Page 12 of The Route to You

She tugged the diamond off her finger and set it on top, aware she had to hurry and get the hell out of here before Evan came back and tried to stop her.

Maybe she was making the biggest mistake of her life, but it was better than doing nothing. She’d ignored her instincts for too long.

Heart racing, she ran out the door, her carry-on strap looped over her shoulder. As she reached the elevator, praying that no one from the dinner would be on it, she reached into the bag and pulled out a soft gray beanie and a hair tie. She tugged her blond hair up into a messy bun, then jammed the beanie over her head. A pair of sunglasses gave the last bit of cover, even though it was night.

Hopefully, security wouldn’t stop her. Their job was to keep people out, not keep people in. And they wouldn’t be looking for the bride.

The elevator dinged, and she hopped on, grateful no one else was on it. Thank God.

She pulled out her phone, opening the ride-share app she’d downloaded last summer but had only ever used once—when she traveled with Evan, he always had a car waiting for them. Always a black Volvo, which had once made her laugh, but she was used to it by now after being with him for four years.

Four fucking years.

You’re turning your back on four years of your life if you walk out of this hotel, Sloan.

She still had time to fix this. Cancel the ride. Go back up to the room. Get rid of the note and put that ring back on her finger.

The elevator door opened, and she started across the lobby, even as her brain screamed, go back, go back, go back.

Halfway to the door, she realized she didn’t have her coat.

Of course.

Maybe this was serendipity. Couldn’t be more than like seven degrees outside. She couldn’t go anywhere without a coat.

Her phone dinged to let her know her ride had already arrived. Had they been right around the corner?

She drew a shaky breath, watching as brake lights fractured in through the glass revolving door of the hotel.

If she went back for her coat, she wouldn’t come back down to the lobby.

Sloan blinked slowly.

The brake lights were red, like a stoplight.

Her heart pounded.

She wasn’t built for impulse. Or chaos. Or unplanned anything.

But she wasn’t the one who believed that a ring on your fiancée’s finger meant you still had “time” to play the field .

If Sloan were honest, she’d known, deep down, that Evan probably hadn’t ever been faithful. Their sex life had always been ordinary, and she’d always felt like she’d disappointed him. Is that why I stayed? Why I accepted all the red flags as nothing?

And then there was his family. Bernice barely tolerated her. Why had she accepted that as . . . her fate? She didn’t want a life where the family she married into didn’t respect her— didn’t really like her— and that it would never improve. Surely, she deserved more than that.

All she knew was that if she didn’t go out the door to the lobby, she’d always wonder what her life would be like if she’d just taken twenty steps forward.

Twenty steps.

That’s it.

Twenty steps.

Now. Or never.

Then she started forward, into the cold night, and the automatic door closed behind her.

Closing the door to her past life and leaving it all behind.