Page 198 of Dream On, Liar

Maeve

I GOT HOME LATER than I’d planned.

It had been nearly nine when I finally unlocked the front door, the weight of the day settled deep into my bones. It was a heavy, sluggish kind of exhaustion, the sort that lingered long after my mind had stopped paying attention to it. My private client had overrun by nearly an hour, and I had spent most of that extra time smiling politely while internally counting down to the moment I could finally be alone in the quiet.

On the drive back, the city had blurred past the window in soft streaks of gold and grey. Streetlights smeared across the glass, and every now and then the glow of a passing car washed briefly over the dashboard before disappearing. My thoughts had barely stayed on the road. They had drifted instead to the shower I still needed to take, something hot in my hands, and the bag sitting by my front door like a small accusation.

By the time I reached the flat, I was moving almost entirely on autopilot.

That was why it took me nearly a full minute to register that my best friend was home. A day early.

She was curled into the corner of our sofa with her laptop balanced across her thighs, one socked foot tucked beneath the other leg. A mug sat on the coffee table beside her, steam rising in slow, lazy spirals, as though it had nowhere urgent to be. The sight of her softened something in me that I had not realised had been wound so tightly all day.

She looked up, and her entire face changed. It was more than recognition. Something warmer moved through her expression, immediate and instinctive, as though the room itself had finally exhaled.

“Finally.”

The word had come out half-scolding, half-relieved, and it made something in my chest loosen.

I let out a small laugh, tired but genuine. “Sorry.”

She pushed herself upright, and the laptop slipped slightly on her thighs as she shifted. “I was beginning to think your client had kidnapped you.”

The way she said it was dry and teasing, but I caught the way she watched me for a moment longer than necessary, taking stock. That made me smile properly.

“She nearly did.”

That earned me a sharper look.

I dropped my bag beside the door with a dull thud. The sound seemed too loud in the quiet flat, but I barely noticed. I walked over to her without thinking about it, and she opened her arms before I had even reached the sofa.

There was no hesitation, no question about whether I needed it. Just instinct.

I went straight into them.

The hug had felt like warmth after cold. It was not dramatic or overwhelming. It was simply steady, familiar, and exactly what I had needed. Her arms wrapped around me with such effortless familiarity that my shoulders dropped without permission, as though my body had been waiting for her all day without bothering to tell me.

I felt her exhale against my shoulder, and something inside me finally loosened.

I had missed this.

I had missed her. I had missed home, although not the place itself so much as the feeling of it. The kind of familiarity that did not ask questions before it held you.

She squeezed me once, firm and grounding, then pulled back just enough to look at me.

“Right.” Her eyes narrowed almost immediately. “Explain this.”

I frowned, still half caught in the warmth of the hug. “Explain what?”

She did not answer. Instead, she pointed towards the coffee table.

My gaze followed her finger.

The locker-room key was sitting there in plain sight, looking as though it had always belonged in our living room.

My stomach dropped slightly.

“Oh.”