CHAPTER 13 Axel
Axel
Three days without Delia, and I’d apparently decided to make it everyone’s problem.
“No.” Mark stood in my office doorway at eleven p.m. on a Thursday, arms crossed. “Absolutely not.”
I didn’t look up from my laptop. “The Singapore projections need to be finalized by tomorrow.”
“The Singapore projections have been finalized. Twice. You rejected both versions for reasons that made absolutely no sense.”
“The data wasn’t comprehensive enough.”
“The data was fine. You’re being unreasonable.” He walked in and sat down without being invited. “Just because you’re having love-life problems doesn’t mean the entire company has to suffer with you.”
That made me look up. “Who says it’s a love problem?”
“Isn’t this about the woman you were staying with?
” Mark adjusted his glasses in that way he did when he was about to say something I wouldn’t like.
“You’ve been here every night this week.
You leave for the gym at six AM. You come back at seven.
You stay until midnight. Yes, Axel, only a relationship problem makes a man act like this. ”
“I don’t have relationship problems. I don’t have a relationship.”
“Exactly my point.”
I went back to my laptop. “The projections need another review.”
“No, they don’t. What you need is to go home, sleep, and stop punishing the entire acquisitions team because you’re in a mood.”
“I’m not in a mood.”
“You made Jennifer cry yesterday, Axel.”
“She presented incomplete data.”
“She presented perfectly acceptable data, and you told her it looked like a middle-school science project.”
I had said that. In my defense, the formatting had been terrible. “She’ll recover.”
“That’s not the point.” Mark leaned forward.
“Look, I don’t know what happened with Delia…
I don’t know if you told her how you feel or if you’re still doing that thing where you suffer in silence like some tragic Victorian novel character.
But whatever this is, you need to deal with it.
Because making everyone work overtime isn’t helping anyone. ”
“I’m not making anyone work overtime.”
“You literally just asked me to have the team redo projections that are fine.” He stood up. “Go home. Sleep. Stop using work as an excuse to avoid your feelings.”
“I don’t avoid my feelings.”
“You’re the most emotionally constipated person I’ve ever met, and that’s saying something.”
“That’s inappropriate workplace conversation.”
“So is making your entire staff miserable because you can’t tell a woman you like her.”
My phone rang before I could respond. Unknown number. I almost didn’t answer. Then something made me pick up.
“Hello?”
“Axel? It’s Maria. Elena’s sister.”
I straightened instantly. “Is everything okay?”
“Not really. Elena’s having a bad day. She keeps asking for Delia.
I’ve been trying to reach Daniel but his phone goes straight to voicemail.
” Her voice was strained. Worried. “She’s really agitated.
Keeps saying she needs to tell Delia something important.
About Jake. Says it’s urgent, that Delia needs to know before it’s too late. ”
My chest went tight. “I’ll reach Delia.”
“Thank you. I’m sorry to bother you, but—”
“It’s not a bother. I’ll have her there soon.”
I hung up and was already grabbing my coat.
Mark watched me from the doorway. “Emergency?”
“Yes.”
“The personal kind or the professional kind?”
“Does it matter?”
“Not really. But for what it’s worth, the personal kind tends to be more important.” He stepped aside to let me pass. “Go. I’ll handle Singapore.”
Twenty minutes later I was outside Delia’s building, staring at the buzzer and trying to decide if this was a terrible idea.
I hadn’t seen her in three days. Hadn’t texted. Hadn’t called. Had given her the space she’d said she needed even though it felt like cutting off my own arm.
I pressed the buzzer.
“Hello?” Her voice crackled through the speaker.
“It’s me. Maria called. It’s your mom.”
The door buzzed open immediately.
She was already waiting in her doorway when I reached the fourth floor. Hair in a messy bun, dark circles under her eyes, wearing sweatpants and a paint-stained shirt. She looked exhausted—beautiful, and exhausted.
“What happened?” she asked.
“Your mom’s having a bad day. Maria can’t reach Daniel. She’s asking for you.”
“Right. Okay.” She grabbed her jacket and keys. Didn’t quite meet my eyes. “Thank you for coming.”
We didn’t talk on the drive. She stared out the window at Brooklyn passing by while I tried to focus on the road and not on the fact that she looked like she hadn’t slept in days.
“How have you been?” I asked at last.
“Fine.”
“Delia.”
“I’ve been great, Axel. Fantastic. Living my best life.” She said it flat. Sarcastic. “How have you been?”
“Fine.”
“Liar.”
“You started it.”
She almost smiled. Almost. “Fair point.”
At the care facility, Maria met us at the door looking frazzled. “Thank god. She’s in her room. Be prepared, she’s very confused today.”
Elena was sitting up in bed, clutching a tissue box, looking small and fragile in a way that made something in my chest twist. When she saw Delia, her entire face lit up.
“There you are! Finally!” She reached out with both hands. “I’ve been trying to tell them. Trying to make them understand.”
Delia sat on the edge of the bed, taking her mother’s hands. “I’m here, Mom. What do you need to tell me?”
“The letters. I found the letters.” Elena’s grip was desperate. “In his room. Years ago. I found them and I kept them because I thought you weren’t ready but now you need to know. You need to know before it’s too late.”
“What letters, Mom?”
“Love letters. To you. From your husband.” Elena looked at me then, something flickering in her eyes. Recognition mixed with confusion. “He wrote you so many letters. Beautiful letters. About how much he loved you. How he’s always loved you.”
My blood went cold.
Delia looked at me, shocked. I couldn’t move.
Couldn’t breathe. Because Elena was talking about my letters.
Letters I’d written when I was sixteen and stupid and couldn’t keep my feelings contained anymore.
Letters I’d hidden in my room at the Santoro house and thought I’d destroyed before I left for college.
But she was calling me her husband.
“Mom, I don’t understand.” Delia’s voice was gentle. Patient. “Jake wrote me letters?”
“Yes! No.” Elena’s confusion was growing. “Not Jake. The other one. The boy. The one who stayed. The one who was always there.” She looked at me again. “You wrote them. Tell her. Tell her about the letters.”
She was looking right at me. Calling me Jake. Mixing up the names completely.
“Mrs. Santoro,” I started.
“Tell her!” Elena’s voice rose, sharp with urgency. “Tell her Jake is the wrong choice. She’s thinking about going back to him but it’s wrong. It’s all wrong. The letters prove it. You love her. You’ve always loved her.”
Delia’s face was pale. “Mom, you’re confused.”
“I’m not confused about this.” Elena grabbed Delia’s hand tighter. “Jake is wrong for you. The letters say so. He wrote them. He wrote how much he loved you. How he’d always love you. Don’t go back to him, sweetheart. Don’t make the wrong choice.”
Then something in her eyes shifted—went distant, the clarity slipping like sand.
“Where is Jake?” she asked suddenly. “Did you marry him yet? Is the wedding today?”
Delia’s face crumpled. “No, Mom. The wedding didn’t happen. Remember?”
“Oh.” Elena looked around the room like she was seeing it for the first time. “Where am I? This isn’t my house.”
“You’re at the care facility” Maria said gently from the doorway. “You’re safe. Everything’s okay.”
We stayed another twenty minutes while Maria helped Elena settle. By the time we left, Elena had forgotten we were there—forgotten the letters, the wedding, everything.
In the parking lot, Delia finally looked at me. “She’s completely lost it.”
“It’s the disease.”
“I know.” She leaned against my car. “But she was so insistent—about the letters, about Jake being wrong. She really believed it.”
“She was confused.”
“Was she though?” Delia studied my face. “Was she though?” Delia studied my face. “The way she looked at you… calling you Jake… it was like she knew something but couldn’t get the words right.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. Couldn’t confirm it without revealing everything. Couldn’t deny it without lying.
“My mother was right about one thing,” Delia said quietly. “Jake is the wrong choice.”
My heart stopped beating.
“I’ve known it for days,” she continued. “Maybe weeks. But I couldn’t admit it because admitting it meant acknowledging something I wasn’t ready to face.”
“Delia—”
“Jake is familiar. Safe, in a twisted way. Even though he hurt me, I know him. I know what being with him looks like.” She was staring at her hands. “But you… you’re terrifying.”
“I’m terrifying?”
“Yes. Because choosing you means starting over completely. It means trusting someone new. Building something from nothing. And if it doesn’t work, if you leave too—” Her voice cracked. “I won’t survive it, Axel. I barely survived Jake. If I choose you and you leave, it’ll destroy me.”
“I’m not leaving.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do know that.” I moved closer. “I’ve been here for years, Delia. In different forms — your brother’s friend, the guy who stayed away, the person who moved in when you needed help. I’m not going anywhere now.”
“But what if—”
“There’s no what if. My feelings aren’t temporary. They’re not convenient. They’re not going to change.” I looked at her directly. “You can trust me or not trust me. That’s your choice. But I’m here either way.”
She was crying now. Tears running down her face while she looked at me like I was something both wonderful and impossible.
“I’ve been lying to myself,” she whispered. “Telling myself I needed time when what I actually needed was courage.”
“Delia.”
She moved then. Closed the distance between us.
And I froze.