Chapter 43 Isobel
Isobel
Isobel found Dane sitting on the steps of the front porch, staring blankly at the long, empty street. Dad was in the bathroom, taking a shower, having already wolfed down the first of the two cheeseburgers she’d gotten him.
Isobel stepped out onto the porch. “Hey, Charming,” she said softly.
He didn’t look back, but the curve of his spine straightened a little as Isobel gingerly sat on the porch step beside him.
She’d made a mental log over the years of the emotions he kept under lock and key, but this expression was a stranger to her, new and raw and more than a little bit lost.
“I really wanted to believe he’d changed,” Dane finally said, the words coming out flat. “I thought he could, Isobel. Even after… everything.” He drew in a long, heavy breath. When he let it out, Isobel set a hand on his knee.
“You’ve given him every chance,” she said just as softly.
Dane hung his head, deflated. Gone was the authoritative lawman who’d kept order and clarity moving as they coordinated the search for Eva and Arthur, and in his place was a very tired, and very worried, older brother.
“Do you think Lenny’s alive?”
Isobel chewed her bottom lip. She knew why he was asking, after what had happened to Avi. There was a mystery hidden in those woods. Maybe her father had been right about ancient places creating unusual things.
“I hope he is,” she said honestly.
Dane nodded at his shoes a moment, then covered her hand on his knee with one of his own. There was a small cut on his arm. Isobel’s focus contracted on the smudge of red-green, long dried now.
“Jack gave me that tea a month after what happened,” Dane said. “I told him I was having chest pains. You know how he is with herbs. I thought he could suggest something. But I never thought… All this, it’s unbelievable, Isobel.” He turned to look at her.
“I know.” Turning her hand over, she clasped his hand with her own, heart in her throat. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.”
“Why didn’t you?”
The simple, earnest question could have been a cut thread between them. Instead, the way he’d said it felt like a lifeline.
Dane Walker was one of her oldest friends, and time and time again, he’d shown Isobel that he could adapt to remarkable truths about her family. He and June had been there for every major milestone since Isobel was young. It was always the three of them.
“I didn’t want to lose you too,” she said, looking away. “And that is selfish.”
The silence stretched between them as Dane sat without answering, simply considering. Finally, he spoke. “I should have done more for your sister.”
Isobel’s eyebrows arched in surprise.
“I was so desperate to see the best in my brother, I refused to see anything wrong. I didn’t want to accept the truth.”
Isobel knew the texture of remorse. Her own regrets were like an itch she could never fully scratch, especially when it concerned Eva.
“No more secrets.” The words were out before Isobel could fully plan what she wanted to say. But this felt right. “No more lies.”
She didn’t miss the flash of relief in Dane’s eyes. He turned to face her. “No more lies.”
Isobel arched an eyebrow. “And?”
“Well, I do have one more secret, actually.” Dane reached into his pocket and drew something out, pressing it firmly into her palm. The ring was a simple band of gold, warmed by his touch.
“What are you doing?” Isobel croaked out.
“I’ve been carrying this around for months,” Dane said, his eyes soft and hopeful.
The words struck her like a bell, leaving her ringing.
He sandwiched her hand in both of his. “I love how much you care, Isobel, and how hard you fight for the people you love. You are the most extraordinary person I know.” A smile pulled up the corners of his mouth.
“You are already my family, but I want—I hope—that you will let me be even more. That you will let me be yours.”
It was getting more difficult to keep the moisture out of her eyes. “Are you…?” She could hardly get the words out, but Dane must have heard the nervous catch in her voice, because he tilted her chin up and kissed her softly, just once.
“Proposing?” he asked, his voice deepening in a way that sent a pleasant shiver over Isobel’s skin. When she nodded, he shook his head. “Not yet.”
It wasn’t fair that she could feel both disappointment and relief at once.
“I want to, love.” Dane laid another, longer kiss on one side of her mouth. “I want it all. To go to bed with you”—he kissed the other side—“and to wake up together. I want to bear your burdens, to love those you love and protect them as my own.”
A tear slipped from the corner of Isobel’s eye. It was so rare for her to cry.
“I want my daughter to know how wildly obsessed with her you are,” Dane said, his tone changing to something more playful. “Did you know Esther thinks the tooth fairy stocks our cookie jar with honey sticks?”
Isobel let out a weak laugh. “I love her.” The words came surprisingly easily. They’d been living inside her for ages, unsaid.
“She’s a good kid,” Dane said softly, as though he knew the ache in Isobel’s chest.
“The best.”
Dane ran his thumb over the line of her jaw, slowly taking in every inch of her face. “I’m not asking yet, Isobel, because I want you to be ready. To be sure. But this”—he smiled as he slid his hand back into her hair, anchoring her—“is where I hope we land.”
The sudden roll of tires over gravel drew both of their attention to the black car sliding into the drive. Isobel shoved to her feet, Dane’s words ringing in her ears, her heart soft and pliant.
All thoughts of proposals and futures dissipated, however, at the sight of the driver. A pair of thick dark sunglasses helped conceal June’s expression from where she sat behind the wheel.
Heat stung Isobel’s cheeks.
Esther threw her door open and came barreling toward them. “Hi, Dad! Bye, Dad!” she called out as she rushed up the steps.
“What’s she after?” Dane grunted.
“Popsicle,” June said coolly.
Dane shot Isobel a quick look and rose to his feet. “Better monitor that,” he said, following his daughter inside and leaving Isobel and June alone.
Awkwardness thickened between them, made worse when Isobel realized she still had Dane’s ring trapped in her fist.
“Didn’t know you’d be here,” June said.
Isobel nodded, not sure what else to do.
But when June turned back to the car, that steady ache opened up in her chest again.
Maybe Arthur had awakened something in her with his return, because suddenly the years of estrangement between Isobel and her former friend seemed like such a waste, and that gave her courage.
“June, wait,” she called, feeling uncharacteristically nervous. There weren’t many people who could make her shrink. June certainly didn’t try. She was calm, if cold. “Please,” Isobel said.
“What is it?”
June’s hesitation made all the old, comforting memories they shared rise to the surface. Isobel wanted to confide in June, to spill her every thought and worry. She wanted to tell June she was sorry, that she was confused, that she was very afraid June hated her now.
Instead, what came out was “Are you free tomorrow?”
June blinked. “What?”
“I was just thinking, maybe I could buy you a coffee?” The second the words were out, a wave of insecurity washed over Isobel. “We can catch up,” she offered weakly.
“Catch up?”
“Only if you aren’t busy,” Isobel blurted. “It’s just that it’s been a long time, and I…” Oh, this was mortifying. Was this how Eva felt in social situations? “I miss you, Junie.”
As June’s eyes strayed to the farmhouse, Isobel held her breath, feeling oddly similar to how she’d felt the first time she’d asked a girl on a date.
Only this was June, who’d always been a fixture in her life.
Isobel wanted to believe that a bond like that, though wounded, could be healed with time.
When Esther’s giggle filtered through the walls, June’s expression softened into something more bittersweet. “Nine o’clock,” she said. “And you’re buying me breakfast too.”
“Done,” Isobel breathed.
An odd feeling collected in her chest as she watched June get into the car, adjust her sunglasses, and drive away.
Inside, Esther had removed her backpack—a spotted pink-and-white bag with unicorn pins pushed into the vinyl—and was seated beside her father, licking an ice pop. Strawberry juice stained the corners of her mouth. Dane held a matching ice pop, his sleeves uncuffed and pushed to his elbows.
At first, neither father nor daughter saw her. Isobel tucked the ring into her pocket and knocked softly, trying not to feel like an intruder. Dane waved her in with a smile.
“Daddy says you can choose any flavor you want.”
Isobel bent to ruffle the little girl’s hair. “Do you have any green ones?”
“No. Only strawberry left,” Esther chirped. “We have ice cream too, but we can’t eat it yet.”
Dane and Isobel shared a look of amusement. “A strawberry pop sounds perfect.” Isobel opened the freezer and dug one out. “What have the two of you got planned next?” she asked, her eyes on Esther, though she felt Dane’s curious study of her face. A warmth spread where his gaze touched her skin.
Esther wiggled in her chair. “Pear time!”
“Oh?” Isobel asked, bemused.
“The storm knocked some of the harvest off the branches,” Dane explained. “They’ll be too bruised to sell fresh, but we can freeze some and make jam with the rest.”
Isobel could still remember stirring a mixture of pears and sugar on jam-making days with her mother.
It was those little memories she’d clung to most as time went by and other details of her childhood faded away.
It put an ache in Isobel’s chest now, and she almost drew away, tempted to let Dane and Esther work alone.
Though small, their family was as full of love as the one she’d grown up with.
Isobel didn’t want to insert herself where she didn’t belong, or to complicate things for Esther.
Dane’s words resurfaced in her mind, a balm for worry. You are already my family.
Gathering her courage, Isobel offered the two of them a hesitant smile. “Mind if I join you?”