My place is in Fairmount,” she said. “We’re almost there.”
He nodded and kept looking.
Her apartment was small, which was fine. She was one person who worked long hours. She didn’t need much. Nor could she afford it. She made a decent salary, but even a studio in a decent part of the city was expensive.
She stood in the doorway and watched Patrick take it all in.
The galley kitchen with the builder-grade everything.
The single window over the sink with its view of the building opposite.
The living area that was also the dining area that was also, essentially, her office.
The folding table by the window that was usually stacked with case files and her laptop.
He paused in the center of the room and did a 360.
She knew what he saw, because she was seeing it too.
The tiny space had none of the character of his hundred-and-fifty-year-old fixer upper.
None of the warmth of his family’s pub. Even Frank’s utilitarian farmhouse seemed like a riot of personality compared to this place.
There was absolutely nothing about it that was her.
It was just a space, and a temporary one at that.
Before, that had been enough. Now, she wanted more.
“Hungry?” she asked, opening the freezer to reveal the frozen meals for one, stacked with the precision of someone who’d made a system of solitude.
He looked at them for a moment. To his credit, his expression remained fixed and impassive. Then he closed the freezer gently and said, “I’m not that hungry. Where do you want to eat tonight?”
She almost laughed. “Let me show you the city first.”
She took him to the art museum steps first because they were the thing everyone did when they came to Philly.
She, like most of the people who called the city home, felt the same absurd civic pride that had turned a fictional training montage into a genuine landmark.
Even the most reserved tourists ran up steps and threw their arms in the air in triumph at the top.
Patrick was no exception. She could see it in his eyes.
“Go ahead,” she told him. “You know you want to.”
He leaned down, kissed her cheek, and just… went, taking the steps two at a time with the easy athleticism of a man who was in peak physical form, and when he reached the top, he jumped and pumped his arms toward the sky and grinned down at her.
Her heart swelled and she laughed, climbing the steps at a more dignified pace to meet him at the Rocky statue. She went willingly when he slid his arm around her waist and gently tugged her to his side.
The view wasn’t new to her, but standing there with Patrick, she felt like she was seeing it for the first time through his eyes. The city spread out below them. The fountains at the base of the steps and beyond that, the plaza and Logan Square.
“It’s a nice view,” Patrick said.
“It is,” she agreed. “But there’s something to be said for mountains too. Come on. There are some other things I want to show you.” Before I leave here for good, she added silently.
The Reading Terminal Market in the middle of the day was organized chaos—vendors and produce and Pennsylvania Dutch baked goods and the scents of everything competing for the same air space at once. Patrick moved through it with his hand at her back, which she’d become quite fond of.
She steered him to the cheesesteak counter. “It’s not the Celtic Goddess, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t give you this experience.”
“I’ve had cheesesteaks before.”
“Unless you’ve had one made here, you haven’t. Wit or witout?”
He looked at her and blinked. “I don’t know what that means.”
“With or without onions.”
“With,” he said, without hesitation.
They ate standing at the counter the way you were supposed to, and Patrick ate his with the focused appreciation of someone who took his food tasting seriously. He probably did, given who his mother was.
“Well?” she said.
“You’re right. It’s not the same at all.”
Dinner was at a small Italian place in her neighborhood that she’d ordered from a hundred times. The owner recognized her when they came in and seemed mildly surprised when she asked for a table for two.
Patrick studied the menu and chatted amiably with the server, who seemed to enjoy it. Patrick Callaghan was the kind of man who made people feel seen and appreciated, she realized.
They talked for two hours about nothing and everything, including a lighthearted, getting to know each other version of ‘never have I ever.’ She couldn’t remember a time when she’d smiled so much or laughed so often, but something told her that if she listened to her instincts, it wouldn’t be the last.
They spent the night at her place, the two of them pressed close together on her tiny twin mattress. It wasn’t so bad for one night—especially since she spent most of the time sprawled over his much bigger body—but it wasn’t ideal.
In the morning, she walked out and got fresh bagels while Patrick was showering, which he wasn’t happy about.
He didn’t like the thought of her walking around the city by herself, even though she told him she’d been doing it for years without issue.
Once, she might have found his concern irritating, but now, knowing Patrick like she did, she realized it was a chivalrous streak that had been instilled in him since birth.
“What are we doing today?” he asked, ready and willing to do whatever she wanted.
“I need to stop by the ME’s office and hand in my resignation,” she answered, tossing him packets of cream cheese.
“Are you sure that’s what you want?” Patrick asked.
She was sure. She had no desire to continue with a department that hadn’t had her back when she needed them. That, more than anything else, had made the decision easy.
And no, she didn’t know what she was going to do next, but she had time to figure it out. She had enough in her savings to tide her over for a while, and living at Frank’s was going to be a hell of a lot cheaper than living in Fairmount while she did.
Plus, there were perks to staying in Pine Ridge. The biggest one was sitting beside her with a dab of cream cheese on his nose.
“I’m sure.”
The ME’s office was quieter than she’d expected.
Her supervisor wasn’t there—leave of absence, the administrator said, with the careful neutrality of someone who knew more than they were saying.
The federal inquiry had apparently moved faster than either of them had anticipated.
She filed her resignation with HR and walked out through the lobby with a sense of freedom she’d never felt before.
Patrick was waiting outside on the steps.
He’d offered to come in. She’d said no, and he’d accepted that without argument, which was one of the things she’d come to appreciate about him.
He understood the difference between support and intrusion, and he had a good sense for which one was needed at any given time.
“Okay?” he asked.
“Yes.” She was, possibly for the first time in her life, entirely okay. “Let’s go pack.”
It didn’t take long. Morgan had never been one to accumulate things.
Books. Files. Her limited wardrobe, most of which she’d probably end up donating.
She stood in the middle of the living room with a half-full box and looked around with a sense of finality. Took in the flat builder’s white walls, the vinyl flooring, the window with its view of the building opposite and realized she wasn’t going to miss this place at all.
“Is that everything?” Patrick asked from the doorway.
“I think so.”
Morgan checked her phone one last time. Once she’d made up her mind, she’d texted her mother to tell her that she’d decided not to return to her job and would be moving out of her apartment.
The message had been read, but there had been no reply.
She was debating whether to drop by her mother’s house to say goodbye or just leave when there was a knock at the door.
At just over fifty, Rosalina DeStefano was still a beautiful woman.
She looked, as always, impeccable. Dark hair with a touch of silver at the temples gave her a regal air, as did her skillfully applied makeup and designer clothes chosen with care.
Presentation and appearance were everything in her world.
She looked at Patrick first, her eyes moving over him with rapid, thorough assessment, then looked to Morgan, the question apparent.
“Mom,” Morgan said. “This is Patrick Callaghan. Patrick, my mother, Rosalina DeStefano.”
Patrick extended his hand. “Mrs. DeStefano.”
After a brief hesitation, her mother accepted his hand. “Patrick.”
An awkward silence ensued.
“I’ll finish loading,” Patrick said, with the ease of a man who understood exactly when to absent himself. He picked up the last box from the hallway, letting the door close behind him.
“You look well,” her mother said, which was where she always started.
“I feel well.”
Rosalina looked around the apartment—the bare walls and empty cupboards, waiting for someone else to put their mark on them. “So it’s true. You’re leaving.”
“Yes.”
“For Pine Ridge.” Her mother said the name carefully.
“Yes.”
A silence. Her mother moved to the window and stood with her back to the room, looking at the building opposite, the same view Morgan had looked at for years.
“Is that where you met him?”
“Yes.”
“He seems… solid,” her mother said finally.
“He is.”
“Irish.”
“His father’s side, yes.”
“Something you have in common then.”
Morgan waited, the way she’d learned to wait with her mother—not pushing, not filling the space, just letting it be what it was.
Her mother turned from the window. She looked at Morgan with an expression Morgan had never quite seen before, her careful composure softening into something more genuine.
“You look like him, you know,” she said quietly. “Your father. You have his eyes.”
“That’s what Frank said. He said he was a good man.”
Her mother nodded. “He was. It wasn’t his fault,” she said, casting her eyes downward. “He didn’t know about you.”
It was as close to an apology as Rosalina DeStefano had ever come. Morgan recognized it for what it was.
“I know,” Morgan said. “Frank told me that too.”
Her mother looked at her for a moment. Then she looked toward the door through which Patrick had gone.
“He’s in love with you.”
“How could you possibly know that?”
“The same way I know you’re in love with him,” Rosalina said with a slight smile. “It’s in your eyes when you look at him.”
Morgan said nothing, because that was a truth she hadn’t even admitted to herself yet.
“I hope you do better with it than I did.”
On impulse, Morgan crossed the room and put her arms around her mother, who was stiff for a moment, then returned the embrace.
It didn’t fix everything, but it was something.
“I should go,” her mother said when they parted. At the door she paused, looked back, and said simply, “Take care of yourself and… call me once in a while.”
“I will,” Morgan said.
And meant it.
Patrick reappeared in the doorway a few minutes later.
“You okay?” he asked.
She thought about it honestly. “Yes. I think I am.”
He came in and stood beside her. She leaned into him slightly. He put his arm around her. “Ready?”
She took one last look around.
“So ready,” she said.
She accepted Patrick’s offer to drive back.
She fell asleep before the city was fully in the rearview, which she hadn’t intended to do but which her body apparently decided was necessary.
When she woke, they were already in the mountains, riding along the highway curving through the dark shapes of the ridgelines against the evening sky.
Patrick was driving with his usual unhurried ease, one hand on the wheel, the radio low. He glanced at her when she shifted.
“I’m sorry I fell asleep.”
“You needed it.”
She had. The last few days had taken a toll, but she hadn’t been lying when she said she was ready to move on. She looked at the mountains and felt a sense of peace settle over her.
The Pine Ridge town limits sign appeared in the headlights, and that’s when she felt it.
She was home.