Chapter 14 #3
And of course he knew what, or who, she was referring to. “Okay, so the problem is Livvie is leaving. When the book is done, she goes back to New York. Back to her career, her life, her world that doesn’t include—” He stopped. Swallowed. “This.”
So tell her.
“Tell her what?”
What Aldric would tell the woman. If you knew what that was.
He laughed—a short, rough sound. “I don’t know what that is. That’s why I’m out here talking to a ghost at five in the morning.”
I’m not a ghost. I’m you, trying to figure out what you already know.
The words landed heavily, like a physical blow to the solar plexus.
“I can’t find your notebook. The one with all the notes.”
Then stop looking. You don’t need my notes, Nate. You never did.
“That’s not—”
You have everything you need. You just have to be brave enough to see it.
The mist was thinning now, the sun burning it away. The lake was transforming from mystery to ordinary—just water, just trees, just a man in a kayak talking to himself.
He picked up the paddle. Turned the bow toward shore.
“I miss you,” he said.
The empty space beside him didn’t answer. But the ache in his chest felt different than it had three days ago. Less like drowning. More like remembering.
He paddled back.
Emma’s room smelled like vanilla and lavender.
The scent was fading—every time he opened the door, a little more of her escaped into the hallway, into the rest of the house, into the world that kept moving even though she’d stopped. But it was still there. Still her.
He crossed the threshold.
The morning light was golden through the east-facing window, catching dust motes, making everything glow.
The bed made with the quilt their grandmother had sewn, the stitches uneven in places, perfect in its imperfection.
Her desk, still covered with the evidence of her creativity, her personality imprinted on every surface.
The notebook wasn’t here.
He checked anyway. The desk drawers, running his hands along the contents. The bookshelf, pulling out volumes to look behind them. The closet, where boxes sat on the top shelf like promises he hadn’t kept.
He pulled one down. Photo albums. Old journals from high school. A stack of birthday cards she’d never thrown away, every single one he’d ever given her.
Not the notebook.
He sat on her bed. The quilt was soft beneath him, and he could almost feel her—the weight of her beside him, the way she’d lean against his shoulder when she was tired, the sound of her voice saying What’s wrong?, the way she always knew when something was wrong.
The corkboard caught his eye.
Behind a photo, half hidden, a piece of paper he’d never noticed before.
He stood. Crossed to the board. Unpinned the photo—him and Emma and Livvie, all of them tanned and smiling on the dock that last summer.
He stared at it.
He was writing the wrong ending.
Because Aldric wasn’t in love with Elara. He just thought he was supposed to be.
He nearly ran to his office.
The Post-it wall glowed in the morning light.
Yellow squares covered the surface—fifty of them, maybe more. Livvie’s handwriting on each one, neat and efficient, with little stars next to the scenes she was most excited about. Her questions in the margins: What does he feel here? and Does she know yet? and THIS IS SO GOOD.
She’d seen patterns he’d missed, asked questions that had unlocked doors he didn’t know were closed.
She was the answer.
The realization hit him like cold water. A truth he’d been avoiding for three days. For two weeks. For his whole creative life.
He’d been stuck. And God had sent him the answer.
The front door opened.
The dogs scrambled past him, racing to greet whoever had arrived. He heard her voice in the hallway, talking to them: “Yes, hello, I know, I missed you too, it’s been twelve whole hours, you’re very dramatic—”
He walked out of the office.
Livvie stood in the kitchen.
A white bakery box sat on the counter—maple-glazed doughnuts, the same ones she’d been bringing every morning, and the smell hit him before he fully registered anything else.
Sweet, caramelized, like autumn distilled into pastry.
She’d already started the coffee; the machine was gurgling and hissing, that familiar sound that had become the soundtrack to his mornings.
Her back was to him as she reached for mugs. Her hair was still sleep tousled—she hadn’t brushed it yet, hadn’t done any of the things that made her look polished and professional. Just Livvie in jeans and the cream sweater, in her stocking feet because she’d kicked off her shoes at the door.
She turned when she heard him.
“You’re up early,” she said. And then, looking at him more closely, “Or did you never go to sleep?”
“I slept.”
“Liar.” But she was smiling. “You’ve got that look. The I’ve been staring at a screen for six hours and forgot how blinking works look.”
“I blinked. A few times.”
“Groundbreaking.” She pulled a mug from the cabinet, set it on the counter beside his usual one—the gray one Emma had made in pottery class years ago. “Coffee’s almost ready. Doughnuts are fresh. Edie said to tell you she’s rooting for you.”
“Edie knows?”
“The chapter tracker at the bakery. Remember? She’s like the NSA but with better pastries.”
He moved into the kitchen. Leaned against the counter beside her, close enough to smell her shampoo—that same floral, summer note he kept catching on her—mixed with the coffee and the maple glaze.
The morning light came through the window over the sink and caught her profile, and he thought about the way she’d looked on the lake.
Not Livvie. Emma. The ghost who wasn’t a ghost.
You have everything you need. You just have to be brave enough to see it.
He did. Oh, he did. “The festival starts tonight,” he said.
She blinked. “Yeah. The vendors are already set up. Opening bonfire. Edie’s been talking about it all week—she’s made so many sugar cookies that look like little flannel shirts.” A pause. “Why?”
“Let’s go.”
The words hung in the air between them. Her lips parted. Her eyes widened—just slightly, just enough to show surprise before she could smooth it over.
“Really?”
“Really.”
Her whole face transformed. That smile—the one that made his chest tight, the one he wanted to see every morning for the rest of his life. It started at the corners of her mouth and spread outward, reaching her eyes, changing the geometry of her face into something radiant.
“Okay,” she said. “Yes. Okay. That’s—” She stopped. Took a breath. “That’s great. That’s really great.”
The coffee maker beeped. She turned to pour, and he watched her—the graceful efficiency of her movements, the way she added cream to hers and left his black without asking, the small domestic intimacy of two people who knew each other’s habits.
She handed him his mug. Their fingers brushed.
He didn’t pull away.
“But first,” she said, and her voice was steadier now, teasing, “you have a book to finish. So drink your coffee, eat a doughnut, and get to work, Hemingway.”
She picked up her own mug and the bakery box and walked toward the living room, toward the couch where she’d been spending her afternoons reading his chapters and making notes.
He stood in the kitchen, coffee in his hand, watching her go.
Emma, he thought. Did you send her?
No answer. But he didn’t need one.
He knew what he was going to write.
The words came.
Not all at once—nothing magical about it. Just the steady accumulation of sentences into paragraphs, paragraphs into pages. The cursor that had mocked him in the early morning finally moved.
Aldric stood in front of the woman who’d saved him and ruined him and saved him again, and Nate knew exactly what he was supposed to say.
“I don’t know how to do this.”
He typed the words. Saw Aldric saying them—standing in the aftermath of the battle, covered in ash and blood, looking at the woman who’d betrayed him to save him, who’d broken his trust to earn it back.
“Do what?” Kaela asked.
“This.” Aldric’s gesture encompassed everything—her, him, the space between them. “I know how to fight. I know how to grieve. I know how to build walls and defend them. But I don’t know how to—”
He stopped typing. Started again.
“You make me want things I stopped wanting a long time ago. That terrifies me. Because wanting things means losing them, and I’ve already lost so much.”