Chapter 2 - Echoes Across the Miles
Life in Albany settled into a predictable, hard-earned rhythm. I was no longer the fragile woman who had dropped an anniversary dinner in a Chicago high-rise. My hands, once soft and manicured, were scarred by flour, hot pans, and the endless work of running Rose & Rye. Margaret helped watch the boys during the morning rush, treating them like her own grandchildren while grumbling about modern parenting methods.
Yet, ghosts have a habit of lingering in the margins.
Every few months, an envelope would arrive at my mother’s apartment in Evanston, forwarded meticulously by Grace without comment. I never opened them. I could recognize Nathan’s heavy, deliberate handwriting through the paper without even turning the envelope over. Sometimes I burned them in the small metal trash can behind the bakery; other times, I dropped them unopened into the recycling bin, pretending they were junk mail from a company I no longer did business with.
But you cannot burn away the past when your children carry it in their faces.
Benjamin had my stubborn chin, but Samuel had Nathan’s quiet, calculating gaze. Whenever Sam sat at the kitchen table drawing pictures of skyscrapers or airplanes, his brow would furrow in the exact same shape Nathan’s had when he was reviewing architectural contracts late into the night.
One evening, while scrubbing flour off the kitchen counter, Margaret set a local business journal down next to my elbow.
“You might want to look at page twelve,” she said, her voice unusually subdued.
I wiped my hands on a dish towel and glanced down. A glossy photograph stared back at me. It was Nathan, though he looked like a shadow of the man I had married. The sharp tailoring of his custom suits still hung from his frame, but his cheeks were hollow, and the dark circles beneath his eyes spoke of years of relentless insomnia. The article detailed the steady unraveling of Cole Real Estate Holdings—lost contracts, massive corporate restructuring, and a relentless whispering campaign among investors who no longer trusted his leadership.
“He’s been looking for you, you know,” Margaret murmured, watching my reaction closely. “Private investigators. Public records requests. He’s spent four years turning Chicago upside down.”
“He’s looking for absolution, Margaret,” I said coldly, pushing the magazine away. “Not me.”
“Maybe,” she replied, pouring herself a cup of black coffee. “Or maybe people change when they lose everything they thought mattered. Doesn't mean you have to forgive him, Clara. But don't pretend the ghost is dead just because you locked the door.”
I didn't answer her. I couldn't. Because deep down, beneath the anger and the quiet pride of raising my boys alone, a terrifying thought sometimes whispered in the dark: What if he truly was sorry? What if the man who broke my heart had broken his own trying to find us?
May you like
I shook the thought away, turning my attention back to the bakery schedule. We had our biggest corporate catering gig of the season coming up at the historic Bellwether Hotel. It was a prestigious preservation fundraiser that could cement Rose & Rye’s reputation across upstate New York for years to come.
Little did I know, the Bellwether Hotel was also where my carefully constructed fortress was about to be blown wide open.
