Chapter 30
The sun hung low over High Peaks Lake, casting golden ribbons across the water as autumn leaves drifted down like confetti from the maple trees that lined the Sutherland property.
Noah made his way down the worn wooden steps to the dock, his shoulders heavy with the weight of a day that had started with hope and ended with gunfire in a hospital corridor.
He found Ethan sitting at the end of the dock, his feet dangling over the edge, earbuds trailing wires to the phone in his lap. He didn't notice his father's approach until Noah tapped him gently on the shoulder.
Ethan pulled out his earbuds and looked up with the guarded expression that had become his default whenever confronted by authority figures, even his own father.
"Where's your sister?" Noah asked, settling down beside his son on the sun-warmed planks.
"Celebrating, I guess."
"Yeah, I heard about the incident at the hospital." Noah studied his son's profile, noting the tension in his jaw, the way his hands fidgeted with the earbud cord. "Seems Mia got to solve her first case."
Noah sat down fully beside Ethan, brushing lint from his pants as he looked out over the lake.
The water reflected the dying light like hammered copper, and somewhere in the distance, a loon called across the water with its haunting voice.
This conversation was long overdue, perhaps years overdue, but the events of the past week had made delay impossible.
"How are things with you, Ethan?"
"Fine."
"You always say that, but really, how are you doing?"
"I just told you. I'm fine."
Noah nodded, recognizing the defensive walls his son had built around himself.
Without warning, he reached over and grabbed Ethan's wrist, pushing up the sleeve of his hoodie to reveal the network of cuts that crisscrossed his forearm—some old and silvered, others fresh enough to still carry the pink of recent healing.
"Get off," Ethan said, jerking his arm away.
"That doesn't look like fine to me."
Ethan's face flushed with anger and embarrassment. "She told you, didn't she?" He cursed under his breath and started to stand. "I'm going inside."
"Sit back down."
"Why? So we can have a heart-to-heart? So you can tell me how everything is going to be fine?
How life will just work things out?" Ethan's voice cracked with the emotion he'd been holding back.
"Well, let me save you that conversation.
It's all going to be fine, Dad. Fine, fine, fine!
Is that good enough? Did I put a big enough smile on my face? Satisfied?"
"Sit down, Ethan."
"No, I'm going inside."
"Sit down! Now!" Noah's voice carried across the water with enough authority to draw the attention of their neighbor Ed, who stepped out onto his porch to investigate.
"Everything okay down there?" Ed called.
Noah raised his thumb in acknowledgment. "Please, son," he said to Ethan, his voice gentler now. "Sit."
Ethan reluctantly lowered himself back onto the dock, his body language radiating resentment.
"I can't help you if you're not honest with me," Noah said.
"If I was honest with you, Dad, you wouldn't help me. You'd lock me up."
"What are you talking about?"
"You don't know the thoughts that go through my head. I'm not a good person."
"Of course you are. You're a Sutherland."
Ethan gave a mocking laugh that contained more bitterness than any teenager should possess. "Even you don't believe that."
Noah felt the weight of his words. There was truth in what Ethan said, painful truth that Noah had been avoiding for years.
At one time, the Sutherland name had been associated with morality, honesty, integrity—but over the years, that line had been muddied by town politics, rumors, and secrets.
His own father's legacy cast shadows that Noah had spent decades trying to escape.
"What's going on with you?" Noah asked, fighting to keep his voice level.
"That whole thing you did with Mia—tracking her, sending those messages—that's not you, Ethan.
I didn't raise you to be that way. And don't tell me it's because you were scared for Mia's life.
Those messages you sent were designed to inject fear. So what is it? Jealousy?"
"No," Ethan shot back, the speed and force of his denial revealing how close to the mark Noah had come.
"Then give me something. Because right now I'm—"
"Disappointed?" Ethan asked, expecting a challenge.
"No. Confused." Noah paused, choosing his words carefully. "Look, Ethan, I know the loss of your mother has affected you."
"You haven't got a clue how it has."
Noah stared back at him. "No. You're right.
I don't fully know, but unless you talk to me about it, how can I?
I barely get two words out of you at night.
You come in from school, mumble a few words, and go to your room.
We used to hang out on weekends. You don't do that anymore.
And before you say I work too much—you know the situation.
I do my best. The job requires me to be available. "
"Sure it does."
The retort caught Noah off guard. "What does that mean?"
"You used to have time for us when you didn't live here.
Since you've moved back to High Peaks, everything is Luther Ashford, crime, work, that next case.
Even when you aren't working, you're working.
I see you looking at case files on your phone.
You say you're nothing like Grandfather, but you are him, and more. "
The words stung because they carried truth.
Noah's desire to create distance between himself and Hugh had been something he'd worked hard at, even choosing to join the State Police instead of the Sheriff's Office.
But perhaps geography and agency affiliation weren't enough to escape the patterns that had defined the Sutherland men for generations.
"It's like you don't see us anymore," Ethan continued, his voice gaining momentum as years of frustration poured out.
"And if you do, it's through the eyes of fear.
Fear that we might make the wrong friends, fear that we might die at the hands of one of Luther's cronies.
I feel smothered. I know Mia does too. She just acts like she's not.
She pretends she's grown out of that phase, but even this—even this case—this was her way of trying to be closer to you.
More like you. To be accepted by you. And you don't even see it. "
Noah felt each word like a punch to the gut. "And where does that leave you?"
Ethan shrugged. "I don't care, and maybe that's what bothers you.
At least with Mia, you have a sense she's heading in a direction that's familiar to you.
Like it or not, you understand that world.
But me?" Ethan's voice filled with disdain.
"I will never work in law enforcement. Never.
I've seen how it poisons everything it touches. "
Noah forced himself to remain silent as Ethan unleashed years of pent-up anger and frustration, blaming anyone and everything within reach. The dock creaked gently beneath them as waves lapped against the support posts, the only sound interrupting the torrent of emotion flowing from his son.
When Ethan finally ran out of words, exhausted by his own outburst, Noah waited a moment before speaking.
"You feel better now?"
"You'd like that, wouldn't you? For me to tell you that I'm good.
Then you can get back to doing what you need to, what you want to.
Then I'm just one less distraction in your world.
One less headache. Well, you don't have to worry about me, Dad.
I'm just going to keep on doing my thing, just as everyone does theirs. "
"And what does that involve? Cutting yourself?"
"If need be."
Noah shook his head, feeling the full weight of his failures as a father.
Despite all his training as a cop, when it came to his kids, he was at a complete loss.
Lena had been better at this, she'd known what to say, how to soothe them, how to get them back on track.
But him? He was damned if he did and damned if he didn't. If he tried to tell them what to do, he was overbearing.
If he said nothing, he was ignoring them.
If parenting was a balancing act, he'd fallen off more times than he could count.
"I don't know what to say, son, or if I should say anything at all. I just want you to know that I love you. I always have. I always will. I only want the best for both of you. That means, whether you go into law enforcement or not, I’m still proud of you.
What matters is that you know that no matter what you do or don't do, you are worthy.
Not because I say so, not because of anything required, simply because you exist."
He paused, watching a leaf spiral down from the maple tree above them to land on the water's surface.
"You know, I never told you this, but when you were born, I told your mother that I hoped neither of you went into law enforcement.
Not because I feared for your lives—though I wouldn't be much of a father if I said I don't worry.
But because more than anything, I wanted you to find your own way, your own thing, that thing that brings you alive.
Not what I want. I grew up under that pressure with your grandfather.
I know what it feels like. I've done my best to steer you both away from it, to ask you what you love.
And maybe I haven't always been there. I'll take responsibility for that.
But my absence doesn't mean I love you any less. "
Noah reached for Ethan's shoulder, but his son pulled away, creating physical distance to match the emotional chasm between them.
"You've never asked me what I love."
"No? I thought I had."
"Maybe when I was six. I'm seventeen now."
"Right you are." Noah smiled, feeling a crack in the wall between them. "So what do you love?"
"Technology."
"Ah. Okay. You know, Rishi could—"