Chapter 10
Benedict
Hugh’s waiting in the drive when I come out, the early morning sun soaking into his dark, tight curls. He’s got that same easy posture he always has before a job—hands in his jacket pockets, gaze scanning the property like it belongs to him too.
“You’ve got his location?” I ask.
“Croatia,” Hugh says. “Some coastal town—Zadar. There’s a music festival. He’s registered with the resort under a friend’s name, but it wasn’t hard to connect the dots.”
I grunt. It’s exactly the kind of thing Derrick would do—run halfway around the world to drink overpriced liquor and forget about the wreckage he left behind.
“When do you leave?”
“Ten minutes. The flight’s already arranged.” Hugh tilts his head, eyes narrowing just slightly, but still kind. “You’ve got that look.”
“What look?”
“The one you get when you’re turning something over in your head, trying to grind it down until it stops cutting you.”
I glance past him to the line of pines along the edge of the courtyard. “Maddie’s settling in.”
“Is that an update or a warning?” he asks.
I huff out a laugh that doesn’t sound right. “Not sure.” There’s a beat of silence, and then I ask: “When she got here, did she seem… ?” I feel like a teenager again, stomach knotted with anxiety over what a girl might think.
What a woman might think about this place, so reflective of me.
“She seemed happy to be here,” he answers after musing for a moment, leveling me with a gaze that I know means he’s telling the truth. “Tired, but curious.”
“Mmm… I think she likes…” I gesture around us, at the lush nature just waking to spring.
There’s no need to explain further; like me, and apparently Madeline, Hugh also values solitude.
When I hired him years ago to help with Georgiana’s care, it wasn’t just because he was organized and ruthless—but because he’d shown an understanding of profound silence. That solace could be found there.
The last thing I needed after her passing was everyone trying to talk to me about it.
Hugh just let me be.
“I never expected to be married again,” I say finally. “Not after…” My throat closes. “And if I did, I sure as hell didn’t think it would be like this.”
“Life’s got a sense of humor.”
“She’s young, Hugh. My son’s fiancée. And I—” I cut myself off before I can finish. Before I can give the thought any more oxygen than it already has.
Hugh’s gaze sharpens, but he doesn’t push.
I exhale hard. “We need to get Derrick back. He marries her, this ends clean. That’s still the plan.”
Hugh nods. “And if he doesn’t come back willing?”
Movement catches my eye up near the balcony that overlooks the drive.
Maddie.
Leaning lightly on the rail, her hair pulled over one shoulder, the pale sleeve of a sweater pushed up her forearm. She’s not looking at me—she’s looking past me, toward the mountains beyond the tree line.
But I can feel her, the same way you feel a change in the weather.
It stalls my answer to Hugh for half a beat. I force myself to look away, to finish the conversation, but the knowledge that she’s there lingers in the space between us.
“He’ll come back.” I meet his eyes. “Especially if you’re the one out looking.” It’s an arrow to the heart, but Derrick has always been more partial to Hugh. “And he’ll face the consequences of disappearing in the first place.”
That gets me the barest flicker of a smile. “I’ll make sure he understands.”
I clap him on the shoulder, the way I always do before sending him out. “Keep me updated.”
He walks to the SUV without another word, and the engine hums to life a moment later. I stand there, watching the taillights vanish down the long drive, until the silence folds in again.
Inside, the house feels bigger than it should. The kind of big that isn’t about square footage but about absence.
It’s not just the ghosts that live here—Georgiana’s laughter in the hall, the echo of Derrick as a boy—it’s the ones I’ve managed to create for myself.
I shouldn’t have opened her door the other day. Shouldn’t have looked. Shouldn’t have let my eyes linger on the bare skin she didn’t quite hide with that sheet.
The memory comes back in sharp detail now: the flush high on her cheeks from unpacking, the soft line of her collarbone, the way she held my gaze even when she should’ve told me to get the hell out.
Dinner was a game of avoiding eye contact and making polite conversation.
I climb the stairs to my room, jaw tight. Close the door behind me.
There’s a perfectly good desk here, papers I could be working through, calls I could make. Instead, I sit on the edge of the bed, elbows on my knees, dragging in a breath that feels heavier than it should.
I think about her in the bath after I left—how her hair would float around her, how the water would bead on her skin, how she might tip her head back and close her eyes, the way she did when my fingers were—
It’s wrong. Every part of it.
My hand slides over my thigh anyway, the pull too strong to ignore. I picture her mouth opening on a gasp, the way it did against mine that first night. The sound she made when I pressed her to the wall. The heat of her body wrapping around mine.
I work myself to the edge with those images, the guilt coiling tight with the pleasure until I can’t tell them apart.
It’s been years of this, of taking care of the problem myself when my body decided it needed attention but now—now, nothing will ever feel as satisfying as feeling her lush ass press back against me for more.
When the memory breaks, I bite down on her name and swallow it, like that makes it less dangerous. My cock twitches in my tight grip, seeking heat and finding only disappointment.
When I finally lean back, breath still uneven, the truth’s right there waiting. I want her.
And no plan—no contract, no son to hand her back to—is going to change that.
I drag a hand over my face and lie back on the bed, staring at the ceiling until my vision blurs. I should be thinking about flight plans, about how to keep the press from tearing this situation apart before I’ve had a chance to fix it.
Instead, my mind goes back to breakfast this morning—to the brief, steady way she looked at me like I wasn’t the man who’d hijacked her wedding, but someone she’d been expecting all along.
At least, before she’d made a joke about older men waking up early, cracking a smile. It took everything I had to level her with a look instead of letting out the chuckle that rose in my throat. I’d bit back, A ranch girl like you is always up before the sun, isn’t she?
I shouldn’t enjoy it this much—talking to her, teasing her. Being teased about the age difference that the press will surely latch onto.
It’s enough to push me upright again. My feet hit the floor before I’ve decided where I’m going. I tell myself I’m just getting coffee, that I need the excuse to walk past her door.
But when I step into the hall, she isn’t there. Just a faint trace of her perfume in the air, leading back toward the far wing.
I stand there longer than I should, listening for her, before forcing myself toward the stairs.
The house is too damn big. I’ve thought that every day since losing Georgiana. But it’s starting to feel smaller now that Madeline’s in it.