Chapter 8 The Confession
The Confession
Maren
* * *
Yes.
The word hangs in the air between us, sharp and final. He saw my call. He saw my name while I was locked in that room, listening to strangers tear apart our bedroom.
He saw it, and he didn't answer.
I thought I'd scream if he admitted it. Now I can't seem to raise my voice. I'm wrung out, emptied, sitting at my kitchen table in pajamas with my mother-in-law's arm around my shoulders and my husband standing three feet away looking like I've gutted him.
Good. He should look gutted. He should feel exactly one-tenth of what I felt in that safe room.
"I need to tell you where I was." Jackson's voice cracks on the last word. He's still standing, hasn't tried to sit down, hasn't tried to touch me again. "I need you to know."
I want him to say no. Even now, I want to be wrong about this. "Were you with Shay?"
He looks down at the table instead of answering me immediately. "We were at Riley's Bar. She called about her ex, said he showed up at her cousin's place in Cheyenne, and she was scared, and I thought..."
I look at his clean shirt. Mine smells of sweat and the stale air in that room. "You thought you'd go comfort her."
"The crew was at the east property. You were reading.
I thought it would be fine, just one drink, I'd still be home when I said.
" He runs his hand through his hair, a gesture I've seen a thousand times, and right now it makes me want to throw something.
"And then you called, and I saw your name, and I thought... "
I say it for him because I can't bear watching him search for a kinder way to put it. "You thought I was calling to yell at you for being with Shay."
He answers so quietly I almost ask him to repeat it. I don't need to hear it again. "Yes."
Delilah makes a sound beside me, low and disgusted. She doesn't say anything, doesn't need to. Her silence is louder than shouting.
"Nothing happened with her." Jackson takes a step closer, then stops when I don't move. "Nothing has ever happened. I swear to God, Maren, I would never..."
"I was in the safe room, Jackson." My voice comes out steady, which surprises me. I want him to hear every word. "I was sitting on the floor listening to men tear apart our bedroom. And you didn't answer because you assumed I wanted to nag you about your childhood friend."
He tries to answer, but stops without getting a word out. I watch him absorb it, watch the realization settle into his face, and I don't feel any satisfaction. I just feel tired.
He starts toward me and stops when I draw my chair closer to Delilah. "Maren..."
I watch him as I say it. This time he is going to hear me. "Shay is off ranch property by sunrise."
His gaze shifts toward his mother, then back to me. "What?"
"You heard me." I set down the tea I haven't touched.
My hands aren't shaking anymore. Something has gone cold and clear inside me, the part that survived tonight, the part that called 911 and gave the address and stayed on the line until help arrived.
"I don't care where she goes. I don't care how you explain it.
I won't share my home with her after this. "
"That's not fair." The words come out before he can stop them, and I watch him realize what he's said. "I didn't mean that."
"Fair?" The laugh that escapes me sounds nothing like me.
"I just sat in a steel box wondering if I was going to survive the night.
And the whole time, my husband was at a bar with the woman who's been undermining me for weeks, ignoring my calls because he thought I wanted to fight about her. Tell me more about fair."
Jackson opens his mouth, closes it. He looks at his mother like he's hoping for backup, but Delilah just shakes her head.
Delilah keeps her arm around me. She gives him no shelter from the question. "Don't look at me, son. This is your mess to fix."
He sounds younger for a moment, and I hate that it still makes me ache for him. "Mom..."
"I've watched this girl bend over backward to make room for your friend.
I've watched her bite her tongue at my table while that woman insulted her.
And tonight, while she was in danger, you were exactly where Maren was worried you'd be.
" Delilah's voice is calm, but there's steel underneath it.
"You wanted her to trust you again. She told me you finally stood up for her at the committee meeting.
She sounded happy, Jackson. Is this what you did with that? "
Jackson's shoulders drop. He looks older than he did an hour ago, older and smaller, like the weight of what he's done is physically pressing him down.
I can't comfort him. I know that look on his face, but I have nothing to give him tonight.
Five years of marriage, seven years together, all those memories of who we used to be before Shay came back and everything went sideways.
But right now all I can see is my phone screen showing his name, showing the call going to voicemail, showing me exactly where I ranked on his list of priorities.
"Shay will be gone by sunrise." His voice is quiet. Defeated. "I'll tell her tonight."
I let go of the cup. I don't thank him for agreeing to something that should have been obvious. "Good."
Deputy Ellis appears in the kitchen doorway. "Mrs. Wilder? We're finished processing the bedroom. You're clear to collect anything you need for tonight."
I stand up, and Delilah rises with me, her hand steady on my elbow. Jackson moves like he's going to follow, but his mother stops him with a look.
Delilah turns toward her son before he can get between me and the stairs. "Stay here."
He looks past his mother toward me, as though I might overrule her. "Mom, I should..."
Delilah holds her son back with a hand on his arm while I pass. "You should give her space."
I don't wait to hear what he says. I walk past him, through the living room where crime scene tape marks the broken window, up the hardwood stairs, keeping clear of the marks the deputies are photographing.
My bedroom looks like a tornado hit it. Drawers pulled out, clothes scattered everywhere, the mattress shoved half off the frame.
My jewelry box lies open on the vanity. I lift a tangled chain and check beneath the loose tray.
The opal is gone.
I check again. Then I check the drawer beneath the box, though I know I didn't put it there. My grandmother wore that necklace when she hugged me. I remember the stone cold against my cheek, her fingers closing over mine when she gave it to me. They took it. How am I supposed to replace that?
I sink down on the edge of the ruined bed and let myself cry.
Delilah sits beside me. She doesn't say anything, just puts her arm around my shoulders and lets me fall apart. She's good at this, at being present without pushing, at offering comfort without demanding anything in return.
When the tears slow down, she hands me a tissue from her pocket. "What do you need?"
The torn bedding is against my leg. I move away from it. "I can't stay here tonight."
Delilah stays beside me when I can't manage to look at her. "You're coming home with me. That was already decided."
"I mean..." I take a shaky breath. "I don't think I can stay here at all. Not right now. Not while I figure out what comes next."
She nods like she expected this. "My guest room is yours as long as you need it. We'll get you some clothes, whatever else you want, and we'll go."
I hesitate before asking. After five years, I still think of him when I make a plan. "Jackson..."
"Jackson can wait." Her voice is firm. "You've been waiting on him for weeks. He can spend one night wondering how it feels."
I grab a bag from the closet and start filling it. Clothes, toiletries, the charger for my phone. Basic things, survival things. Delilah helps without being asked, folding shirts I would have just shoved in, asking which shirts I want to take instead of choosing for me.
Deputy Ellis meets us on the landing. I tell him the opal is missing, describing the setting while he writes it down. I have to stop when he asks for a photograph. Delilah tells him we can send one in the morning.
Jackson is waiting at the bottom of the stairs when we come down. He looks like he's been crying too, which shouldn't make me feel anything but does.
He stops short of the doorway, leaving me a way out even while he asks me to stay. "Maren, please. Don't go. We can talk about this."
"There's nothing to talk about." I keep walking, past him, toward the door. "I'll be at Delilah's. Don't call me tonight."
His voice follows me toward the porch. I nearly turn around out of habit. "When can I call?"
I keep going. I won't promise him a time just to make leaving easier for him. "I don't know."
The night air hits my face when I step onto the porch, cool and clean. I draw a breath that doesn't catch halfway in. Delilah's truck is parked beside the police cruisers. I climb into the passenger seat and she starts the engine and we drive away.
I don't look in the rearview mirror. I don't want to see Jackson standing on the porch, don't want to see the house lit up like something terrible happened inside, don't want to see any of it.
Delilah drives in silence. Her hands are steady on the wheel, her profile calm in the dashboard light. When we turn onto the road to the east property, she speaks without turning toward me, letting me hear it without having to meet her eyes. "You did the right thing tonight. All of it."
I stare down at my phone, dark again in my lap. "I don't feel like I did."
"I know." She reaches over and squeezes my hand. "But you called for help. You got yourself somewhere safe. And you told him the truth about what you need. That's not nothing."
It doesn't feel like enough. It feels like my whole life just shattered and I'm holding the pieces wondering how they'll ever fit together again.
But I'm alive. I'm safe. And tomorrow, Shay will be gone.
The guest room at Delilah's is warm and familiar, with a quilt on the bed that smells like lavender and cedar. I set my bag on the chair by the window and stand there for a moment, looking out at the dark shapes of the ranch I've called home for five years.
Delilah appears in the doorway. "Try to sleep. We'll figure out the rest in the morning."
"Thank you." The words feel inadequate for everything she's done tonight, but she just nods like she understands.
She draws the quilt back for me before she leaves. I don't have to earn the place she's offering. "That's what family does."
She closes the door behind her. I change into the pajamas I grabbed, climb under the lavender quilt, and stare at the ceiling.
My grandmother's opal is gone. My marriage might be over. My husband chose an evening with another woman over answering my call during the worst night of my life.
But I survived. I got myself out. And I'm not going back until I'm ready.
The tears come again, quieter this time, and I let them fall until exhaustion pulls me under.