Her Regret Came Too Late Chapter 06

Her Regret Came Too Late Chapter 06

After I hung up the phone, I sat in silence for a while.

I told myself not to do it.

I told myself that the past was the past. That I had buried it. That opening old wounds would only make them bleed again.

But my fingers moved anyway.

I picked up my phone, opened the browser and typed the names I had sworn to forget.

Victoria Brown.

Dillan Perez.

The screen filled with headlines. I scrolled slowly.

There was a picture of Dillan moving out of the Clark family house. Alone. No friends helping him. No moving truck. Just one man carrying boxes to a small rental car, his back curved like an old man’s.

The article said he had been kicked out. The adopted son of the Clark family, once celebrated and admired, now discarded like something broken.

I read the words without feeling them.

Another headline caught my eye. Dillan’s architecture firm had declared bankruptcy. Several major clients had canceled their contracts. The reason given was “business reputation issues.”

I wondered what that meant. Probably the stolen designs. Probably the video I had posted. Probably the slow unraveling of a man who had built his career on other people’s work.

I felt nothing. Not satisfaction. Not pity. Just a quiet acknowledgment.

Then I saw a photo of Victoria.

It was grainy-taken at night, from a distance. She was walking down the mountain path from Dragon’s Peak, dressed in a black coat. Her hair was wild, tangled by the wind. Her eyes were red. Even in the low- qual

I could see that.

“Victoria Clark, heir to the Brown Group, has visited Dragon’s Peak every week for over a to be mourning her missing husband.”

the photo for a long time.

ace looked thinner than I remembered. Dark circles under her eyes. Her mouth was a tight line, like she was holding something back. She looked exhausted. She looked broken.

I scrolled down to the comments.

“She really did love him. Some people don’t know what they have until it’s gone.”

“Fake. She’s just trying to save her image. Stock prices are down. This is damage control.”

“Poor man. He deserved better.”

I almost laughed.

Not because any of it was funny. But because the comments-both the ones defending her and the ones attacking her-were all wrong.

Victoria wasn’t mourning me. She was mourning the man who had loved her. The man who had given her everything and asked for nothing but honesty in return.

She wasn’t sad because I was gone. She was sad because she had finally realized what she had lost. And that wasn’t love. That was regret.

“Mr. Clark, what are you looking at?”

Callie’s small voice cut through my thoughts. She had tiptoed over from her seat and was standing on her toes, trying to see my phone.

I reached out and ruffled her hair. Her pigtails bounced.

“Nothing important,” I said. “How’s your bridge coming along?”

“Almost done!” She held up her wooden bridge. It was crooked. The sides didn’t match. The glue had left white streaks on the wood. But her face was so proud, so happy, that the bridge looked beautiful anyway.

I smiled and took it from her hands.

“The edges are a little rough,” I said. “Let me fix them for you.”

I picked up the sandpaper and worked on the corners. Callie leaned against the desk, watching me with her big brown eyes.

After a moment, she said, “Mr. Clark, you seem sad today.”

I stopped sanding.

“I said. “Just a little tired.”

her head. She thought about this for a moment.

she reached into her pocket and pulled out a piece of candy. Strawberry. Still wrapped in crinkly plastic.

Here,” she said, pressing it into my palm. “Auntie says eating candy makes you not tired anymore.”

I looked down at the small pink wrapper in my hand. Then I unwrapped the candy and put it in my mouth.

It was sweet. Too sweet, maybe. The kind of sweet that only a child would enjoy.

But it somehow made me feel better.

Callie didn’t know my past. She didn’t know that the man sitting in front of her had once jumped into freezing water and let the darkness take him.

She just knew that I looked tired. And she wanted to help. That was all.

I finished the candy, picked up my carving knife, and put my attention back on the half-finished lighthouse.

Shortly afterwards, the sun turned golden and low.

Ariel appeared at the door to pick up Callie. She stood for a moment, watching me work. I didn’t look up at first. I just kept carving, my knife moving in small, careful strokes.

Then I finished, and I set the lighthouse on the desk.

It was done. The pink paint had dried. The windows were straight. The little light inside actually worked when you pressed the button on the bottom.

“Well done,” Ariel said softly.

I looked up. She was standing in the doorway, Callie holding her hand.

“Thank you,” I said.

She’didn’t walk away. She just stood there, looking at the lighthouse.

“I mean it,” she said. “Your work is really good.”

I set down my knife and turned to face her.

“Why do you say that?” I asked.

Ariel thought for a moment. Then she walked closer and picked up the lighthouse. She turned it over in her hands and ran her finger along the smooth edges.

“Because I’ve never seen anyone make things like you do,” she said. Her voice was quiet but certain. “I can feel something when I look at your models. Warmth. Direction. Hope.

I said nothing.

She set the lighthouse back on the desk and looked at me with those calm, patient eyes.

“Other people just build things,” she said. “You put something inside them. Something that points the way

forward.”

what to say.

her aunt’s hand. “Auntie, I’m hungry.”

She turned to leave, then paused at the door.

u tomorrow, Mr. Clark,” she said.

nodded and raised my hand in a small wave.

They walked out. The door closed behind them.

The workshop fell quiet again.

But Ariel’s words stayed in my head, circling like birds that refused to land.