Chapter 13
WHAT WAS LEFT UNSAID
Truth lies beneath what remains unsaid
Della
The silence that had wrapped around us all evening vanishes.
The warmth of the fire, the stillness of the lake, the softness of this fragile peace—gone.
I feel it rise—something dark and sharp clawing up from everything I’ve spent years trying to lock away. My voice trembles—not from fear, but from fury. From heartbreak. From all the words I never thought I’d say aloud.
I look him straight in the eyes—rage and grief crashing together behind mine.
“How is Leah?” My voice comes out cold, sharper than I mean—but maybe that’s the point. “I’ve been so caught up in this quiet little fairytale today, I nearly forgot to ask you about your wife.”
His hands are on mine. I shake them off.
I gesture toward his phone still glowing on the counter.
“She seems worried. Calling late. Sweet of her.”
Dorian blinks, visibly thrown.
“What are you talking about? Leah and I are—were—done. That ended a long time ago. You know that. She probably called about something work-related.”
I step away from the couch, needing space. Air.
“Della, what’s going on?” His voice follows me. “Talk to me. I want to know… I need to. Please.”
But something’s already cracked open. Rage receding, leaving a raw exhaustion behind.
“She was never really out of your life, was she?”
He exhales hard, running a hand through his hair.
“We work together. That’s it. Nothing else.”
I almost laugh. Bitter, hollow.
“Really? I know what I saw that night, Dorian.”
But still… there was that whisper in my chest—the part of me that wanted to believe he couldn’t. Wouldn’t.
“I needed you, so much,” I say quietly. “I needed to hear your voice. To see your face. To believe I’d survive what was happening.”
He steps closer, cautious. Like he’s afraid he’ll push me further away.
“I called you—a video call,” I continue, my voice quieter now, as I stare at the dark through the large windows facing the lake. “Six weeks and two days after I landed.”
His eyes widen. “But I never—”
“You didn’t answer,” I say flatly, pointing at his phone. “She did. Lying in bed beside you.”
I finally look at him. Direct. Unflinching.
“She told me you’d gone back to her. That I was a mistake.”
A beat passes. And then I see it—the shift. His face hardens, recognition flashing like lightning, followed by something darker. Rage.
He drags a hand through his hair, rough, almost violent. A broken sound escapes his throat as he paces once, twice, then halts, fists tight at his sides.
“It’s not true, Della. She had no damn right to lie to you like that. Not even to touch my phone. Nothing happened.”
He drags in a breath, but it shudders out like it burns.
“That night… I was already a wreck. She showed me pictures—of you and that man. Smiling. Close. She said you’d moved on. That I’d been nothing more than a summer game for you. And God, I believed her. For one second, I believed her. And it felt like something split me open from the inside.”
His jaw locks, fury carving deep lines into his face.
“I drowned it in whiskey. I drank until I couldn’t feel, until I didn’t care if I woke up the next morning.
And then… I don’t remember how I ended up in bed.
But I swear to you, Della—” His fists clench harder, knuckles white.
His eyes blaze. “I never touched her. I never would. I couldn’t.
Not when every part of me was still yours. ”
Fury flickers in his eyes—at her, at himself, at everything he let happen.
I stare. Cold dread begins to spread in my chest with the thought of the pictures he just mentioned.
“What pictures? What man?”
Without a word, he walks to his bag and pulls out a worn yellow envelope.
“I tried calling you the day you were supposed to land,” he says, quieter now. “Again, and again. It rang once or twice, then nothing. I waited. I kept calling. Nothing at all. I couldn’t sleep. Couldn’t work.”
His voice tightens.
“I had no way to reach you. No address, no emergency contact. God, how stupid of me to let you leave like that.”
He pauses, the guilt sharp in his voice.
“And then one day, Leah came to my office. Said she could help. That her father might have a way of finding out what happened to you.”
He holds out the envelope.
“And two days later, she gave me these. These damn photos. Every time I thought about going after you, every time I almost picked up the phone—I looked at them. Reminded myself you’d chosen someone else. That you never called. That you didn’t want me. At least, that’s what I believed then.…”
I take it slowly. My fingers tremble as I open it.
Inside—glossy lies. Me, laughing. Holding hands with a man I’ve never seen. Kissing. Smiling. I flip through them with a sickening sense of disorientation.
My face. My body. But not me.
“This isn’t me,” I whisper. “I don’t know this man. These aren’t real. I was at—”
I stop. The word burns in my throat. Hospital.
But with it would come everything else. The pain. The loss. The shame.
I close my mouth. Swallow it whole.
Dorian watches me, eyes full of confusion and something deeper—guilt.
“You believed this?” My voice sharpens. “You got drunk and ended up in bed with Leah because of this?”
“Yes,” he admits. “I believed them. I drank. And yes, I was in that bed—but nothing happened, Della. I couldn’t. I wouldn’t.”
He steps closer, gently lifting my chin so I can’t escape his dark eyes.
“You were the only one,” he says, placing my hand over his chest, his voice a low, steady ache. “You still are.”
For a second, the world stills. I want to believe him. And maybe, for that one breath, I do.
But it doesn’t erase what happened. It doesn’t rewind anything.
“You believed those pictures so easily,” I whisper, and the words taste bitter on my tongue. I look away, blinking hard. “It didn’t take much, did it?”.
“I thought you were gone. You disappeared. And she—she used that. Twisted it. Gave me just enough truth to make the lie believable.”
Then his voice tightens, confused, pained.
“Six weeks. Not a word. Why didn’t you call me when you got home, Della?”
My breath catches. I step back.
“I—I got home after seven weeks.”
He frowns. “What do you mean?”
I can barely speak. My voice thins into something hollow.
“The pictures… they are not real. I was… in the hospital.”
He grips the edge of the table, like he needs to anchor himself.
“The hospital?” He comes closer again, softer this time, his voice laced with something like fear. “Seven weeks? Della… what happened?”
I shake my head. “I can’t.”
I can’t tell him.
Because if I do, he won’t look at me the same. And I don’t think I could bear it.
“Please.” His voice breaks around the word.
I step away, panic rising like floodwater. “I can’t do this.”
“Della—" His voice is raw now, fraying around the edges. “I didn’t know. I didn’t know.”
I turn, heading for the stairs, but I stop before taking the first step. I glance back. His eyes meet mine—wide, anguished, the weight of guilt carved deep into them. I almost falter. Almost.
“You know what hurt the most, Dorian?” I ask, barely more than a breath. “More than seeing you in her bed? More than the lies?”
He waits. Silent. Braced.
“Your absence,” I say. “The promise you broke. The stupid hope that you’d come for me.”
Something in him cracks. I see it in his eyes. But I can’t stay here.
Not now. Not when the pain is this loud.
And so, I walk away—before the rest of the monsters catch up with me.
* * *
Dorian
I watch her going up the stairs—slow, but steady. She doesn’t turn. And the silence she leaves behind is unbearable.
I stand frozen, one hand gripping the edge of the banister, the other clenched useless at my side. I want to run after her. To say something, anything. But the look she gave me before turning away—it’s still lodged in my chest like a blade.
The promise you broke. The stupid hope that you’d come for me.
I collapse on the edge of the sofa and bury my face in my hands.
“God. Am I too late?”
Her words circle me like smoke, clinging to everything, poisoning the air. I close my eyes, but I still see her—cracked open, vulnerable, voice raw with betrayal. I let her down. I wasn’t there.
I stand and pace the kitchen, my hands clenched at my sides. Fury simmers under my skin—not just at Leah, not just at myself, but at how easy it all was for everything to fall apart. A few photos. A lie, whispered at the right time. A phone answered by the wrong person.
Seven weeks. Seven weeks in a hospital.
She didn’t say why. Didn’t tell me what happened. But I saw it in her eyes—it was something terrible.
And I didn’t know.
I didn’t even try hard enough to know. I just… gave up.
Worse—I believed Leah.
I hear my own breathing, heavy, jerky, interrupted by guilt. Something inside me tightens to the point of pain. Her words still echo in my mind with sharp clarity "What hurt most? Your absence."
The weight of that truth crushes me.
How could I have believed it?
How could I not have known, that something was wrong?
My eyes flick toward the phone still lying on the counter.
Leah. Her name might as well be etched into the glass.
A quiet, crawling hatred moves up my spine.
She lied to me. She manipulated me. She stole something I didn’t even realize I was losing—my chance to be there for Della when she needed me.
And I let her.
A wave of nausea rolls through me.
How do I tell Della that while she was alone in a hospital bed, I was tying myself to the woman who helped destroy us? That I was signing away what we had—for numbers on a page and a lie I convinced myself was closure?
I pull out my phone, the bile still thick in my throat. My fingers hover for a second, then I type a message to David:
Start the process to dissolve the partnership on all projects with Leah. Quietly but immediately. We’ll talk details when I get back.
Then another, to Maddox:
Full audit. MH Construction. Anything tied to Leah—get me out. Keep it quiet. And—get the papers ready for the lake house, as discussed.
This isn’t business anymore. This is correction. This is the beginning of what I should’ve done years ago—untangle myself from every damn string she wrapped around me.
It won’t fix anything. Won’t turn back time. Won’t bring back what I lost with Della. What we lost.
But it’s a start.
I drift toward the window, staring out at the trees and the faint shimmer of the lake under moonlight. I don’t see any of it.
All I see is her—not Della from tonight, stiff with pain, hiding something she couldn’t bring herself to say—but her, from years ago at Lake Geneva.
She was curled up in the armchair of that little inn room, wearing my t-shirt—way too big for her, hair damp from the rain, her bare legs tucked under her.
She wasn’t reading, not really—just holding the book, watching the lake. She looked up when I walked in with the tea, smiled that sideways smile that made my heart tremble.
She took the cup, rested her head on my shoulder like it was made for her, and I remember whispering into her ear, inhaling the jasmine scent of her skin:
"How can I feel this much and not explode?"
She’d laughed into my chest.
“You don’t explode,” she said in a warm whisper tracing her hands over my chest. “You melt.”
And I did.
Back then, I melted for her without fear. Completely.
Now, I’ve hardened into someone else. Someone who let doubt win. Someone who let her go.
I can still see her tonight, shaking, trying to stay upright under the weight of whatever she’s hiding. Seven weeks in a hospital.
The thought guts me.
I glance at the stairs.
She’s up there now. Alone again. And I don’t know if she’s crying, or staring at the ceiling, or replaying every broken piece of our story in her head—but I know better than to follow her now.
She doesn’t need more words tonight. She needs space.
But tomorrow?
Tomorrow I’ll bring my truth. My regret. All of it.
Even if it’s too late to repair what we had, I’ll burn down every lie I helped build between us—starting with Leah.
Even if she never forgives me.
Because the woman upstairs—
The one I still love more than anything—
Was alone when she shouldn’t have been.
And I will never let that happen again.
* * *
I’m still on the couch, elbows on knees, head heavy in my hands. The silence presses in around me.
Then I hear it. A sound sharp enough to slice through the air.
A cry. Muffled at first. Then another—hoarse, panicked.
“Della?”
I bolt upright, heart in my throat.
And then again. Louder this time. Frantic.
“No—no, please—don’t—”
I’m already running, taking the stairs two at a time, fear twisting through my gut. Her door is slightly ajar. I push it open.
She’s in bed, but she’s not asleep.
She’s trapped.
Sheets tangled around her legs, body curled in on itself like she’s trying to make herself disappear. Her arms raised, fending off something that isn’t there. Tears stream down her face.
“No,” she sobs. “Stop. Please, stop…”
God.
I rush to her side, kneeling by the bed, frozen for a second. Do I touch her? Say her name? Her whole body shakes. Her face is contorted in pain I can’t begin to imagine.
It’s a nightmare. Maybe more than that.
“Della,” I whisper, voice cracking. “I’m here. You’re safe. I’ve got you.”
But she doesn’t hear me. Or maybe she can’t.
Whatever she’s reliving in the dark…
I’ll stay until it ends.