Chapter 13
Georgia
The city lights of Duluth were a smear of amber and red in the rearview mirror.
We were driving north. Away from the campus. Away from the team. Away from the penthouse that felt less like a sanctuary and more like a gilded cage with every passing day.
I watched Toby drive. His profile was etched in shadow, sharp and unreadable. He had one hand on the wheel, the other resting on the center console, close to mine but not touching.
He had woken me up twenty minutes ago. No explanation. Just “Get dressed. We’re leaving.”
Usually, that kind of command would have triggered my brat reflex. I would have argued. I would have demanded an itinerary.
But tonight, I saw something in his eyes—a haunted, hollow look—that made the fight drain out of me. So I put on my coat, grabbed a thermos of coffee, and got in the car.
"Where are we going?" I asked softly, breaking the silence that had stretched for miles.
"Nowhere," he said. His voice was gravel. "Just... away."
"Away is good," I agreed. "Away is underrated."
He glanced at me. A flicker of a smile touched his lips, but it didn't reach his eyes.
"You didn't ask why."
"I figured you'd tell me when you were ready. Or we'd end up disposing of a body. Either way, I'm your accomplice."
He let out a short, dry laugh. "No bodies. Just ghosts."
He turned off the highway onto a smaller road that wound up the coastline. The trees grew thicker here, dark sentinels crowding the pavement.
We drove for another ten minutes until he pulled into a scenic overlook. It was deserted. Just a gravel patch on the edge of a cliff, overlooking the vast, black expanse of Lake Superior.
He killed the engine. The silence rushed in, heavy and cold.
Toby didn't move. He stared out the windshield at the nothingness.
"Today is the anniversary," he said.
I waited. I didn't push. I knew that whatever was coming, it was fragile.
"My mother left ten years ago today," he continued, his voice devoid of emotion. "Not died. Left. Packed a bag while I was at school. Left a note on the fridge. Moved to Paris with a sculptor named Jean-Luc."
I turned in my seat to face him. My heart ached. I knew his parents were divorced, but the details had always been vague.
"I was twelve," he said. "I came home. The house was empty. The staff had the day off. It was just me and the note."
He gripped the steering wheel so hard the leather creaked.
"What did the note say?" I whispered.
"It said: 'Be good, Toby. Don't be like your father. I can't breathe here anymore.'"
He closed his eyes.
"She couldn't breathe. In a mansion. with everything money could buy. She felt like she was suffocating. So she left her son behind to save herself."
"Toby..."
"My father came home later that night," he went on, opening his eyes and staring at the lake. "He read the note. He didn't cry. He didn't yell. He just crumpled it up and threw it in the trash. Then he looked at me and said, 'Emotions are liabilities, Tobias. Your mother was weak. Don't be weak.'"
A chill went down my spine that had nothing to do with the winter air.
"That's why," I realized. "That's why you are the way you are. The control. The discipline. The robot mode."
"Because if I feel anything," he said, turning to look at me, his eyes wide and vulnerable in the dark, "I'm weak. And if I'm weak, I get left behind. Or I get crushed."
He let go of the wheel and leaned his head back against the seat.
"I hated her for leaving. For years. I hated her for choosing herself over me.
But lately..." He looked at me, his gaze intense.
"Lately, I think I understand her. The pressure...
the expectations... it's like a weight on your chest that never lifts.
Sometimes, running feels like the only way to survive. "
"Is that why we're here?" I asked, my voice trembling. "Are you running?"
"I wanted to," he admitted. "I wanted to keep driving until the gas ran out. Until I was somewhere where the name Kincaid didn't mean anything."
"But you stopped."
"Yeah." He reached out and took my hand. His fingers were cold. "Because I realized I couldn't run. Not without you. And dragging you into my mess... that's selfish."
"I'm already in your mess, Toby," I said, squeezing his hand. "I live in your mess. I sleep in your mess."
"You deserve better," he murmured. "You deserve someone uncomplicated. Someone who doesn't have lawyers tracking his movements and a father who thinks love is a transaction."
"I don't want uncomplicated," I said fiercely. "I want you."
I unbuckled my seatbelt and climbed over the center console. It was awkward in the cramped space, but I didn't care. I settled into his lap, straddling his legs, wrapping my arms around his neck.
He groaned, his arms coming around my waist instinctively to hold me steady.
"Georgia..."
"Listen to me," I said, framing his face with my hands.
"My mother left too. Remember? Pilates retreat in Sedona that turned into a permanent vacation from reality.
My father treated me like a doll to be dressed up and sold to the highest bidder.
I know what it feels like to be an accessory to someone else's life. "
I pressed my forehead against his.
"We are broken people, Toby. We have jagged edges. But maybe... maybe our jagged edges fit together."
He looked at me. Really looked at me. The walls were down. The Ice King was gone. There was only Tobias, the boy who had been left behind.
"I'm scared," he whispered. "I'm scared that if I let myself love you the way I want to... I won't be able to do what I have to do. I won't be able to be ruthless."
"Then don't be ruthless," I said. "Be real. Be the guy who makes soup. Be the guy who paints violent storms in a boathouse. Be the guy who holds me when I cry."
"That guy doesn't win championships," he argued weakly.
"That guy wins me," I countered. "And isn't that enough?"
He stared at me for a long heartbeat. The silence stretched, filled with the sound of our breathing and the wind outside.
Then, slowly, he nodded.
"Yeah," he whispered. "It's enough. It's more than enough."
He kissed me.
It wasn't like the other times. It wasn't hungry or desperate or claiming. It was soft. It was slow. It was a seal on a contract written in scars.
It tasted like salt tears and coffee and hope.
He pulled back, resting his forehead against mine again.
"I have a secret too," I whispered.
"Tell me," he murmured, his hands rubbing soothing circles on my back.
"The debt," I said. "The money I needed. It wasn't just credit card bills."
Toby went still. "What was it?"
"My brother. Leo."
Toby frowned. "I didn't know you had a brother."
"No one does. My father disowned him five years ago when Leo came out. Erased him from the family history. Leo moved to Chicago. He tried to start a business. It failed. He got involved with some... bad people. Loan sharks."
I took a shaky breath.
"He called me a month ago. They were threatening to break his legs. He needed fifty thousand dollars. That's why I was desperate. That's why I took the job. That's why I'm selling the paintings anonymously. I'm trying to buy his safety."
Toby’s grip on me tightened.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because I didn't want you to fix it," I said. "I didn't want to be another person asking you for money. I wanted to handle it. I wanted to prove that I could save someone I loved without my father's help."
"Fifty thousand," Toby repeated. "Is he safe now?"
"For now. I sent them the first installment. But they want the rest by the end of the month."
"We'll pay it," Toby said instantly.
"No," I pulled back. "No, Toby. That's not why I told you. I don't want your money. I just... I wanted you to know. No secrets."
"It's not my money," he said. "It's our money. If we're a team, we handle threats together."
"It's my brother. My fight."
"You're fighting with one hand tied behind your back," he argued. "Let me help. Not because I'm rich. But because he's your family, and you're my family."
The word hung in the air. Family.
It was a loaded word for both of us. A word that meant pain and obligation. But coming from him, it sounded different. It sounded like a choice.
"We'll figure it out," I compromised. "Together."
"Together," he agreed.
He pulled me back down for another kiss. This one was deeper, filled with the relief of unburdening.
We stayed like that for a long time. In the car, on the edge of a cliff, in the middle of nowhere.
"What if..." I started, tracing the line of his jaw. "What if we just kept driving?"
"Where would we go?"
"Paris," I smiled. "Or Tokyo. Or a cabin in the woods where no one knows who Richard Sterling or William Kincaid are."
"A cabin," he mused. "With a studio for you. And a frozen pond for me."
"And a dog," I added. "A big, dumb golden retriever named Puck."
He chuckled. "Puck. Original."
"I like classic names."
"I like the sound of it," he admitted. "You, me, a dog, and silence."
"It sounds like a fairy tale," I whispered.
"It sounds like a plan," he said.
But even as we wove the fantasy, spinning a future out of starlight and whispers, the reality was waiting for us back in Duluth.
The draft was in two weeks. The debt collectors were waiting. Our fathers were plotting.
But for tonight, in the bubble of the Rover, we were safe.
"Let's go home," he said eventually, his voice heavy with reluctance.
"Yeah," I sighed. "Back to the war."
"Back to the war," he agreed.
He helped me climb back into the passenger seat. He buckled me in like I was precious cargo.
As we drove back down the winding road, the city lights growing brighter on the horizon, I looked at him.
I knew, with a terrible certainty, that this moment was the peak. We had climbed the mountain. We had seen the view.
And now, the only way was down.
The next morning, the descent began.
I woke up alone in the bed.
A note was on the pillow.
Practice. Then meetings. Don't forget to eat. - T
No heart. No "Love you." Just logistics.
The Robot was back.