Page 58

DORIAN

The car service pulls up in front of the familiar two-story brick colonial in Old Greenwich, Connecticut.

Snow dusts the lawn like powdered sugar, and Christmas wreaths with red velvet ribbons hang in each window.

Even in daylight, the Christmas tree positioned behind the picture window glows with warm white lights—clearly lit in anticipation of their daughter’s arrival.

I take a deep breath, my stomach tightening. Last time I stood on this doorstep, I was delivering Caroline’s childhood possessions after she left me.

The front door opens, and her parents crowd the stoop. Her father stands patiently behind his wife, and surprisingly, his focus appears to be on his daughter, not on the man he instructed to “take care of her.”

Anne, Caroline’s mother, releases her daughter and turns to me. Her smile isn’t as warm as the one she gave Caroline, but it’s more than I expected. “Dorian. It’s good to see you again.”

Take care of her.

Those four words her father spoke on our wedding day echo in my head. Words I failed to honor.

On the way over, I asked Caroline what she’d told her parents. She said that she’d told her mom we were seeing each other again. That we’re taking things day by day.

Then I asked what she’d told them when we separated. “I told them I wasn’t happy and that it was better if we split.” She held my hand to soften the truth, but it still sliced. The pain didn’t make the fact any less true.

Take care of her.

I let her father down.

If she had ever needed money, I most certainly would’ve given it to her.

I chose not to follow my father’s precedent.

I never canceled her credit cards or closed down access to her bank accounts.

I told my lawyer I wanted a fair prenuptial agreement, not that she ever saw a cent of that because we never filed for divorce.

Neither of us did. But she didn’t need the money.

Or if she did, she never asked for any. But her father wasn’t telling me to provide for her.

Where I failed is in taking care of his daughter’s heart. I dragged her into a harsh world filled with scrutiny and didn’t protect her. I left her to fend off the vultures while I pursued my dreams and familial responsibilities.

She said that she was suffocating. I should’ve been the one to give her oxygen, but instead, I allowed my world to smother her.

Anne Scott’s hug is quick, nothing like the long embrace she gave Caroline, but I’m off-kilter from her unexpected touch. When she steps back, her husband offers his hand.

“Dorian. Good to see you again, son.”

My throat tightens and doesn’t ease until Caroline’s fingers slip into my hand.

“Come on inside. It’s chilly,” Mrs. Scott says.

It’s actually warmer than in Telluride, but compared to Santa Barbara, the low forties here in Connecticut are chilly.

We crowd the foyer beneath an antique chandelier that’s hung there since Caroline was a child. The scent of cinnamon and pine mingles with something baking—cookies, maybe—creating that unmistakable fragrance of a family Christmas that I never experienced in my own childhood home.

“Oh, Mom, I love the decorations.” Our gazes connect, and an unspoken promise crosses between us.

Next year, we’ll have our own.

Mr. Scott bends for a suitcase handle, and I’m quick to jump in. “I can take these.”

Her father is in good shape, but he’s in his late seventies and doesn’t need to be hauling our luggage up the stairs.

“Oh, I have Caroline in her room,” Mrs. Scott calls up to my retreating back. “And…um…you can take the room across the hall.”

“Mom,” I hear Caroline say, and I’m glad my back is to them so they can’t see my grin.

While it’s ludicrous that at forty-one I’d be sleeping across the hall from my wife, the rules are heartwarming in a way.

Their insistence on following the rules they themselves grew up with makes me feel like I’m part of something—not just something, their family.

As I open my mouth to say it’s fine, Caroline’s voice rings out, “Mom, we’re still technically married. We never divorced.”

“I don’t see rings,” Mr. Scott says.

A touch of mirth coats his words, but nevertheless, when I reach the landing, I dutifully deposit Caroline’s suitcase in what was once her childhood bedroom.

The lavender walls and daisy curtains I remember from our engagement visit are gone, replaced by tasteful beige and navy.

Her collection of worn paperbacks and academic trophies, the physical evidence of who she was before me, is all packed away.

It strikes me how little I know about her formative years, how rarely I asked. Another failure to add to my list.

A creak on the stairs lets me know someone is coming.

“You know, they never come upstairs. This is just?—”

“Caroline, it’s fine.” I press my lips to her temple. “Your father’s right.” I lift her hand, my thumb brushing across her bare ring finger. The absence feels significant in a way it never has before.

“Do you still have your rings?” I ask quietly.

“Yes.” Her answer is immediate, certain.

I nod, studying her face. “I’ve never felt their absence quite so much.”

“Are you okay?” The concern in her eyes reminds me how perceptive she’s always been—perhaps why I fell into the habit of not speaking my thoughts. She seemed to understand without words.

I lift her hand and press a kiss to her ring finger. “One day,” I say, meaning it as both a question and a promise.

“My rings are in my jewelry box back home.”

“Mine is with my cufflinks in Colorado.”

“We can?—”

I stop her with a finger over her lips.

“We will. One day. I promised you we’ll take it day by day, and I intend to fulfill my promise.”

She flattens her fingers over my chest, smoothing the holiday plaid flannel shirt she picked for me to wear today.

“I thought, maybe, we could give your mom a call?” Caroline’s voice is gentle, tentative.

Something tightens in my chest. My mother. The woman I met for the first time just days ago, after a lifetime of believing she abandoned me.

“It’s Christmas,” she adds when I don’t immediately respond. “We can call her together.”

“She has her own family. I’m sure she's busy with them.” The excuse sounds hollow even to my ears.

“She’d love for us to call. I told her we might.”

“Caroline…” I start to protest, but those pleading blue eyes make resistance futile.

“We don’t have a relationship.” It’s the truth, but saying it aloud feels like admitting defeat.

“No, but that's the funny thing about relationships. They build over time. And they start with a conversation.” Her fingers brush my cheek. “She never stopped loving you, even when she couldn’t reach you.”

The words shouldn’t hit, but they do. I pull Caroline tight against me, grateful for her solidity while everything else in my world has shifted.

“You really want this, don’t you?”

She nods, with her upper teeth sinking into her lower lip. It’s a look I’ve never said no to.

“All right. Let’s do it.”

“Mom has a list of cookies we need to make to give to the neighbors. Why don’t we do that, and after we finish, we’ll call. I’ll text your mom to coordinate a time.”

“Okay. Make sure she doesn’t feel obligated. She shouldn’t miss out on time with her family.”

“Dorian. You’re her family, too. You’re her son. She loves you. And she always will.”

Man, saying it like that stirs emotions I’m too old to feel.

“We can call your dad, too.”

“Nah, we’ll see him on our way back.” I can’t stand the confusion he so often exhibits when we have a video call. Even though video calls were coming into use before he slowed his time at the office, he never warmed to them. And now, they just seem to increase his confusion.

“I didn’t ask…when you saw him in Colorado, how was he?”

“He misses Geoffrey. I think he keeps expecting him. But Dad’s doing okay. The staff is good with him. They’re good at redirecting him.”

“When we go back, do you think I can go through his files?”

“Of course. Whatever you want. These days, most everything is electronic, but Dad’s from a different generation. There’s no telling what you might find in his files.”

“That’s what I’m thinking.”

The authorities likely have access to all his electronic files, but my father has decades of paper files. She can dig as much as she likes. I won’t hide anything from my wife.

She links her fingers with mine.

“Are you ready to brave the parentals?” Caroline asks, squeezing my hand.

I smile at the term she’s always used. “Do you think our kids will refer to us as ‘the parentals’?”

“No. I mean, we wouldn’t force separate bedrooms?—”

“Who says? If we have a daughter, absolutely.”

She pinches my sides, and I twist away, laughing. “Ow!”

“We will treat any son or daughter equally.”

“Are you two coming down?” Anne calls from the base of the stairs.

I pull Caroline against me, pressing my forehead to hers. “You know, I never imagined having this again—family, holidays, a future worth planning for.”

Her eyes soften. “Is that what you want? A family?”

“With you? Yes.” I brush my thumb across her cheek. “Once we’ve found our way back to each other properly.”

She leans up and kisses me softly, but I don’t take the kiss deeper; instead, I call down to Caroline’s mother, “Yes, ma’am, we’re coming!”

But instead of moving, I hold Caroline a moment longer.

This house, with its Christmas lights and cookie-scented air, represents everything I missed growing up—and everything I nearly lost forever. But as Caroline leads me down the stairs, her hand warm in mine, I realize it’s not just her parents’ home we’re experiencing, but the promise of our own.

A home where promises will be kept. Where separate bedrooms are a quaint memory. Where perhaps someday, the patter of small feet will join ours on Christmas morning.

Not today, but someday. Day by day, just as we promised.

The End

Blind Prophet concludes the Arrow Tactical Series, but the spirit continues, with visits from the Arrow world, in The Sinful State Series.

The first book, Only the Wicked , releases September, 2025.

When the meek inherit the world, the wicked shall rule it.