“You expected this?” I asked.
His attention shifted briefly toward the dark hallway. “It was always going to end this way.” The tone carried no surprise, only quiet acceptance.
I studied him carefully. “You’re not angry.”
Drew’s mouth curved slightly. “Anger doesn’t change outcomes.”
The calm in his voice felt strange against the chaos unfolding around the company.
Drew shrugged lightly, the movement small. “Dad’s furious, obviously. The board’s nervous. There have been a lot of arguments over the last few days.” His gaze flicked toward thestudy door. “Mom’s stepped in more than once to keep those conversations from turning into something worse.”
That I could picture. “What happens now?”
Drew exhaled slowly. “Now we rebuild.”
The words landed quietly between us.
“Lorne’s mess doesn’t define the company unless we let it. There’s a lot to clean up. Internal audits. New oversight. A few people who won’t be staying once everything settles.” He leaned back slightly against the wall. “This time around,” he added, almost to himself, “I want to build something better out of it. Something the family name doesn’t have to hide behind.”
His eyes met mine again. “Something worth being proud of.”
Neither of us spoke. Then Drew tilted his head slightly. “You and Mila okay?” he asked.
The question was unexpected. “Yes.”
A faint nod. “Good.” Silence hung between us. Then Drew pushed away from the wall. “Some wars end long after the first shot.”
Before I could respond, he turned and walked toward the staircase. I watched him disappear down the corridor, something about the conversation sitting oddly in the back of my mind. Not wrong. Just… incomplete.
Later that night, after Mila and I’d messaged back and forth, neither of us able to sleep, I picked her up, and we spread our blanket in the sand.
The waves rolled back and forth against the shoreline in a steady rhythm, the sky stretching wide overhead.
She shifted closer as the tide rolled in.
I tightened my hold without looking down. Some things in my life had always been complicated. My need for Mila was the only thing that never changed.
I eased back onto the blanket and drew her down with me. She rested against my chest, her head resting lightly against my shoulder.
For the first time since this entire investigation began, the truth had started surfacing. Darren hadn’t died for nothing. The system he tried to expose was finally cracking open.
But that fight didn’t belong to us anymore.
My fingers threaded slowly through Mila’s as I looked out over the dark water. The fallout inside those companies would keep unfolding long after we left for college. Lawyers, investigators, boards of directors—all of them would spend years sorting through the wreckage.
None of that was our life. Michigan was. The future waiting beyond Blackwood was.
And now, with Mila back in my life, I could finally see a path forward that didn’t involve looking over our shoulders.
The rest of them could deal with the ruins. We were leaving after graduation.
The thought lingered quietly in my chest as I glanced at her.
Somewhere between the chaos and the secrets and the war our families had built around us, Mila had become the one thing that made any of it worth surviving.
I brushed my thumb across the back of her hand, grounding myself in the warmth of her fingers threaded through mine.
Above us, the stars burned quietly across the sky. A thousand silent witnesses.