Too Late

Carter goes outside to look at his phone, where Dalton has entered all relevant contacts for the job. Sloan is listed as “Asa’s girl.” He calls her and tells her that Asa knows she went to lunch.

Her instant fear makes him want to kill Asa. He tells her to get the pizza out of his car and walk in casually. As long as she’s the one who brings it up, it should defuse the situation. Carter says he won’t let Asa hurt her, and she hangs up.

After joining Asa by the pool, Carter asks about Jess’s sexual talents to distract Asa. Sloan arrives with the pizza and offers it to everyone. Asa accepts her story and kisses her hand, but Carter can’t watch. Asa then carries her inside and looks back to make sure Carter is watching. Dalton is worried by how she looks at Carter. Then he tells Carter he thinks she could help them with the case.

On his bed, Asa asks Sloan if she loves him. She says yes, and he says it back to her and then rubs her back non-sexually, which surprises her. He says she can’t ever leave him. Asa makes her say she loves him and makes her repeat that she will never leave. Sloan complies, though it makes her feel tainted and used. She doesn’t believe he will ever see her as anything but a possession.

Carter hears them upstairs. He writes on a whiteboard in the kitchen to distract himself. Asa comes downstairs and asks how the business meeting the previous night went. After Carter’s report, Asa says they won’t need the guy anymore since they were only using him as a go-between for his Spanish. He suggests that Carter take his place.

Carter asks how long Asa and Sloan have been dating and whether she can be trusted. Asa says they’ve been together for two years and she has no choice but to accept everything. Asa tells him never to trust anyone, but when Sloan comes downstairs, he gropes her in front of Carter and says she has earned his trust. Carter hates how scared she looks when Asa touches her. He feels like he has to choose between saving Sloan from Asa and taking down the drug ring.

While going for a drive, Carter thinks about his situation. He knows that, professionally speaking, Dalton is right: They should use Sloan for the case. He sees her reading on a bench at the park as he drives back to Asa’s house.

Carter interrupts her studies, and they talk. She admits that she wishes he could save her, but he can’t save her from this dangerous life because he’s also part of it. She thinks he would be just like Asa.

Sloan says she left Asa once and then tells him about her twin brothers, Drew and Stephen. Drew died of an aneurysm at age 10. She tells Carter that Stephen’s care is in jeopardy and her mother has a substance use disorder. She can’t leave Asa because he pays for Stephen’s care. Carter wipes her tears and says she won’t be able to help Stephen if Asa kills her. Then he holds her. For the first time, Sloan feels like someone genuinely cares about her.

Trying to stick to his mission, Carter says he can’t save her and returns to the party at Asa’s house. Asa watches him talk to Dalton and then goes inside without speaking. Carter can’t relax because Asa is suspicious of him now.

Sloan walks home 30 minutes after Carter leaves. She stops in the driveway and thinks about Carter’s rejection. She decides that she must save enough money to be financially independent. In the kitchen, she sees a message on the whiteboard: “Worries flow from her lips like the random words that flow from her fingertips. I reach out and try to catch them, clenching them in my fists, wanting nothing more than to catch them all” (91). It’s meant for her. She erases the words and picks up the marker.

In a stream of consciousness rant, Asa, under the influence of drugs, contemplates whether leather comes from dinosaurs. He remembers his father calling his mother a “whore.” His father said that a man has to learn to be impassive when women cry because crying women make men weak.

Asa has forgotten most of his parents’ argument from that terrible night. It had been silent after they stopped speaking. They found his mother’s body four days later, wrapped in a sheet. Asa’s father went to prison, and Asa lived with his aunt until age 14.

He injects himself with heroin and is glad Sloan isn’t like his mother. He tells himself she better not complain about finding him doing drugs in their room, especially not after the day he’s had.

Carter watches Sloan arrive as he and Dalton observe the guests. Carter hates the party setting: He is an introvert, and groups of people drain him. He sees a new message on the whiteboard: “He unclenched his fists and dropped her worries, unable to catch them for her. But she picked them back up and dusted them off. She wants to be able to hold them herself now” (96).

A door slams upstairs, and Sloan comes into the kitchen. She says she hates Asa, who is, again, passed out from the drugs. She says he’s getting paranoid, which happens occasionally. When Asa thinks he’s about to get caught, bad things happen to everyone around him, which now includes Carter.

Carter says he was wrong to call her a doormat and apologizes. She calls him a bastard, but he says he now understands that she’s too strong to leave because of her brother. He knows she can endure it and says that her courage inspires him. Carter tells Sloan that she’s one of the strongest people he’s met. They almost kiss, but Jon walks in. He gives them a suspicious look and asks what he interrupted. Carter winks at him and leaves. Their situation has just become more dangerous.

Sloan hates that Jon has an advantage on her now. When they’re alone, he asks what the whiteboard message means. He squeezes her throat and says he’s sick of Asa getting what he wants. Then he grabs her hips just as Kevin enters and interrupts. Kevin laughs, apologizes, and goes back outside.

Jon drags Sloan to the living room couch and puts a blade against her throat. She knows he’ll hurt her to punish Asa. She hears a gun click as Carter puts it against Jon’s head. He makes Jon apologize, before the two of them agree to keep each other’s secrets. Carter says he’ll kill him if he tells Asa and then knocks Jon out with the gun. He tells Sloan to go upstairs to Asa because, if nothing else, Asa won’t let anyone else hurt her. Carter hugs her, kisses her forehead, and tells her to call if she needs him. Sloan worries that Asa will think Carter is trying to replace him.