Chapter Sixteen
Ben
I pull into the gravel drive and kill the engine, sitting for a second with my hands still on the wheel.
The house sits back from the road, framed by tall maples, their leaves shifting in the late-summer breeze.
It’s not too big, but it’s not small either.
Two stories, white clapboard, dark blue shutters—but everything about it is well cared for.
The covered porch stretches wide across the front, the kind of porch that begs for quiet mornings and coffee, with a line of hanging flower baskets swaying just enough to catch the light.
The lawn is freshly cut, neat lines marching toward the edge of the property where the land slopes gently down to the river. From here, I can see flashes of blue water through the trees, the surface glinting like polished glass.
Jason grew up here. I’ve been by quite a few times over the years, especially before I left for college, but it still catches me off guard how much it suits the family. Solid, good bones. The kind of place you can trust to be the same no matter how much time passes.
Jason had texted me this morning, casual as anything: Got an appointment. Can you drop a box at Mom’s? It’s your day off anyway. No problem, I’d said.
But it is a problem. A big problem.
The box sits in my passenger seat, taped shut, and light enough that I have no idea what’s in it.
I rest it against my hip for a second as I look at the front door. Back when we were teenagers, I used to roll in here with Jason, laughing like two idiots about nothing, stopping in the kitchen to raid the fridge before heading out again.
Paige was too young for crushes then. No, that only happened after I’d come back from college and before she’d left.
But she’s back now, and there’s no avoiding her.
The porch creaks softly under my weight as I climb the steps, my boots leaving small scuffs on the sun-warmed wood. There’s a rocking chair near the door, a folded quilt draped over the back, and for a second, I can picture Jason’s mom here, tea in hand, watching the river.
I knock lightly, listening for footsteps inside. There’s the soft murmur of voices on the other side, maybe a TV? Then footsteps follow.
The door opens, and she’s there. Paige.
She fills the doorway, and for a heartbeat, I forget why I’m here.
Paige’s hair is half-up in a loose knot, a few dark strands falling around her face the way they always do when she’s been working.
She’s in a soft gray T-shirt knotted at her waist and a pair of worn jeans.
Bare feet. Pink toenails. Nothing fancy.
And yet the breath still catches somewhere between my chest and throat like I’ve swallowed wrong.
“Ben,” she says, and it lands neutral. Not warm. Not cold. A word placed carefully on the line between.
“Hey.” I lift the box because I need something to do with my hands. “Jason asked me to drop this off for your mom.”
“She’s not here.”
“That’s all right. I can just leave it for her.”
“Right.” She glances past me toward the truck, then back, and steps aside. “Come in.”
The house smells the way it always has—a little lemon from whatever they clean with, something yeasty and warm coming from the back, and the faintest thread of river air that sneaks in through the screens.
The entryway is bright and neat, shoes lined up under the coat hooks, a framed photo of Jason on a baseball field next to one of Paige at a piano in a white dress, hair a mile long and braces flashing.
I force my eyes away from that one before my brain can try to square the kid in the frame with the woman in front of me.
“You can set it on the bench in the kitchen,” she says, closing the door behind me.
The kitchen smells like warm sugar and cinnamon. It’s not until I see lemon halves on a plate near the sink that I realize it’s not cleaner that smells like lemon. Whatever Paige is baking does.
Afternoon light pours in through the big window over the counter, catching on motes of flour that hang in the air and drift down onto the wood.
She’s already back at work when I set the box on the low bench near the wall, her sleeves pushed up, hair twisted into a knot that’s unraveling in pieces.
There’s flour on her cheek, on her forearm, on the hip of her jeans.
She’s not looking at me. She’s got a spoon in one hand, a big pale-green mixing bowl in the other, and she’s beating the dough like it owes her money.
“Bench is fine for that,” she says, without turning. Though her voice is calm, it doesn’t seem calm somehow.
I put the box down and stay where I am.
“You’re not working at the bakery today?” I immediately regret the words. Obviously not, you idiot.
Stating the obvious seems to be the only thing I’m good at today.
She shrugs one shoulder. “Just testing some recipes.”
“Did you finish painting the shop?”
I know she did because I’ve made it a point to look in the window when I walk past to see the progress.
Her mouth does something small, not quite a smile, not quite a frown. “Yeah, like three weeks ago.”
Somehow, I feel even dumber. Of course, she only had the two walls left that night.
“I’m sure it looks good.”
She continues mixing whatever’s in the bowl. “It came out the way I wanted.”
“Good.” I drag in a breath and feel it lodge somewhere tight.
This is insane. The last time we were within an arm’s reach, there wasn’t any space left at all.
I’ve told myself a hundred times since that I’d apologize the first chance I got.
The words are right there, and if I don’t say them now, I don’t know when I will.
“Paige—”
“Ben—”
We speak at once and both stop. For a second, it almost feels like we’re about to laugh. We don’t.
“You first,” she says, and I hear the steel lining her voice. It punches something low in my gut because I’m the reason it’s there.
“I’m sorry,” I say. No preamble, no warm-up, just the thing I should have led with a week ago, slamming into the quiet foyer. “For that night. For what I said after. For…all of it.”
Her eyes go still. A dozen responses look like they want to try her mouth on. She chooses none of them.
She sets the bowl down with a solid click. “Okay. You apologized.”
I grip the edge of the counter beside me.
The surface is worn smooth from years of use, but I hold it hard enough to feel it dig into my palms. “I mean it,” I start.
“I was an ass. I panicked. It came out like—” I stop, the sentence tangling in my mouth.
“It came out like you were a mistake. Like I regretted you. I don’t. Not for a second.”
The words leave my throat hot and clumsy. I’ve rehearsed them alone—over the sink, under the hiss of a shower, into the empty cab of my truck—none of those places pushed back. This one does. She does.
The spoon slows, stops. She rests it in the bowl and finally looks at me. There’s a flicker in her eyes—softening, maybe—but it’s gone before I can be sure. “You have a hell of a way of showing it.”
Her chin tips a fraction, not quite defiance, not quite a dare; more like a brace. I recognize it. I’ve lived in that posture for years.
It’s defensive, and I hate that I’m the one who forced her there.
“I know.” The words scrape my throat raw. “I know, Paige. I’ve been thinking about it every hour since. I don’t expect you to forgive me because I finally figured out how to say sorry without choking on it. But it’s the truth.”
She sets the spoon down on a folded towel, crossing her arms over her middle. “You hurt me.”
The simple words do more damage than any yelling or anger could. plainness of it does more damage than any accusation could.
“I know.”
“No.” Her gaze sharpens, pins me where I stand. “You don’t. I need you to hear it. You hurt me. Not because we slept together, but because you made me feel like I was nothing. A spot of dirt you had to wipe away before anyone noticed.”
I glance toward the window, the sun angling in low, throwing a glow across the flour dust in the air. The shame feels like that light—hot, unavoidable, too bright to hide in. “I was thinking about Jason,” I say.
Her laugh is short, not amused. “Nothing I love more than hearing a man was thinking of my brother while he was inside me.”
“I know how that sounds,” I say quietly.
“Do you?” she snaps. “Do you have any idea how it feels to be swept under the rug like some shameful secret because the person I just slept with cares more about my brother’s feelings than mine?”
The words land like a slap I earned. My throat tightens, but I don’t look away. “I wasn’t trying to erase you, Paige. I swear to God, that’s not what it was.”
My voice comes out lower, rougher than I mean.
“I was thinking about how it would blow up everything— me and Jason, you and Jason, the whole rhythm of our relationships— if he found out and thought I’d…
crossed a line. I froze. I said the worst possible thing because I thought it would lessen the fallout. ”
Her eyes narrow and, for a second, I think she’s going to laugh in my face again. But she doesn’t. “Is this the smaller fallout you had in mind?” Her arms tighten across her chest, like she’s holding herself together by force.
“No.” I drag a hand through my hair, my fingers catching in the back where it’s still damp from the shower. “It wasn’t smaller. It was cruel. I know that now. I knew it the second I saw your face.”
“Well, maybe next time, realize it sooner.” Her jaw works, but she doesn’t speak right away. Then: “You made me feel disposable.”
The shame hits harder than her anger. “You aren’t. You never were.” I step forward without thinking, then stop myself halfway across the worn kitchen rug. “If I could take that night back—”
Her chin lifts. “Would you?”
The question catches me off guard. “What?”
“If you could undo it. Pretend it never happened.” She says it like she’s daring me to tell the truth, even if the truth splits her in two.
“No.” The answer is out before I can think better of it. “Not a chance. I’d take back what I said after. I’d take back the look on your face. But not you.”
Something flickers in her expression again—soft, then gone. She shifts her weight and looks toward the counter, her hands fidgeting with the edge of the towel she left there. “You can’t fix it with a few sentences.”
“Paige, I’m just asking for a chance to correct a mistake I made in telling you that it was a mistake.
I’m not asking you to do anything with that.
You can keep hating me. You can tell me to stay the hell out of your shop unless something’s broken.
You can tell me we’re just neighboring businesses and that’s it.
” My hands flex on the counter. “But I need you to know that I didn’t mean what I said that night. ”
“And what about Jason?”
I hesitate. I have two choices now. I can lie, and she’ll go back to thinking she was a mistake. Or I can tell her the truth—spill my guts right now.
“I see,” she says and turns away.
“No. No, Paige, you don’t,” I say quietly. “Jason is… the only family I have.”