He Chose My Best Friend, Now He Wants Me Back Chapter 11

He Chose My Best Friend, Now He Wants Me Back Chapter 11

Sloane filed for divorce.

The process was eerily calm, like signing a business contract. In the cold marble hallway of the Cook County Clerk’s Office, they didn’t argue. They didn’t even look at each other.

As they parted at the entrance, Sloane finally looked at him, her voice barely a whisper. “Ben, if you… if you see Mara, tell her I’m sorry.”

Her gaze drifted past him, as if she were remembering a long-faded afternoon. “I destroyed our friendship. I was the thief.”

Ben nodded silently and turned away. He offered no comfort. Sloane had only lost a friend. He had lost everything.

After that, he drifted through Chicago, a man untethered.

Until one night, scrolling through Instagram, he saw a post from a mutual college friend.

The friend was on vacation in Maine, posting photos from a town called Bar Harbor. Blue sea, sailboats, quaint streets. Ben scrolled past them, his heart numb.

Until the ninth photo.

It was a casual street shot. In the corner of the frame was a small bookstore with blooming hydrangeas by the door. A wooden sign hung above the entrance. On it, in a familiar, elegant script, were the words: “Mara’s Books.”

It was her handwriting.

He had seen it a thousand times in the notebook where she practiced her wedding vows.

Ben shot up from the sofa, his heart seizing. He zoomed in, staring at the sign as if he could will himself through the screen to see the woman who haunted his every waking moment.

Without a second thought, he booked the earliest flight to Maine.

A few hours later, the plane landed in Bangor. Armed with only the screenshot, he rented a car and drove toward the coast through the pre-dawn fog.

When he finally found the street, the first rays of sun were just breaking over the harbor. He looked at the photo on his phone, then at the scene before him. The bookstore was there, by the sea, the flowers beaded with dew. It was peaceful, beautiful, like something out of a storybook.

In that instant, a thought pierced him.

While he had been descending into his own personal hell, Mara—his Mara—had already built the life she’d always dreamed of.

She had truly started over.

A better life, without him.

The realization was suffocating, but it fueled a desperate obsession. He had to find her. He had to see her with his own eyes.