Page 19 of Split Decision

I put the car in reverse.

The word “wise” follows me home.

Wise decision.

Luke is already asleepwhen I get there. He's on the couch in his training clothes, one arm across his chest, the other fallen off the cushion toward the floor. The television is on but muted. He went through a whole day and ran out of steam before I even got home.

I sit in the armchair across from him for a minute. I can tell by the way he’s positioned that he tried his best to wait up for me, so we’d have a few more minutes together that don’t involve pre-dawn mornings, oatmeal, and fruit. But because I also know Mack’s training schedule backwardand forward, Luke already would’ve been beyond exhausted before he even reached the couch. Once he touched the cushions, he would’ve been out like a light.

He looks younger when he's asleep. The visible tension he carries in his jaw releases, and what's left is just the person underneath all of it—the one who called me baby before he even knew my last name. The one who drove forty minutes in the wrong direction once because I mentioned offhand that I liked a specific diner's coffee.

I love him so much it sits in my chest like a stone sometimes.

He hasn’t agreed to Marin’s suggestion. Not yet. He’s still thinking about it, weighing his options.

But the statement is still on the table—the one with his name on it and mine conspicuously absent. The one that protects his license by treating us as two separate stories. And I know what Luke does when he can't solve a problem by standing in front of it. He finds a lever. He pulls it. He fixes it.

The question is whether he'll decide that letting me stand alone is the lever that fixes this.

I turn the television off and go upstairs. I can’t bring myself to wake him.

But I don't sleep well.

The weight of the world is on my mind, and the love of my life isn’t beside me.

LUKE

Three days after the board meeting, Brandon calls me on my way into the gym.

"Audit's been assigned," he says. "The auditor is someone Marin knows. She says that's actually good news—he's methodical, not politically motivated. The review should be clean."

"Should be," I repeat.

"Is."

I pull into the parking lot and kill the engine. "How does Marin know him?"

There’s a slight delay before he replies. "They worked adjacent cases in D.C. a few years back. She says he runs straight."

I don't say what I'm thinking, which is that knowing the auditor doesn't sound like distance. It sounds like positioning.

"Okay," I say instead.

"How's Andi?"

I look at the gym door. Inside, Mack is already waiting. "Holding on."

"That's Andi for you."

"Yeah." I get out of the car. "I'll call you later."

I never call him back. I go three hard rounds with Mack’s best sparring partner and come home so drained that even words feel out of reach. Andi has left a plate for me in the microwave with a note that just says, “Eatthis.” I eat it standing at the counter and go upstairs and fall asleep before I can think about Marin's offer again.

I’ll think about it in the morning instead.

ANDI

The first call comes on a Wednesday.