"Thank you," he said. "For this." He held up his hands, the bandages I'd wrapped around his knuckles already spotted with blood seeping through.
I nodded. "You should ice them when you get home. And keep them clean."
"I will."
We stood there for another beat, as if unsure what to say next.
"See you tomorrow?" he asked.
"Seven sharp," I said.
His mouth quirked—almost a smile—then he picked up his toolbox and walked out into the dark.
Chapter 22
Olivia
Sleep wouldn’t come.
And I’d tried.
I'd showered until the hot water ran cold, but I couldn't scrub the smell of the site out of my pores. Wood and metal and antiseptic, all tangled together in my hair, under my nails.
I stood in front of the bathroom mirror, my skin pink from the heat, and looked at my hands. They were clean, the nails trimmed short, but they felt different. Heavy with the memory of Ben’s palms. They had been so cold, then so hot, the pulse in his wrist a steady rhythm against my thumb.
I’d spent eight years as an archivist of Ryan’s life. I knew the exact pressure of his touch, or the way he held a pen and gripped a steering wheel. But holding Ben’s hands had felt like touching a live wire—dangerous and impossibly real.
My eyes dropped to my left hand.
The ring was there, glinting under the LED vanity lights. I'd never realized how much it stood out against the pale, winter-white of my skin. I turned my hand slowly, examining the deep indent the gold had made over the years. Even if I took it off, the mark would stay. A permanent ghost of a contract I no longer understood.
I left the bathroom and went to the kitchen. I didn't even bother with the lights. The blue glow of the microwave clock was enough.
I pulled my project binder toward me—the same one I'd used to organize Ryan's paperwork for the funeral, now repurposed for the Route 9 build. Tonight I added a new tab:Discrepancies.
I opened my laptop and logged into our joint banking portal. I’d looked at these numbers a thousand times, but always with the eyes of a woman who trusted the math. Tonight, I looked at them like a forensic accountant.
I scrolled back six months. June.
Ryan had told me he was in Boston for a three-day architecture seminar. I remembered the weekend clearly. I’d spent it painting the guest room, listening to podcasts, and texting him photos of paint swatches. He’d texted back:The eggshell looks great, Liv. Can’t wait to be home.
I found the charge, dated June 14. A gas station in Pelham, twenty miles from the Route 9 clearing. He hadn't been in Boston. He’d beenthere. In the dark, in the mud, building a life I wasn't invited to.
I stared at the screen until the numbers blurred into gray lines. The archivist in me wanted to file it away, to categorize it underBetrayals, Categorized by Date.But the woman in me just felt cold. Every text he sent that weekend, every "I love you" whispered over the phone from a "hotel room," was a brick in the house he was building on Route 9.
I closed the laptop and walked back upstairs. The house felt too big.
I climbed into bed at ten-thirty, but the sheets felt too heavy and stifling. I lay in the dark, staring at the ceiling, listening to the house settle around me. Outside, a branch scraped against the window with a skeletal sound.
My left hand rested on top of the comforter. Even in the dark, the ring felt like it weighed five pounds.
I’d worn it for eight years. It had become part of me—invisible and automatic, like breathing. It had been on my finger when we bought this house. It had been there when we buried his father. It had been there for every anniversary dinner, every quiet Tuesday night, every "forever" we’d promised each other.
Until tonight.
Until Ben looked down at my hand and saw it.
I could still see his face in the dim light of the garage. The way his expression had changed—that slight, sharp tightening around his eyes, the way his jaw set like he’d been hit. He hadn't seen a piece of jewelry, but a boundary. A line in the dirt that Ryan had drawn eight years ago and Ben was too honorable to cross.
