Olivia’s POV
I lay in my childhood bed that night, staring up at the ceiling with its glow-in-the-dark stars, and my mind wouldn’t stop replaying everything my parents had told me.
*****
"After you were hit by that car," my father continued, "Maxwell was the one who rushed to help you. He and the driver got you into the car immediately and drove straight to the hospital. He didn’t waste a single second."
I blinked, surprised. That wasn’t what I’d expected to hear. I’d expected to hear he’d run away.
"The doctors started working on you right away," my mother continued softly. "And Maxwell - he didn’t even know our phone number or how to come here on his own. But surprisingly he remembered the way to our house. So he ran all the way there to tell us what had happened."
"He ran?" I repeated.
"He was just a twelve-year-old boy," my father said. "Terrified and crying, barely able to get the words out. But he made sure we knew where you were."
"We got to the hospital as fast as we could," my mother said. "And the doctors told us we were very lucky. That if Maxwell hadn’t gotten you there so quickly, we would have lost you. The impact to your head was severe."
A lump formed in my throat.
"Maxwell heard that," my father said quietly. "Heard the doctors say that you’d almost died because of what happened. And he... he just fell apart. The guilt consumed him completely."
"He disappeared after that," my mother added. "We tried to find him, to tell him it wasn’t his fault, but he was gone. Nobody saw him for weeks."
I sat there, processing this.
"Then one day," my father continued, "a letter arrived. Hand-delivered with a package."
He stood up and walked to his desk, pulled open a drawer, and retrieved an envelope - old, yellowed with age, but still clear.
He handed it to me.
Inside was the deed to the beach house. And a letter in handwriting that was unmistakably younger, shakier, but still recognizable as Maxwell’s.
I read it silently:
Dear Mr. and Mrs. Hopton,
I know this doesn’t make up for what my family did to yours. I know nothing can give back what was taken. But this beach house belongs to you. It should have never been taken in the first place.
I’m sorry for what my father did to Kennedy. I’m sorry I was too scared to speak up when it mattered. I’m sorry Olivia got hurt because of me.
I know you probably hate me, and you have every right to. But please know that I will spend the rest of my life trying to make this right.
I’m so sorry.
Maxwell Wellington
Tears blurred my vision as I stared at the letter.
"He somehow convinced his father to give back the beach house," my father said, his voice thick with emotion. "I don’t know how he did it. Don’t know what it cost him. But he did it."
"The letter touched us deeply," my mother said. "We could see how much guilt and pain that young boy was carrying. We forgave him right then and there. Forgave everything that had happened."
I looked up at them. "You forgave him?"
"How could we not?" my father said gently. "He was just a child caught in his father’s cruelty. And he tried - really tried - to make amends for something that wasn’t even his fault to begin with."
"When Kennedy went off to boarding school," my mother continued, "you were struggling. The memory loss, the recovery, everything. You were moody and withdrawn. So we sent you to stay with your aunt for a while, hoping the change of scenery would help."
"And that’s when Maxwell came back," my father said. "He came looking for you. Wanted to see if you were okay, wanted to try to explain everything. But you weren’t there."
My heart clenched.
"His father sent him away to boarding school too, not long after that," my mother said. "Far away. We think it was punishment for getting the beach house back for us."
"And every time he came back home," my father added, "you were always somewhere else. Visiting relatives, at summer camp, later at college. Your paths just never crossed again."
I sat there, the letter still in my hands, my mind reeling.
"So he’s been looking for me," I said slowly. "All this time. Since we were children."
"It seems so," my mother said softly.
I thought about everything Maxwell had done. Every single thing. It was like there were two different Maxwells, and I didn’t know which one was real.
"He never told me any of this," I said, my voice breaking. "When he found me, when he hired me, he never said ’Hey, remember me? We knew each other as kids. I’ve been searching for you for twenty years.’ He just... played games with me."
"Maybe he didn’t know how to tell you," my mother suggested gently. "Maybe he was scared you’d hate him if you remembered."
"I don’t know what to think anymore," I admitted, pressing my palms against my eyes. "I don’t know what’s real and what’s manipulation. I don’t know if he actually loves me or if this is all some twisted game to him."
My parents were quiet for a moment.
Then my father said, "Only Maxwell can answer that, sweetheart. But I will say this - that boy who returned our beach house, who made sure you got to the hospital in time, who searched for you for years... that doesn’t sound like someone playing a game."
I wanted to believe that. God, I wanted to believe that so badly.
But trust was such a fragile thing, and Maxwell had shattered mine so completely.
Maxwell’s POV
I drove back to my mansion that night feeling like my skin was too tight, like I might explode if one more thing went wrong.
The guard at the gate took too long to open it.
"MOVE!" I shouted through the window, and he jumped so badly he nearly dropped his clipboard.
I drove through the driveway, tires screeching, and slammed out of the car hard enough that the door bounced back before catching.
Inside, the house was quiet. Too quiet.
One of the staff - Maria, I think, though I could barely focus enough to register faces - stepped into the foyer as I passed.
"Mr. Wellington, would you like me to prepare some..."
"No." The word came out harsh. "I don’t want anything. Just... stay out of my way."
I heard a door creak somewhere down the hall - one of those old hinges I’d been meaning to have fixed but never got around to - and the sound scraped against my nerves like nails on a chalkboard.
"WHO’S MAKING THAT NOISE?" I bellowed into the empty house.