Page 143 of Unwritten Rules

I cut her off. “You were right. It is Gabriel’s birthright. And if all of you had only seen fit to be honest with me before now, then I’d have gladly signed all the documents upon my father’s…I mean Xavier’s passing.”

That will take some getting used to.

Silence envelops me then as I continue to wallow in my grief, and I think she’s long gone until she speaks again.

“I…I blackmailed her, Nate.” Her voice catches on my name.

I stiffen, my body suddenly numb with shock as I try to register what she could mean.

“I sent her away. I forced her hand, made her end things with you. It was all for Gabriel…and for Xavier. He…he wasn’t a bad man.” Her voice trails off. “At least…not to me.”

My body jumps to life when I pivot on my heel to face her, instantly freezing when I notice the boy in her arms. All the malice on the tip of my tongue shrivels up in the face of such innocence.

“He looks just like him, don’t you think?”

She pushes a mop of dark hair back from my three-year-old cousin’s face, allowing bright blue eyes – eyes shared by both Xavier and Wetherby – to observe me with a maturity beyond his years.

“Hi, Gabriel.” I barely manage to croak past the lump in my throat as I extend my hand to grasp his, except he decides to fist-bump me instead.

Unable to help it, I chuckle for the first time in what seems like decades.

Zara smiles easily at her son’s antics, turning her face to mine.

“Nate.” Her voice is as genuine as I have ever heard it, her eyes earnest. “I was only doing what’s right by my deceased husband. By our son.”

I break eye contact, glancing over at the side-by-side plots of two star-crossed lovers who got their happily ever after in the afterlife.

The rain picks up pace once more, and Gabriel cries out, “No like big water.”

I gesture to the porch surrounding the Lake House, a stone’s throw away, and we break into a run. Once sheltered, Gabriel sits on the oversized swinging chair, happily playing with two army men Zara pulls from her pocket.

“The Lake House and surrounding property shall remain in the Wetherby line.”

She nods at my statement and then looks up at me. “For what it’s worth, I think I know where she’s gone.”

My heart almost stops. “Mila?”

Wetherby’s words flash through my mind for the thousandth time.

Find Mila. She didn’t leave willingly, son…

Nodding she explains, “I told her to leave. My words were perhaps…harsher than required. As I was leaving, she mumbled something about the Pearson School of the Arts, and that’s in New York, yes?”

I nod, desperate to see her, to make things right with her at the forefront of my mind, but Zara’s next haughtily spoken words stop me in my tracks.

“You know you two can never be, right, Nate? Her brother would literally kill you if you told him you’d laid a hand on his sister. He’s not the most forgiving of people, if memory serves.”

I frown, looking out into the rain and the lake beyond. My mind runs at lightspeed as I try to look at this situation from every angle.

The rain has cleared, and Zara and Gabriel are long gone when a plan begins to form in my mind.

And as much as it kills me to stay away from her now that I know where she is and that she didn’t leave of her own free will, I know I must.

When I go to her, I will do so without anything between us. With nothing hanging over us or holding us back. No hurdles to jump or mountains to climb.

When I claim her, we will be free to just be.

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