Kenna is in the shower when Ledger pounds on her door and arrives at her apartment. His urgency immediately turns physical, but once they are alone together, Ledger tries to slow down long enough to ask whether Kenna still feels right about what is happening between them. He admits he wants to keep sleeping with her, yet he also feels he should speak to the Landrys before their relationship goes any further.

Kenna rejects another anxious discussion about the future because she feels they cannot solve anything by worrying in circles. Out loud, Kenna tells Ledger they should enjoy the time they have instead of trying to predict an outcome they cannot control. Internally, however, Kenna is terrified, because she believes Grace and Patrick Landry will never change their minds about her and that their refusal would be understandable.

Because Kenna wants one more moment of happiness before accepting that reality, she chooses to stay with Ledger for the night and lets him believe she still hopes for a future. They undress, move past a brief interruption from Ivy the cat, and make love with a sense of urgency, as if both understand their time together may be limited. The encounter becomes an emotional release as much as a physical one.

Afterward, Kenna and Ledger shower together, and the tenderness of the moment makes Kenna dread the goodbye she expects will eventually come. Even so, she tries to hold on to Ledger’s hope that he might gradually help the Landrys see her with more empathy. The chapter ends with a mutual confession of affection: Kenna says she would have fallen for Ledger even without his bond with Diem, and Ledger answers that he fell for Kenna because of how deeply she loves Diem.