Chapter 37 Garrett
Garrett
The silence in the conference room feels profound, like the quiet awe after a perfectly executed play. But this isn't about hockey. This is about watching the most extraordinary woman I've ever known completely remake her world through sheer force of brilliance.
I can't stop staring at her.
Sloane stands at the head of that massive mahogany table like she was born to command it, her hands flat against the polished surface, shoulders squared beneath her navy blazer.
The presentation still glows on the wall behind her—her vision, her strategy, her revolution—now backed by Henderson himself.
She did it. She didn't just win her job back—she transformed defeat into dominance, turned her termination into promotion, weaponized their dismissal into absolute victory.
And I got to watch it happen. Got to be here when she proved to everyone in this room that underestimating Sloane McKenzie is the kind of mistake that costs you everything.
The pride coursing through my veins is so intense it's almost painful.
Not the possessive pride of a man claiming credit for his woman's success, but something cleaner, purer—the deep satisfaction of watching someone you love become exactly who they were always meant to be.
She didn't need me to save her. She saved herself.
All I did was give her the tools and get out of her way.
Finally. Finally, I got it right.
Across the room, Easton and Brynn are gathering their things with the quiet efficiency of people who know the real show is just beginning. Brynn's laptop disappears into her bag with a soft snap, and she moves toward Sloane with predatory satisfaction gleaming in her eyes.
"Jesus Christ, Sloane," she breathes, pulling her into a fierce hug. "You didn't just win—you conquered."
Easton reaches them in two long strides, his massive frame radiating the protective satisfaction of a goalie who just shut out the opposing team's power play. When he wraps his arms around both women, his voice carries the rough edge of someone processing relief and pride in equal measure.
"I'm sorry," he says into Sloane's hair. "For the ultimatum. For not trusting you to handle this. For thinking I needed to protect you from your own choices."
"You were protecting the team," Sloane replies, and there's no edge to it now, no lingering resentment. Just understanding. "I get it. But next time, trust that I know what I'm doing."
"There won't be a next time," Easton says firmly. "You just proved you're untouchable."
They hold each other for another moment, siblings who've weathered the storm and emerged stronger. Then Brynn steps back, her mind already shifting toward the story she'll craft from today's victory.
"I need to get back to work," she says, but her gaze flicks meaningfully between Sloane and me. "This story writes itself, but I want to get it published before anyone tries to spin the narrative."
She pauses at the door, turning back with a grin that could power the city. "Enjoy your moment. You both earned it."
The words hang in the air like a benediction, and then Easton smiles too before he follows her out, leaving us alone in this cathedral of corporate power with nothing but the truth between us.
I watch Sloane's shoulders drop as the warrior persona she's worn for days finally begins to fade.
The brilliant strategist is still there—will always be there—but underneath it, I can see glimpses of the woman who used to steal my hoodies.
Who laughed at my terrible jokes. Who trusted me with her secrets and her dreams before I broke that trust with my need to be her hero.
She turns toward me, and when our eyes meet, the impact is like a clean hit to the chest. Everything I've been holding back—relief, love, hope, the desperate need to touch her—crashes through me with enough force to make my knees wobble.
"Garrett," she says, and my name in her voice sounds different now. Softer. Less guarded.
"Sloane." I take a careful step toward her, then stop. This is her moment, her victory, her choice. I've learned to wait for her cue.
She's studying my face with that analytical intensity I know so well, but there's something new there too. Something that looks almost like wonder.
"You didn't speak for me in there," she says quietly.
The observation hits me like a revelation.
She's right. When Miller launched his attack, when he tried to reduce her brilliance to pillow talk and personal scandal, every instinct I had screamed at me to defend her.
To stand up and deliver some passionate declaration of her competence. To be her champion.
Instead, I stepped back. Gave her the floor. Trusted her to fight her own battle while knowing I'd be there when the smoke cleared.
"No," I agree, my voice rough with emotion. "I didn't."
"You stood with me."
Four words. Four simple words that rewrite everything between us.
The relief that crashes through me is so overwhelming I have to grip the back of a chair to stay upright.
She sees it. She understands what I've learned, what I've become.
I'm not her hero anymore—I'm her partner.
Her equal. The man who trusts her competence completely and loves her fiercely enough to let her shine without dimming her light with my own need to matter.
"Always," I manage. "I'll always stand with you."
Something in her expression shifts, the last wall between us crumbling. She's crossing the space between us before I can process the movement, her hands coming up to frame my face with a gentleness that makes my chest ache.
"I'm sorry," she whispers, and the words hit me like absolution. "For shutting you out. For not seeing that you were trying to learn. For not giving you the chance to show me you'd changed."
"You had every right—"
"No." Her thumbs trace my cheekbones, and I lean into the touch, starved for the contact.
"I was scared. Scared of wanting you so much that I'd lose myself the way my mother did.
Scared of trusting someone with that kind of power over me.
But you..." She shakes her head, wonder bright in her green eyes.
"You gave the power back. You made yourself my weapon instead of my savior. "
The truth of it settles between us, a connection finally solidified. She's right. That's exactly what I did. What we did together.
"I love you," I say, the words coming out rough and unguarded.
"I love your brilliant mind and your fierce heart and the way you turn impossible situations into victories.
I love that you don't need me to rescue you—you rescue yourself.
And I love that you're strong enough to let me stand beside you while you do it. "
Her smile transforms her entire face. "I love you too. God, I love you so much it terrifies me. But not the bad kind of terrified anymore. The good kind. The kind that means something matters enough to be worth the risk."
When she rises on her toes to kiss me, I meet her halfway, my arms coming around her waist to pull her against me. There's no desperation here, no frantic hunger—not yet. Just the quiet confidence of a promise being kept, the gentle press of lips that says we found our way back to each other.
This is forgiveness and promise and profound love, tasting like forever.
Her lips are soft and sure beneath mine, and when I deepen the kiss, she sighs into my mouth with a deep contentment. But as our tongues dance together, as her hands slide up to tangle in my hair, something shifts. The gentle reunion kiss transforms into something deeper, warmer. More intent.
"So," she says, and I can hear the smile in her voice. "What now?"
Before I can answer, her briefcase catches my eye where she set it beside the conference table.
I move to collect it, lifting the weight that represents everything she's accomplished.
Not because she can't carry it herself, but because I want to.
Because supporting her load is different from carrying her burden.
"Now," I say, offering her my arm, "we go downstairs. Together. Then you're coming home with me. I'm cooking you a proper celebration dinner. No arguments."
Her smile turns wicked, her eyes dancing with a light I thought had been extinguished forever. "Oh, so the master chef is finally going to perform? I was beginning to think all those cookbooks on your shelf were just for show."
I grin back, pulling her close as we walk. "They've been waiting for an occasion special enough. Get ready, McKenzie."
She laughs, the sound bright and unguarded, and takes my arm with the kind of easy trust that makes my chest tight with gratitude. "Dinner sounds perfect. Though I should warn you—I'm starving. Destroying corporate empires works up an appetite."
The elevator arrives with a soft chime, its polished interior reflecting our joined image like a preview of our future. When the doors slide shut, the sudden privacy wraps around us like a cocoon, intimate and charged with possibility.
"Garrett," Sloane says, turning to face me fully. The warrior is gone. In her place is the woman I fell in love with—brilliant and fierce and beautifully, perfectly human.
"Yeah?"
"Thank you." Her voice carries the weight of everything we've been through, everything we've overcome. "For trusting me to fight my own battles. For being my partner."
The elevator descends through the floors, carrying us from the corporate stratosphere back toward earth, back toward the real world where we'll have to figure out how to be together without secrets, without hiding, without shame.
"Thank you," I reply, "for giving me the chance to get it right. For seeing who I was trying to become instead of just who I'd been."