Chapter Fifty-Four
Brady
The helicopter skimmed over the ridge while six people pretended not to be nervous.
Bella had a notebook open on her lap, because apparently even mountain oracles required an agenda. Her pen hovered above the page, ready to organize whatever disaster waited for us into neat bullet points.
Drew sat beside her, staring through the window at the trees rushing past below.
Across from them, Nora held Evan’s hand tightly enough to prove she did not trust either the seat belt or modern medicine to keep him safe.
Elise shifted closer to me on the leather seat. I gave her a smile that admitted I was nervous too.
Stacked behind us were enough supplies to survive a long winter or bribe one extremely stubborn woman.
Mabel had packed flour, sugar, coffee, salt, rice, matches, blankets, batteries, and animal feed into wooden crates and canvas sacks.
She had inspected every item herself, rejecting anything she believed Evie would consider wasteful.
Bella had taken one look at the pile outside Cookies and Coffee that morning and said, “We are officially attempting to bribe a mountain oracle with pantry goods.”
Drew had lifted one of the crates. “More useful than gold in the woods.”
Evan had laughed. Bella had not.
The helicopter tilted toward the small clearing beside Evie’s cabin. The crates rattled against their straps.
Nora glanced toward the sound. “Do we lead with the supplies?”
“We lead with an apology,” Bella said, her executive voice locking into place.
“We lead with kindness and honesty,” I suggested.
Elise nodded. “Your superpowers.”
“My something.”
That earned a small smile.
The skids touched down in a storm of dirt, pine needles, and flattened grass. Evie’s cabin sat at the edge of the timber line, built from weathered gray wood with a narrow porch and smoke rising from the chimney.
“It’s isolated,” Elise said once we were clear of the blades.
“That’s why she chose it.”
“Do you think she’s happy here?”
“No way to know. I hope she likes salt.”
Elise looked at me. “You have a thing for rocks.”
“Is salt a rock? Or like sand? What is rock salt?”
“Brady, focus.”
The pilot helped unload the supplies. Drew and I each took a crate. Evan reached for one of the canvas sacks.
Nora stopped him with a look.
“I am capable of carrying a bag,” he said.
“You are currently only cleared to carry yourself.”
“I’m feeling better.”
“Excellent. Continue doing that without lifting anything.”
Bella glanced between them. “Don’t make me turn this helicopter around.”
Evan looked at the helicopter, then at her. “I’m not sure that threat works after we’ve landed.”
“It works emotionally.”
His mouth twitched. “Fair.”
We approached the porch in a loose line, none of us sure whether we should knock or call out.
We never got the chance.
The front door opened. Evie Thorne stood in the shadowed doorway wearing an oversized gray cardigan and an expression that suggested she had already found us exhausting.
“I explicitly told you not to come back.”
Bella stopped at the bottom of the porch steps. “Please. We need your help.”
“No.”
Evie started to close the door.
“Wait,” I said.
She stopped, although nothing in her face suggested willingness.
“I found Thomas Steele.” I lifted Elise’s hand between us. “This is his daughter.”
Evie looked at Elise, then at me. Her expression somehow became more annoyed.
Drew lowered his crate to the ground. “We brought supplies.”
“We brought a gift,” I corrected. “Whether you talk to us or not.”
Evie’s gaze moved to the crates.
“Mabel made the list,” Drew added.
That held her attention.
I stepped closer to the porch. “Your advice brought the woman I love into my life.”
“All I gave you was a name.”
“That was enough,” Elise said. “It changed my life for the better.”
Evie studied her. For a moment, something shifted behind her eyes. Then it vanished.
Nora stepped forward, still holding Evan’s hand. “We wouldn’t be here if we didn’t need you.”
“No one needs me.”
The bitterness in her voice quieted all of us.
Her gaze moved down the line until it reached Evan. She stared at his fading bruises and the careful way he held himself.
“You look like you’re in pain.”
“I’m recovering,” Evan said.
Her mouth tightened.
“Please help us,” Nora said.
“There is nothing here for you.”
“You’re wrong. You know things about my mother. About our families. All we want is to understand what’s happening.”
Evie’s hand remained on the door.
“Someone tried to kill Evan,” Elise said.
No one softened the words. No one needed to.
Evie looked at Evan again.
I set down my bag and stepped onto the first step.
“This isn’t about getting our parents to like each other anymore.
Someone nearly killed my brother. There is a powerful man named Dominic Corisi who is somehow involved.
He helped us find Evan, but even he can’t find out who’s responsible.
Someone is coming for our family and we’re scared. ”
Evie turned away. For a few seconds, she stood with her back to us. When she faced us again, her shoulders had dropped.
“When will this end?” she whispered. The question did not sound as though it was meant for us.
I moved one step closer. “Are you afraid to tell us?”
A sharp laugh escaped her. “Why would I fear anything? I have nothing left to lose.”
The words settled heavily in the clearing. I wanted to argue. I didn’t.
“What do you need?” I asked instead. “What can we do?”
Evie covered her face briefly with one hand, then looked past me toward the crates.
“You brought flour.”
Bella blinked at the sudden change. “Yes. Two bags.”
“Coffee?”
“Mabel packed the good roast.”
“Salt?”
“Two boxes,” Drew said.
“Batteries?”
“Three sizes.”
Evie looked increasingly irritated by how thoroughly Mabel had anticipated her needs. “Mabel Weaver,” she muttered.
“She took the assignment seriously,” I said.
“Of course she did.”
Her eyes moved across the supplies one more time. Then she looked at us.
“I never asked for any of this.”
“We know,” I said.
“I’ll do it,” she said. “Not for you.”
No one moved.
“For Celia.”
The name changed the air.
Evie stepped onto the porch. “Bring me your fathers.”
For a moment, I thought I had misunderstood her.
“All three of them,” she added.
Bella shifted beside Drew. “Here?”
“Yes.”
Drew frowned. “They’ll never agree to that.”
Evie gave him a flat look. “Then you’ll never have your answers.”
Evan cleared his throat. “You could tell us what you know.”
“If I had a complete answer, I would give it to you just to make you leave.”
That sounded more like her.
“I know what I saw,” she continued. “I know what people told me. I know what each of those men believed. But belief and truth are not always the same thing. I need all three of them standing in front of me before I decide which is which.”
Bella stared at her. “You want to question them together.”
“I want to watch them hear the same words.”
She didn’t only want answers. She wanted witnesses.
“And if they refuse?” Drew asked.
“Then go home and continue guessing.”
“You’re asking for the impossible,” Bella said.
“Am I?”
She looked at the six of us as if our fathers’ stubbornness was our personal failure.
“We’ll make it happen,” I said.
Every face turned toward me.
Evie studied me. “Tomorrow.”
Bella’s eyes widened. “Tomorrow?”
“I will not spend another week waiting for three stubborn men to decide whether the truth is convenient.” Evie touched one hand to her chest. “It isn’t good for my heart.”
“Tomorrow,” I promised.
“Four o’clock.”
“Four.”
She glanced at the crates near our feet. “Leave those beside the door.” Then she looked directly at me. “And leave me.”
The door shut.
For several seconds, no one spoke. Wind moved through the pines.
Drew bent and picked up his crate. “Well.”
Bella stared at the closed door. “I preferred it when the impossible task was getting her to talk.”
We carried the supplies onto the porch and stacked them neatly beside the entrance. No one suggested knocking again.
The moment the helicopter door closed behind us, Bella looked around the cabin. “We are not lying to our parents.”
No one answered.
The helicopter lifted from the clearing. Below us, Evie’s cabin grew smaller between the trees.
Drew rubbed the back of his neck. “Then we should begin by defining lying.”
“Deliberately communicating something untrue,” Elise said.
Bella looked at her. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
Evan leaned back carefully in his seat. “We don’t have many options.”
Nora looked pale. “Dad won’t come if he knows Gabe will be there.”
“Neither will Dad,” Bella said.
“My father will not voluntarily enter a remote location with either of them,” Elise added.
Drew looked around at us. “So the straightforward invitation is dead.”
“It was never alive,” Evan said.
I glanced at Elise. She was turning the turquoise necklace at her throat between her fingers.
“We divide the fathers,” I said. “Bella, Evan, and I handle Dad. Drew and Nora handle Cody. Elise handles Thomas.”
Bella’s eyes narrowed. “How do you plan to get Dad into a helicopter without telling him where we’re going?”
“Carefully.”
“That is not a plan.”
“It’s the beginning of one.”
Nora stared out the window. “Dad will come if I tell him I need him.”
Drew looked at her. “You shouldn’t have to use that.”
“I do need him. I need him to hear whatever Evie has to say. I need this to stop.”
Drew’s expression softened. “Then we tell him you need to speak with him privately. Somewhere away from Gabe. That will get him there.”
Bella looked at Evan and me. “Dad moves when the three of us agree on something.”
“Rare but powerful,” Evan said.
“We tell him we need his help,” I said. “That Evan’s attack may be connected to something from the past and there’s someone he needs to speak with. We don’t mention Cody or Thomas.”
“Technically accurate,” Elise noted.
Bella pointed at her. “That phrase is going to become a problem.”
“It has been useful so far.”
Evan looked at Elise. “What gets Thomas here?”
Her fingers stilled on the necklace. “I ask him.”
Bella studied her. “That’s all?”
“Yes. Even if he knows you’re in Firebrook Valley?”
Elise nodded. “Whatever else my father has done wrong, he has never failed to come when I needed him.”
“What will you tell him?” Drew asked.
“That I need to speak with him in person. Somewhere private.”
“That isn’t a lie,” I said.
“It technically is since I won’t be the one he’s talking to, but we do have a lot we need to discuss, so that part is valid.” Her gaze dropped.
“It isn’t clean,” I said. “But this is our one chance.”
Bella exhaled. “So the strategy is emotional manipulation, strategic omission, and technically accurate statements.”
“I could throw in baked goods?” I offered.
“No,” everyone said.
I leaned back in my seat. “Just checking.”
Nora almost smiled.
Drew looked around at us. “We need them to arrive at the same time. If one sees the others first, we may lose all three.”
“Four o’clock,” Nora said. “No early arrivals.”
“We’ll get our father here,” Bella said.
“We will as well,” Drew countered.
“I’ll stress timing being imperative,” Elise said. “That might work.”
Nora looked at all of us. “What if we get them there and it changes nothing?”
No one had an answer.
Outside the window, the mountains rolled away beneath us.
“We’re not going there to heal them,” Elise said finally. “We’re going there to make them face the same truth at the same time and hopefully learn something.”
Drew nodded slowly.
“It can’t be one of them,” Bella added.
“We’ll soon know,” Evan said.
I looked around at my brother, my sister, Nora, Drew, and Elise.
For thirty years, our fathers had decided what their children were allowed to know.
Tomorrow, we were taking that decision away from them.