Chapter 33
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
MATEO
“Daddy! No!” Allie kicked and screamed.
“Mom,” I hollered.
She already had her arms outstretched to take Allie. “I’ve got her.”
I handed off my daughter, then tore off after Vera, but in my soaked flip-flops, I’d never catch her. So I kicked off the sandals and bolted for my tent, snagging the tennis shoes I’d had on earlier. By the time I had them on, Vera was nowhere in sight. “Fuck.”
But Vance was chasing after her. I’d caught sight of him before he’d disappeared past a cluster of trees. Foster, Jasper and Dad were hot on his heels. Griffin and Knox, who hadn’t stopped to change their shoes, joined the chase.
I outran them all, passing them without a word as I sprinted to find her.
When I caught up to Vance, my lungs and legs burning, he just pointed ahead to where a flash of red-orange streaked in the distance.
“Vera!”
She ignored my shout and kept running, faster than I’d ever seen her move. Like if she were quick enough, she could escape the past.
She ran.
I let her run.
But she was done running alone.
I pushed my body harder, faster, and when I finally caught up, I didn’t stop her. Every fiber of my being wanted to grab her and put this to an end. Except she wasn’t done yet. She needed to keep going.
So I settled in behind her, keeping pace.
She ran.
And I followed.
By the time her strides slowed, I was sweating and breathless. Her run became a jog, then a walk. Then she buried her face in her hands and the wail that escaped her palms tore through my heart.
“Peach.” I wrapped her up, hauling her into my chest.
“Let me go.” A sob broke from her mouth as she tried to wrench her body free.
I held on tighter. “I love you.”
She fought me again, squirming and jerking, trying to wiggle loose. She could fight all she wanted.
I wasn’t letting her go.
“I got you.”
Her shoulders began to shake and the protest leeched from her body.
“I love you.” Nothing else mattered. On the hardest days of her life, I’d be here to remind her that I loved her.
“Mateo.” Another sob cracked clear, then she sagged against me.
“I’m here. I’m not letting go.”
“It hurts.” She sobbed without stopping this time, the cries cleaving me in pieces.
“I know, darlin’.” I held her tighter, a lump forming in my throat. Her pain. My pain.
“It’s open.”
“What’s open?”
She cried harder. “The box. It’s open and it hurts.”
Oh, God. This was killing her. For too long, she’d kept it all locked up. “Let it out.”
“I c-can’t.”
“Yes, you can.” I buried my nose in her hair. “Give it to me.”
“She killed them.” Her entire body went slack, so I turned her in my arms and cradled her against my shoulder as we dropped to our knees. “She killed them. Hadley and Elsie. She killed my sisters. She tried to kill me.”
Her mother.
It was what I’d assumed, but to hear it from her lips was like having a whip slice into my bare back, cutting to the bone.
Was this the first time she’d spoken the truth? She’d never told anyone that before, had she? She’d just locked it away. She’d run from the truth.
Pain, rage, lit my blood into a wildfire, but I didn’t so much as move. I kept my arms locked around Vera, knowing we hadn’t even started yet.
It took her a while to stop crying. The forest moved around us, oblivious to the magnitude of this moment. Birds flew and chirped. Trees swayed and pine cones clacked against branches as they fell.
And I just held Vera, feeling eyes on my back.
Dad. My brothers. They wouldn’t approach. They’d keep their distance and give us this moment. But they were close, ready to help me pick her up when the time came.
“I was on the swim team,” Vera whispered with a hitch. “I was a good swimmer. We lived on a lake. I loved to swim. We had a boat. Dad taught us to waterski. And he’d take us to a quiet spot so we could jump in and swim.”
The lake. That was the trigger. She’d seen Allie in the lake.
A lake, like the one where she’d lived. Where her sisters had drowned.
Fuck. Why hadn’t I thought of that?
“I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry, Vera. I shouldn’t have brought you here.” I should have taken one look at that lake when we’d arrived this morning and turned this camping trip around.
She nuzzled deeper, like if she crawled into my chest, that would make it all go away.
If I could take it from her, I would in a blink.
“She was acting strange when we got home from school that day.”
She. Not Mom. She.
“I’ve never seen anyone high like that. I didn’t hang out with the kids who smoked pot but I’d seen them high before.
This was different. Not just from weed. And it was more than just being drunk, but I wasn’t sure.
I didn’t drink. Ever. Not just because Dad was a cop and he taught us about being responsible, but because I didn’t like getting in trouble. ”
A good girl. My good girl.
I hated her mother for putting her through this. I hated her father for letting this fester. Six fucking years this had lived inside her and she’d dealt with it all on her own.
“She was drinking wine.” Vera shuddered as more wounds ripped open.
“At four o’clock in the afternoon. I thought she was just drunk.
She didn’t drink like that. At least not normally.
But there’d been something wrong with her.
Twice I’d come home and she was drunk. Not slurring or out of it, but almost .
. . hungover. I tried to hide it from Hadley and Elsie. ”
Maybe her mother had started drinking the minute her kids had left for school. And sobered up by the time they’d made it home. Or by the time Cormac, an adult who knew what drunk and high looked like, had made it home.
“I didn’t tell Dad.” Her voice cracked. “Why didn’t I tell Dad?”
The guilt that came with that question was about as hard to stomach as her pain. “This isn’t your fault.”
“I should have told him. Before.”
Before her mother attempted murder.
“Dad was at some coaches meeting at the school,” she said. “Concussion training, I think, for the volunteers. She was acting off, so I told Hadley and Elsie to go upstairs and do their homework until he got home. There was a thunderstorm. It was loud and the rain was hard.”
I was right. That was why she’d gotten scared the night of the storm weeks ago. Because there’d been a storm that night.
“She got frantic. Every time there was thunder, she’d pull at her hair and start talking to herself.
It scared me. Every time I tried to talk to her, calm her down, she’d look at me like I was a stranger.
She didn’t have a clue that I was her daughter.
I was about to call Dad and have him come home but then she screamed.
She screamed so loud, Mateo. I had to cover my ears. ”
Fucking hell. Her mother had gone off the deep end, and she’d had to witness it all.
“She ran outside. Right into the storm. It was still early. Gray. The storm blocked out the sun but it wasn’t dark yet. She ran for the dock and climbed on the boat, untying it before I could stop her. I tried to get her to stop. We all did.”
Vera’s body began to tremble and she burrowed deeper.
I stroked her hair, holding her so impossibly tight that my muscles locked in place. They’d be stiff when I finally let go.
“I wish I could go back to that moment.” A fresh wave of tears soaked my skin. “I would do anything to keep my sisters off that boat.”
“I’m sorry,” I murmured.
“She took off. Drove away from the dock so fast it threw me to the floor. Elsie almost tipped over the edge but Hadley caught her. The waves were . . . impossible. The water just kept coming into the boat, crashing over the hull, and she was out of control, going faster and swerving in all directions. I finally managed to get to my feet and pull her away from the steering wheel. I was going to drive us home but then she said something about swimming lessons. I didn’t understand. ”
Vera pulled away from my chest, staring up at me with so much regret in those beautiful eyes I wanted to scream.
It wasn’t fair that she’d endured this. It wasn’t fucking fair.
“Swimming lessons?”
She nodded, her chin quivering. “She took Hadley’s arm and pushed her to the edge of the boat. A wave rocked us hard and then my sister was just . . . gone.”
I closed my eyes. “Christ.”
“I dove in after her, and it was so cold. It made it hard to breathe and took me a minute to snap out of it. But I swam for Hadley as fast as I could, trying to keep my head above the waves. They were too big. It was too cold. I turned back to look at the boat and Elsie was gone. I was going to swim back and find her too but she drove away. She . . . left us.” Her face crumpled. “She left us.”
Sitting on my lap, cradled in my arms, Vera broke to pieces.
The sobs that wracked her chest shook her entire body. They were endless. Each time I thought they’d stop, a fresh wave would hit and start the anguish anew.
Was that how it had been that night? Wave after wave slamming her toward the depths.
“I lost them,” she cried, clinging to me. “I lost them, Mateo. I couldn’t find Hadley. I tried to find Elsie but she was gone. I lost them.”
“This is not on you, Vera.”
“I should have found them. I was their big sister. I was on the swim team. I should have saved them.”
“Look at me.” I took her face, pulling it away from my shoulder. “You did not lose them.”
She squeezed her eyes shut. “I left them. I thought they’d swim for home, so when I couldn’t see them, that’s what I did. I kicked off my shoes because it’s hard to swim in shoes. They probably didn’t think to take off their shoes, did they?”
“I don’t know, darlin’.” I kissed her forehead, catching tears with my thumbs.
Fuck you, Norah Gallagher. For what she’d done to her daughter, I hoped that woman had landed in an especially hot corner of hell.
“I thought I’d find them.” Vera’s breath hitched. “I stayed on the dock for hours, letting it rain and waiting for them to make it. The boat was gone. I thought she might have sunk it. I wanted her to sink it.”