Chapter Text
Chapter One
“How long until you have to get back?”
Watching Rory from the bed, Logan is silent for a long moment, something holding him back from pinning down a time.
But she’s not quite looking at him, and the tone of her voice tells him that his time is almost out. The piece of him that still hopes and dreams and longs for something more than the life he has in London steps to the forefront of his aching heart.
And he finds himself at a crossroads.
The crossroads is similar to all the crossroads he’s faced with Rory before. When she said she couldn’t do casual anymore, when she didn’t speak to him after the blow up at the bar, when she found out about the bridesmaids, when he was going to London the first time, when he asked her to marry him and she said no, when they ran into each other in Hamburg, when they created the Vegas rule.
Each time, he made a decision based on instinct and heart, and for the most part, he can’t fathom changing his choices with one exception.
Regret weighs heavy in his chest when he thinks about how he walked away from her when she rejected his proposal. He let the hurt carry him far from her, one stupid step at a time. Without her, he was adrift for years. Is still adrift if he’s honest with himself.
All the times he’s been with her post-implementation of the Vegas rule, he wonders what would have happened if he didn’t walk away, if he’d fought harder for them.
And so, he decides to fight now because he doesn’t. . . can’t bear the idea that things are over, that she will walk out of his life forever.
He takes a deep breath and dives in. “What if there was no time limit?”
This time, she meets his gaze with unwavering blue eyes. “What do you mean?”
He leans forward on the bed, the soft sheets falling away. “Exactly that.”
“I’m too old for riddles, Logan.” She presses her lips together, and she has that pensive look in her eyes that he usually sees when she’s about to cry.
“Straightforward is better?” His heart starts to beat faster in his chest. They haven’t been honest, truly honest, with each other in a long time, and she’s giving him an opening.
“Straightforward would be good.”
He swings his legs out of the bed, loops his well-loved t-shirt over his head, and pulls on his warm pajama pants. Then, he goes to her, his hands in his pockets, heart on his sleeve. He peeks at her to make sure she’s here with him in this moment.
And then, he walks out on a limb he thought he left behind, “I want you. I want us. I want this life. With you and no one else. Not Vegas or Odette or Paul. . . just you and me.” He hesitates and admits in a rush, “I’m half of myself without you, Rory.”
She bites her lip, her eyes still steady on his, searching. “Is that why you came?”
She asked for straightforward, so he gives it. “Yes.”
Tears fill her eyes. “And what would that look like? You and me? You have obligations, your career, your dynastic plan, other people you. . . care deeply about. You have a whole other home on a whole other continent.”
He can counter that. He’s always been good at countering. “I don’t care about any of that.”
She shakes her head. “But you do.”
He shifts because she’s right. “Okay. I do. But none of that matters without you. None of it.”
“You don’t want me. I’m a mess. I’m lost. I don’t have a job; I don’t have a home. My mom’s not speaking to me.” Tears flow down her cheeks. “I lost my grandpa. A-and,” she lifts a hand at him, “we’re cheating on our significant others with each other. That’s not a good way to start a relationship. Every TV show and movie ever made has the same message about cheating, and it’s always a bad idea. A-and those relationships always end badly because there’s no trust. And everyone is insecure. And, and I wish we had what we had when we started. A clean slate.”
Every fiber in his being tells him to touch her, but he waits. “We can have that. We can.”
“You say that, Logan, but we can’t. Not the way things are. There’s too much water under the proverbial bridge, and the bridge is on the verge of collapse.”
When her tears fall, he can’t hold back anymore, so he takes her into his arms as if this is the last time, as if holding her while the bridge collapses will save them from drowning, as if he can block out the reality that maybe part of him knows she’s right. When she embraces him right back so tight that he almost can’t breathe, his whole body trembles with emotion, and he feels his own tears slide hot and fast down his cheeks.
As the wave of emotion passes, their tears stop flowing, and their breathing evens out, she pushes her face into his neck, sniffles, and says, “What if there’s a way to repair the bridge?”
Playing with the ends of her hair, he asks, “Are you saying that you and I are on the same page? That you might want what I want, too?”
“I’m saying that the only way for us to work is if we both made some major changes.” Her voice is soft but sure.
“Okay, Ace, I’ll play along. What changes? Because I’m open to the whole world knowing about us. If that is what you’re looking for.”
She draws away but keeps her hand on his chest. “I mean, work on ourselves. My stuff is evident because I feel like we’ve been talking about it, but what about you? You’re clearly unhappy.”
He frowns, feeling his defenses rising. “What do you mean?”
“You’re toeing the company line and getting married to fulfill some sort of dynastic plan. You’re closed off, holding back. The Logan I know was never closed off from himself. He said what he thought, what he felt.”
“We were young. You’ve changed, too.”
Her shoulders sag. “Exactly.”
Something in Logan shifts as he considers what she’s saying, and pieces start falling into place. He pulls away but doesn’t lose hold of her hand. “What if?” His free hand goes briefly to his mouth and then down before he says, “What if we took some time apart?”
She laces her fingers with his. “Say more.”
His mind is still working, eager to make sense out of what he’s thinking. “What if we took a set amount of time and didn’t see each other, didn’t contact the other and worked on ourselves. Independently.”
“Try to find out who we are now? Without any of the trappings of Vegas? So we make changes for ourselves?”
He points a finger at her. “Exactly. And after said amount of time, we meet up and see where we are. And if we’re going with the bridge metaphor, see if we have the right building materials to make a solid foundation for a new bridge together.”
“But what if we grow farther apart?” She has that worried line between her eyes that he wishes he can erase.
He can reassure here with certainty at least. “That’s a risk we’d have to take.”
“How much time?”
“A year?” he suggests.
Her eyes widen. “Six months?”
“Six months,” he agrees. Six months will go by in a heartbeat. Maybe.
“Where and when should we meet?”
Logan gazes around the room. “Well, what about here? We set a date for six months from now. And if we want to try, we show up.”
He wants to tell her that his heart already knows he’ll be here, but he holds back to allow her the space, to prove to himself that he’s taking her need to do this seriously.
“What if this room is rented out? What’ll we do then?” She’s teasing a little now. He’ll take it over her earlier doom and gloom about bridges and rushing water overtaking them.
“I’m happy to just meet at the sofa downstairs with all the deer heads gazing down at us and welcoming us back together.”
She laughs. “Perfect.”
He lifts his eyebrows. “Or if you prefer this room, I’m sure I can book it for six months from now.”
She takes the space in with its cozy bed, the natural light, and the changing leaves on the trees outside. “It is a very nice room.”
* * *
Rory parts from Finn, Colin, and Robert with a warm salute and not much fanfare. The boys don’t know of her and Logan’s agreement, the two of them not wanting to give them false hope or have them try to influence their decisions, and so the parting is bittersweet for her. Between antics and minor jealousies, she regrets their downtrodden looks and already misses them.
Colin’s inability to control his spending doesn’t surprise her at all, though the fact that he bought both the tango club and the inn in a single night kind of does. The result is strangely comforting to know that both were now in the hands of family. Chosen family.
They had been Logan’s boys when she met them, yet over the years they have well and truly become theirs and not just because Finn insists on calling her mother.
Whatever the future holds for them, Rory knows that the memories they forged together during this extravaganza will be cherished and stand the test of time at the inn. A place they can now always return to.
As she watches them walk out ahead of their fearless leader to give them one last moment of privacy, she feels Logan’s eyes on her.
Though they have already agreed on their course, his heavy gaze on her is like a vice around her heart. When she turns to him once the door clicks shut, neither moves. Perfect stillness settles across the room for a few beats, before he steps up to her.
“Alright, let’s do this,” he says reluctantly.
He stops right in front of her, leaning in carefully to lay a gentle kiss upon her lips. Drawing back slightly, he waits for her reaction, visibly relieved when she leans in to reciprocate the affection. She doesn’t want to part from him without a proper goodbye kiss.
Closing his eyes, he lingers against her lips, and she feels a strain in him. Almost like he’s trying to hold something back. The kiss, gentle though it is, carries a vulnerability and tenderness that aches inside her. Aches because they’re about to leave on disjointed roads, to see who they are apart, to find out if they can fit together again.
“If you change your mind about the house, it’s yours, no strings attached. I won’t go there, or contact you, as agreed—” he offers, one hand to her cheek and the other on her arm, already expecting her reaction when she snorts in amusement.
No contact also meant no attachments, not even in real estate form.
“Whatever happens, wherever this takes us; I think your days of rescuing me are over.”
“Oh, you never really needed rescuing, Ace, you know that,” he reminds her. She knows he never likes it when she puts herself down.
“I do now. Here,” she says, pointing at her head. “I think I need this time to fully remember what that means again.”
He looks at her for a long moment, then steps back with the slightest nod, letting her go.
She feels the loss of his touch immediately. Though she yearns to lean in again, Rory stops herself, knowing this is the first step to disentangling themselves from each other and all the toxicity they brought into their lives.
What remained when that is done would have to be enough to rebuild or go their separate ways.
She lets him arrange the top hat at a mischievous angle on her head while sharing a smile. She is glad beyond words to still see some of the carefree boy she once loved in the man who bent so far for so many, including her, and for such a long time.
His smile gives her hope that maybe there is enough of Logan left in the Heir to the Empire for him to find and nurture into someone who is more true to himself. She hopes she can do the same with the Rory who was before she, too, lost her way.
When everything is to his liking, Logan takes a few steps back, holding up his hands to form a faux camera, into which she can smile. She tries, she does. The result is a little hesitant, a little uncertain, because she’s not sure this won’t indeed be the last time they see each other, interact with each other, in person.
“Yeah, just like that,” Logan says, voice like gravel, lips curled into a bittersweet smile.
When he turns away, her head gives an involuntary jerk, her smile falling as a sudden pit opens in her stomach.
What if he won’t be here in six months? What if he looks at himself and finds he’s better off without her? Better off with Odette? What if this is the last time they speak, and that was the last time he smiled at her? The last moment he loved her?
She swallows as he gathers his things.
If she lets him walk out that door, he might not come back in half a year’s time. Suddenly, what seemed like almost too short a time to even begin fixing themselves enough to seriously talk about a future now seems like a lifetime because it could be a lifetime!
That realization grips her all at once, squeezing her heart with a cold hand until she almost says something.
Her mouth opens briefly to call him back, to renege on their deal and just blow their whole lives up without ever fixing anything, even knowing they’d be doomed to crash and burn.
Luckily, perhaps, she is frozen in place, her mouth set in a grimace of terror instead of a smile, unable to speak. Though a foreboding dread fills her gut, she can do nothing but watch him walk out the door.
The sound of it closing — on her, on them, maybe for now or maybe forever — is like a trap snapping shut in her ears.