Chapter 6 Aiden
AIDEN
When my sister sees an emergency, she acts.
There is no thought behind Carlie’s eyes, other than settling an emergency situation. She goes straight into fix-it mode—she did the same thing when we were kids and we got in trouble. No one was better at coming up with a lie or a solution in a split second.
It’s part of what makes her such a good emergency medicine pediatrician. It is also part of what makes her terrifying to deal with day to day.
The second the penthouse door closes behind her and the reality of what she’s walked into registers on her face—Harper in my shirt and nothing else, Mason laughing—Carlie’s hand clamps around my wrist. Her grip is tight, controlled, the way it gets when she’s furious and trying very hard not to make a scene.
“Aiden,” she says under her breath. “Office. Now.”
I don’t argue. I don’t even look back at Harper. Carlie drags me across my own penthouse, past Mason, who’s gone quiet in that instinctive way kids do when they sense adult tension. The sounds of the morning fall away behind us when my office door slams shut.
My office isn’t small. There’s a large desk and walls lines with loaded bookshelves. A big window provides a ton of light in the space, and a small fireplace makes it glow when lit. I even installed a small bar in the far corner.
But Angry Carlie dwarfs every detail.
She spins on me, eyes bright with an emotion I can’t clock.
I’ve never been able to read her the way I read other people.
I see folks on the worst days of their lives, and that lends a certain predictability to their expressions.
Terror. Sadness. The occasional edge of madness when someone can’t accept what’s just happened to them.
Carlie’s face is warring from one emotion to another. “You cannot do this to her again.”
I fold my arms automatically. “I’m not doing anything to her. She needed a place to stay. That’s it.”
Carlie laughs, sharp and humorless. “Bullshit.”
“I’m serious.”
“You’re lying. Maybe not to me—but to yourself. I saw the way you looked at her the second I walked in. And don’t think I didn’t notice the way she looks at you.”
“It’s early, and we weren’t thinking. The way we looked at each other means nothing—”
“It means everything,” Carlie fires back. “You broke her heart six years ago, Aiden. You don’t get to pretend this is just about hospitality. You are not that na?ve—"
“She moved on without me, Carlie,” I say, heat creeping into my voice. “She has a kid. She built a life. She’s clearly been just fine without me.”
Carlie’s lips part as her brows leap up her forehead. “Fine?”
“Yeah. Obviously. She has a terrific son and a bar that is doing well, outside of a minor fire that won’t slow her down, and she’s—”
“Fine?” she repeats while her nostrils flare. “You think that was fine?”
“Clearly, you think I said the wrong thing, but what the hell else am I supposed to think?”
She steps closer, voice rising now. “She married David three months after that night with you. Three. Months. You think that was true love? You think she woke up one day healed and ready to jump into a marriage with a nothingburger of a man?”
I shake my head. “That’s not—”
“She was running,” Carlie cuts in. “From you. From what you did. From what she felt.”
I turn away, jaw tight, staring at the wall of glass that looks out over the city. I am jealous of every person out there, because they are not stuck in here with a pissed-off Carlie. I drag my fingers through my hair. “You don’t know that.”
“I absolutely fucking do. I watched it happen, Aiden. I watched my best friend convince herself that being safe was the same as being happy. I watched her miserable marriage fall apart. Because of you.”
Guilt gnaws at my gut. “I tried.” My voice surprises me with hoarseness. “I tried to put distance between us. After. I knew I’d fuck it up, Carlie. So, I tried.”
Carlie’s voice cracks when she speaks again. “I was so angry when I figured it out. At you. At her. At the timing.”
“Because you knew I’d fuck it up.”
She doesn’t seem to hear me. “…I said things I shouldn’t have. To both of you. I kept you apart because I thought I was protecting her from you.”
I turn back toward her slowly.
“But Aiden,” she continues, eyes shining now, “she never got over you.”
I stare at Carlie like she’s speaking another language. My brain rejects it on instinct, scrambling for something solid to hold onto. Logic. Timeline. Evidence. Anything that doesn’t involve rewriting six years of carefully justified distance.
“That’s not possible,” I say finally. “If she never got over me, she wouldn’t have gotten married. I made sure to be get-over-able by being an asshole the morning after. I made it easy for her.”
Carlie’s mouth twists. Not angry this time. Pained. “You really believe that?”
“She married someone else,” I snap. “People don’t do that if they’re still hung up on the past. And it was just one night! You don’t get attached in one night!” That lie does not get more believable the louder I say it.
Carlie steps back, crossing her arms like she’s holding herself together now. Her voice goes soft. “People do it all the time, Aiden. Especially when the past hurts more than the future they can imagine.”
I shake my head. Truth is, this is familiar territory for Carlie. It’s no wonder she’s so upset for Harper. But that’s not fair to either of us. We are not Carlie and Jack. Still, I see how this would upset her. “You’re projecting.”
“I’m remembering.”
At least she’s aware that she’s projecting. I take a breath, forcing my voice level. “I’m just helping Harper out. She needed a place to stay. That’s it. That’s all this is. I’m not dragging her into anything.”
“Oh, bullshit! Do you hear yourself? You think putting her in your fabulous apartment with you, doesn’t matter? Showing her the life she could have had with you…” She gestures wildly around the office. “And don’t insult me by pretending she doesn’t feel it too.”
“That doesn’t mean I’m doing anything,” I fire back.
“It means you’re already doing everything,” she shoots back. “You broke her heart six years ago, Aiden. You don’t get to hover around her life now and pretend it’s charity.”
The office is way too fucking small. The city beyond the glass blurs, suddenly distant and unreal. I sink into the chair behind me without remembering choosing to. My pulse is loud in my ears, every beat echoing the same impossible thought.
“Whatever you think I’m doing, I’m not. This isn’t some ploy to re-enter her life. I saw a need, so I filled it. You offered for her to stay with you too, remember?”
“I never slept with her and broke her heart.”
“You know what I mean!”
Carlie’s voice softens, but it doesn’t get any easier to hear. “She didn’t love David. She settled for him.”
I stare at the floor, my hands slack at my sides.
I sit there, staring at the floor. Every justification I’ve carried for six years frays at the edges.
I tell myself Carlie is exaggerating. That memory distorts things.
That time smooths over pain until it looks like something else.
“I doubt Harper would want you to tell me things she confided in you about her marriage. Isn’t that some breach of best friend code? ”
“We aren’t kids anymore, Aiden. And some things shouldn’t be kept secret. You walk through life like a wrecking ball, leaving women after a night here and a night there, without any thought of the consequences. Well, this is consequences.”
It’s all I can do to not grind my teeth when my jaw locks tight. “You know exactly why I don’t let them get attached. Don’t act like you don’t.”
“Dad’s bullshit is no excuse. You’re forty. You have to let that go.”
“Easy for you to say. You weren’t his punching bag.”
She leans against the door, and I’m not sure if it’s because that’s the nearest leaning spot or if she wants me to feel even more trapped in my own damn office.
Her deep breath hisses out of her lungs.
“I was angry,” she says suddenly, and the shift in her voice makes me look up.
The fury is gone now, burned down to something raw and exposed.
“I was so angry when I finally figured it out.”
“Because I hurt her.”
“Because you hurt yourself, too.” Her eyes shine, and she blinks hard, like she’s trying not to let it spill over. “And because I’m an idiot.”
I swallow. “What do you mean?”
“I told her you didn’t deserve her. I told you to stay away from her.”
A sick feeling twists in my gut. Those conversations are etched into my mind. “I remember how much you hated me for her.”
“I thought I was protecting her,” Carlie says weakly. “I thought if I kept you apart, she’d finally let go. I thought distance would fix what love broke.”
“It wasn’t love. It was one night.”
“Whatever you want to call it, she never got over you,” Carlie says again, softer this time. “Not once. Not for a second. Her whole marriage, she was pretending.”
My chest tightens. “Pretending how?”
“Pretending safety was the same thing as happiness. Pretending that love could grow between her and David. And eventually, she was pretending that lying to herself every day about her own happiness was just how marriages work.”
I push to my feet, restless now, pacing the length of the office. “You’re telling me she built an entire life on a lie?”
“I’m telling you she did what she had to do to survive,” Carlie replies. “And I watched it happen.”
I stop pacing. “Watched what?”
“I watched her convince herself that this was it, that this was as good as it got and that she wasn’t allowed to want.”
Something in my chest gives way. “Want… what?”
Carlie looks at me then, really looks at me, like she’s deciding whether to finish the job she started. “You, you idiot. She wanted you. Haven’t you figured that out by now?”
I stand there, frozen, every memory rearranging itself in real time. Harper’s smile. The way she asked me last night if I regretted her, like she already knew the answer.