Chapter 27 #2
Two of the saddle racks were loose, so I found the drill in the toolbox and re-hung them securely.
Then I realigned the bridle hooks because whoever reset them at some point put them too close together.
From there I spent almost an hour sorting the various buckets of brushes and polishes that had been thrown in together and spraying down the tools with a disinfectant that I spilled all over my clothes while mixing.
“Logan? You in here?”
My pulse spikes at her voice. “In the tack room.”
Slow, even footfalls approach and then Emery’s there, bundled in a black winter coat, a metal cup in her hand.
Duke trails nearby, sniffing the ground.
“It’s not bad enough that my daughter is punching out players, but then I walk over to check on the parolee and he’s not where he’s supposed to be. ”
“I’m allowed anywhere on the property.”
Her smile is soft, the fury from the rink earlier nowhere in sight. “I know. I’m only teasing.”
“Coffee?” I nod toward her cup.
“Pinot noir. It’s that kind of night.” She holds it out. “Want some?”
“Hell no. This one time, a few inmates had this brilliant idea to horde grapes from mealtime and ferment them in their cell toilets to make wine.”
Emery’s face twists with horror. “You’re kidding.”
“I wish I were. A bunch of them ended up in the infirmary, puking and shitting all over the place. I don’t think I’ll ever see red wine again without thinking about that story.”
“Yeah, me neither now,” she mumbles, setting her drink down on a nearby table. Her eyes flitter over the room. “What are you up to in here?”
“Straightening things out. The place is a mess. No one puts anything where it’s supposed to go anymore.”
“Yeah, there are a lot of kids coming in and out of here, all the time.”
“I remember being a kid in this family and that was never an excuse.”
“Holt’s softer with his grandkids than he was with you boys. I think he’s just happy they’re around.” She adjusts a harness, shifting the way it hangs, before leaning against the old barn wall. “And think, soon there will be seven of them.”
I shake my head. “Sarah’s going to lose her mind.”
“Jon’s gonna lose his head if he doesn’t spend less time playing with drones and taking bets on the spring bison, and more on helping her. I mean, I have one and some days I feel overwhelmed.”
I imagine today is one of those days. “How’s Isla doing?”
“Two-game suspension but she doesn’t care much about that. All she can think about is what Erin said. What everyone’s saying.” Emery bites her bottom lip. “She asked me if I thought Holly was dead.”
“That was bound to happen.” I hesitate. “Did you tell her the truth?”
“That the odds of finding her alive are against us? Yes,” she admits quietly.
“This isn’t on you.” Despite what her douchebag ex says. “You’re doing everything you can to find her.”
“What is ‘everything’?” She tosses her arms to her sides, a helpless gesture.
“Everything would be finding her. Anything short of that is failure. I’ve gone over the case reports a thousand times, looking for a gap or a lie and I can’t find one.
But it has to be there. It has to be right there in front of me. I’m missing it.”
Emery’s going to drive herself crazy.
“Hey, do you remember that barn cat? The one that disappeared?”
Her brow flickers with recognition. “You mean Socks?”
I smile. “I forgot his name, but yeah.” It was all black except for its white feet. Emery named him. “Do you remember that morning we came out here? You noticed him gone right away.”
“Because he always came to say hello. He was the friendliest cat I’ve ever met.”
“So you freaked out and launched an investigation. You had Sarah and I canvassing the fields, the barn, the house, everywhere. You had a clipboard and everything.” I chuckle, remembering a ten-year-old Emery with her ripped jean shorts, pigtails, and dirt-stained sneakers.
“And then my dad rolled in just before dinner and who jumps out of the truck but Socks.”
“He hopped into the back that morning and Holt didn’t notice until he went to fill up in town. He was already late to get to where he was going, so he put the cat in the passenger seat and spent the day with him.” A wistful smile touches Emery’s plump lips. “I can’t believe you remembered that.”
“Memories were all I had to keep me alive. Those and my mother’s letters,” I admit. I clung to them like a rope tossed into the dark well where I dwelled, my only lifeline back to the light.
Her smile slips away. “I don’t think a truck is going to roll up and bring Holly home.”
“No, I know. My point is, you could never have figured out that my father took a road trip with a barn cat.”
She purses her lips and I expect her to argue, but she merely nods.
“Are you gonna look into that Murphy we saw at the rink?” When Emery left me, it was to walk over and talk to him.
“Terry’s on it.” She hesitates. “I shouldn’t be talking about the case with you.”
“You have a habit of doing things with me you’re not supposed to be doing.”
Emery’s cheeks flush as she pushes a hand through her lengthy hair. “About that—”
“I’m sorry,” I blurt. “I shouldn’t have reacted the way I did the day that detective questioned me on the porch.
I panicked. But I didn’t mean what I said.
I don’t want you to stay away.” I occupy my focus and my hands on the row of combs laid out on the table to dry after they’re clean, while I wait for her to list all the reasons that she should.
Emery wanders over to realign the saddle pads I hung earlier, shifting some half an inch this way, others half an inch that way, until her hand stalls on the embroidered I.S.
initials my mother stitched into the one Isla uses.
Isla Sanders. Too bad the kid wasn’t born a McAllister.
Or better yet, a Landry. “They’ve always treated her like one of their own, you know,” she says on a deep inhale. “Even before my parents died.”
“My mom wrote about her nonstop. Every letter, there was some update about Isla.” Emery too. “I felt like I knew her before I ever met her. You’ve raised a good kid. Even with a dickhead for a father.”
She bursts out laughing, but the sound is off.
That’s when I notice the tears streaming down her cheeks. I abandon the grooming tools and close in, scooping her into my arms.
Emery doesn’t fight it, sinking against me, her entire body shuddering with ratcheting sobs. What’s driving it, I can only guess. Holly’s case, her parents’ death, her daughter’s heartache, me.
Probably all of it.
I pull her in tighter as a lump swells in my throat. I don’t have much to offer, but I can offer her this.
“I’m sorry.” Her words are muffled.
“No. Don’t you dare.” I kiss the top of her head before I rest my chin on it, letting my fingers weave through her hair. “I’ll do this all night.” Is it wrong to hope she’ll let me? I close my eyes and hold her, wishing she could pass all her pain on to me to bear.
Eventually, she quiets, but thankfully she doesn’t pull away, turning to rest her cheek on my chest. “I don’t know how to do this,” she whispers.
I stroke strands of hair off her forehead. “Do what?”
“Any of it.” She sniffles against me. “Be a cop when my daughter needs her mother. Be a mother when Holly and her parents and my detachment need a cop. When you told me Isla wished she’d been there that night, all I could think about was how I was there.
I saw Holly sitting in the back of that pickup, and I barked at her to go home.
What I should have done is driven her there myself, or called Jenny. ”
“That wasn’t your responsibility.”
“Wasn’t it, though? If my fifteen-year-old daughter was hanging out outside a busy bar, and her best friend’s mother witnessed her doing what I did, I’d expect a phone call to come and get my kid.” She adds after a beat, “And then I’d ground her ass for the next year.”
“And is that what Holly’s mother would have done?”
“I doubt it. Holly was always off somewhere, making friends and grabbing rides. But God, saying that makes me feel guilty, like I’m blaming Jenny.
You should have seen her today. I almost didn’t recognize her.
She’s a husk, living off caffeine and Ambien.
” Emery brushes at her cheek, wiping away tears. “I wouldn’t be any better, though.”
I vaguely remember Jenny. She was a few years older than us, and she had a big crush on Jay. “This isn’t on you, Em, no matter how much you want to claim all the blame for it. Just like what happened to me and Jay was never Clive’s fault.”
“Yeah, but he thought it was. I watched him carry it all the way to his grave.” She pulls away, leaving me cold.
On impulse, I snag her fingers in mine.
She doesn’t shake my touch, her red-rimmed eyes peering up at me with anguish.
“Just like he watched me suffer for so many years after I’d lost my best friend.
He used to say that seeing me like that was killing him.
I didn’t really understand it. But tonight, I had to look in my daughter’s eyes and tell her that her best friend is very likely dead, and I get it now.
I get what he meant. Seeing your child suffer so much and not be able to do a damn thing to fix it.
” She sniffles. “And I can’t tell her what happened.
I can’t give her that much! At least with you, I knew where you were. ”
“I was alive.” There’s no closure for Isla where Holly’s concerned.
“It didn’t feel like it. To me, you died that night like Jay did.” Her eyes are glossy again as her hand slips free of mine. “And now you’re back from the dead, and I am really struggling.”
“With seeing me?”
A burst of laughter sails from her lips, but there’s no humor in the sound. “Seeing you, talking to you, feeling for you.”
I take a step forward.
“No.” She steps back, keeping us apart as she takes slow deep breaths, as if to compose herself.
Or to keep herself from falling apart. “All those years, I told myself that I’d accepted what happened and moved on.
I wanted to move on so badly. But the truth is I never did.
Never. Not when I married Dillon, not when I had Isla, not in all the years between then and now.
This whole time, I’ve been lying to everyone, including myself.
And that night the girls threw the rock through your window—” Her words break on a sudden, sharp inhale, as she turns away and the tears spill out.
“I don’t know if I’ll ever stop loving you, no matter how hard I try. ”
Her raw confession strikes deep. I don’t know if she means to comfort or wound me, but she certainly doesn’t seem happy.
I swallow the rising lump in my throat. “I guess neither of us have much control over things because, like I told you back then, it’ll always be you, Em.
Always.” My admission comes out in a hoarse whisper.
She furiously wipes her palms against her cheeks, but the tears keep coming. “I’ve gotta get back to Isla. And I need time to … I need time.” She rushes off.
I don’t chase her, giving her a few seconds’ lead before I amble out of the tack room to watch her vanish into the darkness, Duke at her heels.
Biscuit lingers at his stable door, waiting for attention.
I oblige, scratching his muzzle. “That’s right, I’m not dead,” I whisper to no one in particular. “And I’ll be here when she’s ready.”
Even if that day never comes.