Chapter 32 – Ben
Chapter
Thirty-Two
BEN
I sealed the envelope with more care than I’d given anything in years.
The letter inside was eight pages — front and back — of everything I hadn’t had the guts to say to her face.
Apology. Explanation. Truth. The raw, ugly parts I’d buried under manipulation and fear.
The parts where I admitted I’d loved her since the day she bandaged my hand in a hardware store and didn’t flinch at the monster staring back at her.
I wrote about the accident. The coma. Waking up to scars and a dead father and a stepmother who’d already fled the country.
About the clause that turned my life into a ticking bomb.
About how watching her from afar had been the only light in years of darkness, and how I’d twisted that light into something dark because I was too terrified to step into it honestly.
I told her I loved her. Not in the possessive, obsessive way I’d shown it. But in the quieter, steadier way I wanted to prove — if she’d ever let me.
I told her I’d understand if she never forgave me.
I told her I’d spend the rest of my life trying to be worthy of her anyway.
I set the pen down, flexed my cramped hand, and slid the letter into the larger envelope addressed to her in my own handwriting.
Then I added Henry’s note on top — shorter, steadier, explaining why he’d helped me, why he’d stayed silent.
How I was the closest thing to a son he’d ever had.
How the clause had backed everyone into a corner no one saw coming.
I tucked both into the top drawer of the east wing study desk, right side, exactly where I’d told Henry to direct her if she ever came back.
If she ever wanted answers.
If she ever wanted me.
I closed the drawer and leaned back in the chair, staring at the leather blotter. The lodge felt different now. Not empty… more like it was waiting for something. Like it knew I’d finally stopped raging against the wreckage and started sweeping it up.
I thought about the boy I’d been before the accident.
Cocky. Reckless. Certain the world would keep handing me everything on a silver platter.
Dad’s clause had been meant to curb that arrogance, to force me to grow up.
Instead it had frozen me in place for years, terrified of losing the only control I thought I had left.
But losing Chrissy — watching her walk away with her head high and her heart broken — had done what no clause or coma ever could. It had cracked me open.
I wasn’t na?ve enough to think one letter fixed anything.
Eight pages wouldn’t erase the lies, the tests, the blood on my hands.
But it was a start. A line in the sand. From this moment forward, every choice would be about becoming someone she could respect — even if she never looked back.
Someone Henry could be proud of. Someone my father might have recognized.
I’d made my choice. I was going to become the kind of man Chrissy could forgive, even if she never did. Starting with not drinking myself into oblivion. Starting with not burning the estate to the ground just to spite Vivian. Starting with being someone who fixed things instead of breaking them.
The door to the study burst open without a knock.
Henry filled the frame, face grim, phone still in his hand.
“Lucia didn’t show up for work.”
The words hit like a bucket of ice water.
I was on my feet before my brain caught up.
“What?”
“No call. No text. Phone goes straight to voicemail.” His jaw was tight, eyes hard. “She’s never missed a day. Not once. Not in twenty-five years.”
Code red.
I knew it instantly. Lucia wasn’t just staff.
She was the woman who’d snuck me extra cookies when I was twelve and grounded.
Who’d held my hand in the hospital when I woke up screaming from nightmares about the ventilator.
Who, Henry reported, had cried harder than anyone when Dad died.
Who’d told me, fierce and quiet, that I would survive because someone had to carry the Stonewood name forward.
She didn’t miss work.
Ever.
I could still see her at my bedside the first morning I woke up from the coma to three years gone, my body broken, and my mind foggy.
She was there with Henry, both of them looking like they hadn’t slept in days.
She’d taken one look at me — eyes wide — and burst into tears, calling me ‘tesoro’ while she adjusted my pillow and brushed my hair back with shaking hands.
Later, when the pain meds wore off and the reality of the scars hit me and I lost it, she’d sat in that chair for hours, holding my hand, speaking softly to me in Italian like she did after my mother died when I was four years old.
I had no idea what she was saying, really. I just liked the sound of it.
In the weeks after, when the reality of Dad already being gone hit me like a second wreck, she’d sat in that chair for hours, holding my hand, humming old hymns under her breath like she could will away the grief.
She’d brought me real food when the hospital stuff turned my stomach — manicotti she’d made at home, smuggled into the hospital in Tupperware containers inside her massive purse, still warm.
Back at the lodge, she’d kept the place alive, cooking for the staff every day, refusing to let it turn into a mausoleum without him. She’d been the only one who ever called me ‘tesoro’ without hesitation, like I was still the boy she’d known before everything fell apart.
If something had happened to her — if that bastard had laid one hand on her — I’d burn the world down to make it right.
“Her husband?” I asked, voice low.
Henry’s nod was sharp.
“Last I heard, she was staying with her sister after filing the papers. But he’s been making noise. Threats. Showing up places he shouldn’t.”
Fury roared through me, hot and immediate.
“No,” I said. “He wouldn’t—”
“He already did once,” Henry cut in. “You think the son of a bitch stopped just because she left him?”
I grabbed my coat from the back of the chair, ribs protesting the sudden movement, but I ignored it.
“We’re going,” I said.
Henry didn’t argue.
We were halfway down the hall when I paused.
“One more thing,” I said. “I hired Garrett Graves and his crew yesterday. They’re coming out tomorrow to jackhammer the concrete floor in the barn and pour a new one.”
Henry stopped, eyes sharpening. He knew exactly what that meant — the blood-stained slab from Hayden and Brett, gone forever.
He gave a single, approving nod. “Smart of you to get rid of the evidence. What are they going to do with the old concrete?”
“Garrett’s taking it offshore. Building a new artificial reef for the divers out past the point.”
Henry’s mouth twitched, the expression the closest he ever got to a smile these days.
“Good cover. Ecological bonus.”
“Figured it was time to erase some mistakes,” I said quietly.
“Smart choice to sink the evidence offshore. I scrubbed the stain away with muriatic acid, but still… you can never be too careful. Are you sure it’s wise to hire an outside crew to do it, though? You could always rent a jackhammer and do it yourself.”
“I have to deal with Chrissy and Vivian, and I want that concrete out of here sooner rather than later. Garrett’s a smart enough guy to know what side his bread is buttered on, and the bonus I’m tacking on doesn’t hurt,” I said dryly.
Henry huffed a short laugh.
“Money talks, especially when it’s enough to buy silence and a new boat, but are you absolutely certain he won’t flip on you given the proper motivation?”
“It’s not just the money that makes him trustworthy,” I murmured.
“What made you pick Garrett for this?” Henry asked as we kept walking. “What makes you so sure he and his crew will keep their mouths shut?”
“His dad worked for mine back in the day. He poured the east wing expansion foundation when Mom was sick. Garrett came to the job site often to help out his dad after school, and we became friends, up until Mr. Graves killed himself when Garrett was fifteen. After Mr. Graves committed suicide, Garrett’s grandmother made him finish school.
She wouldn’t let him hang around the construction sites after school anymore, but we stayed in touch anyway…
until my accident. She wouldn’t let him drop out and start work on his dad’s crew before he had his diploma, either.
So, after he graduated, he rebuilt his dad’s old construction business from scratch, with no help from his mother or that prick stepfather of his. ”
Henry nodded, letting me talk it through.
“Garrett’s got grit, which is why he’s the youngest construction company owner in the area.
By all reports, he’s hardworking, efficient, and discreet.
He might be from the wrong side of the tracks, but he’s never forgotten who gave his dad steady paychecks back in the day.
I just wanted to be sure you’d thought this through properly before bringing in outside help. ”
“I have, I promise,” I said. “Our friendship runs deep, even though we haven’t talked often since my accident.
I’ve nudged the board to hire Garrett’s company for several projects, and they’ve always been pleased with his work.
Besides, the bonus I’m tacking on — enough for a new boat and a year off, not that he’ll take the year — seals the deal. ”
“He’s earned it,” Henry replied. “And we need people we can trust when Vivian starts circling.”
“Garrett’s crew won’t talk. Not to cops, not to reporters, not to her lawyers,” I said, patting Henry on the back.
“It’s good insurance for us… one less loose end to worry about.
This way, we can focus on making sure Lucia’s okay, and then I’ll see if there’s any way I can work things out with Chrissy before Vivian arrives. ”
We reached the front doors. I shrugged into my coat, the cold already seeping through the cracks.
As Henry reached for the doorknob, something hot and furious settled in my chest. Vivian. Lucia’s husband. Anyone who dared touch the people I loved? I was going to find a way to make them regret it, one way or another.
Henry hesitated, hand on the knob. I studied him for a second, taking in the tight set of his shoulders, the way his eyes kept flicking toward the driveway like he was already halfway to Lucia’s sister’s place in his head.
“You’re in love with her,” I said quietly.
Henry froze, and I didn’t let him deflect.
“That’s why you never settled down. You never dated anyone seriously after you started work for my dad.
You blamed the demands of the job, but that’s not it.
It’s because Lucia’s been it for you since…
what? Since Dad hired you? Since she started bringing you coffee when you pulled all-nighters watching over me in the hospital? ”
His jaw flexed. For a long moment, he didn’t speak.
Then, he sighed.
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It does,” I said. “It matters a hell of a lot. She matters. You matter.”
He looked away, throat working, refusing to rise to the bait.
“I’m not blind, Henry. I’ve watched you watch her for years. The way you light up when she walks into a room. The way you step in front of any threat — real or imagined — before it gets within ten feet of her.”
He exhaled slowly.
“She’s married, Ben.”
“She’s leaving him,” I countered. “And even if she wasn’t, that wouldn’t change how you feel.”
Silence stretched between us. Finally, he met my eyes.
“You’re a perceptive little shit when you’re not drowning in your own mess.”
I gave a humorless smile.
“Takes one to know one.”
He shook his head, but some of the tension eased from his shoulders.
“She’s family,” he said gruffly. “That’s all.”
“Bullshit,” I said softly. “But okay. We’ll table it… for now.”
He didn’t argue. We stepped out into the cold.
“The lodge—” I started.
“I’ll have the skeleton crew lock up, then head over to Ashgrove House to get it ready for you,” he said. “Everyone else gets sent home with pay until we see how the situations with Vivian and Lucia’s husband shake out. No one stays here alone while this is going on.”
I nodded.
“Good. The fewer people around if things go sideways, the better.”
I glanced back toward the east wing study one last time. The drawer was closed. The letters were waiting. If Chrissy came looking — if Henry managed to get one of the skeleton crew members to get that key to her — maybe she’d find them.
If not… at least I’d gotten what I needed to say off my chest.
I turned away and followed Henry out into the cold.
Lucia needed us now, and for the first time in days, I had something to do besides bleed, and regret all my life choices.
I wasn’t okay, not even close, but I was moving, and that was a start.