Chapter 17
Chapter Seventeen
A Lumberjack in the Family
EMILY
H alf of me was with Archie as we wandered the baby section at Walmart and picked out a car seat and enough other baby gear to outfit a small village of babies. But the other half? The other half of me was back in that hotel room, watching the pain that physically wracked through him as he talked about what had happened the day my brother died. I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it all night and then this morning in the shower. I was doing my best to hold myself together, to compartmentalize. But it was hard.
I’d never really blamed Archie Kasper, not like my father did. It wasn’t that Dad’s pain was deeper than mine—my brother and I had been close and it hurt to miss him so much. I guessed it was that Dad’s pain was different because he was different. And maybe there was something about losing a child that made you irrational, unable to consider any scenario beyond the one your pain-riddled mind chooses.
It had been hard to hear, nonetheless. Archie’s words had taken me to the day of the accident in a way no naval officer’s condolence speech or news report had ever done. In one perspective, it was closure. But it also renewed the pain of exactly how Jake had died. What had happened to him. And where he was now.
Nowhere.
Nowhere we could ever find him, at least.
But this was why I had come to Kasper Ridge, wasn’t it? To see if the bogeyman in every one of my father’s tales really did have red gleaming eyes and sharp slavering teeth.
Turned out he didn’t.
But now? I’d gotten in far deeper than I’d meant to.
The one person who would give me clear-sighted perspective on the whole mess was gone. Jake would know what to do. He would say the perfect thing, make me feel better about everything.
Of course, if Jake was here, I wouldn’t be.
And the guilt and betrayal made me feel dirty and ashamed of myself.
“What do you think?” Archie was holding up a tiny pair of jeans and an itty-bitty flannel shirt.
I laughed and took them from his hands, admiring the sheer adorableness of minuscule clothing. “I think he’s not going to be dressing like a lumberjack for a while. Probably one of these things is a better choice.” I pulled a sleeper from the rack. “And a hat.”
“So small,” Archie said softly, reaching for a little cotton cap.
“Blanket?” I suggested. I imagined the tiny guy in his car seat heading up into the mountains with winter coating the ground all around us.
“Good call.” Archie pulled out his phone and inventoried what was in the cart. “I think this is everything Wiley said we’d need. Think we should get a toy, too?”
I smiled at the new uncle’s enthusiasm. “I think babies pretty much just eat, poop, and sleep for the first few months. Not a lot of toy handling.”
He frowned, and then picked up a stuffed elephant from the shelf. “They snuggle though.” He didn’t sound sure, so I affirmed this for him.
“I think they snuggle, yes.” I took the elephant from his hands and added it to the cart, working to enjoy myself but fighting with a need to retreat, to think. “Ready?”
“Yep.”
We checked out and then dropped through the diner across the parking lot to pick up a to-go order that the waitstaff probably assumed was for at least ten people. And then we headed up to see Aubrey and Wiley.
I felt a little out of place when the attendant took us both back onto the ward—I wasn’t family, but she didn’t ask any questions. Aubrey had her own room, and she was nestled into her bed with the baby tucked up close against her, asleep. Wiley sat at her side, scrolling through his phone.
I would have been hesitant to interrupt such an idyllic scene, but the second she spotted us, Aubrey’s face erupted into a huge smile. “Oh thank god. Food.” She kissed Finn’s tiny head and carefully moved him to the bassinet at the side of her bed, and then reached out toward Archie with both hands making a grabbing motion. “What’d you get me?”
“Everything,” her brother said, pulling the rolling table close.
We unpacked the food and after Aubrey had first dibs, we all dug in. It was so natural I almost didn’t question it, but it was also so far from the kind of family experiences I’d had lately, I couldn’t help but feel touched to be included. Things were so easy between the Kaspers. Maybe this is how Jake and I would have been. In some strange way, being with them filled a void I hadn’t realized was there.
“So,” I asked. “How was the first night of parenthood?”
Wiley’s smile was so wide, I could already feel his pride beaming through it. “Pretty amazing.”
Aubrey scoffed. “You slept through it.”
“So did Finn, though.” He pointed to the baby.
“Except the five times he wanted to be fed,” Aubrey said, but her words held no venom, and she smiled as she said them.
“If I could do it, I would,” Wiley told her.
She smiled at him, and there was a settled and happy air in the room on the heels of the fake fight. They were a good couple, and it was clear they would be attentive and caring parents.
“Well, we bought out the baby section at Walmart,” Archie said. “And after we eat, I’ll go get the car seat put in and then we can go whenever they discharge you guys.”
Aubrey nodded. “They’ll come down and check the seat, I think. And then they do his final exam and send us off.”
“Isn’t it nuts how they let a couple people in here with no baby and then twenty-four hours later they send us out in the world, totally responsible for another human life? With like zero training?” Wiley sounded a little bit scared.
“There should at least be a test or some kind of license you need,” Aubrey agreed.
“That’s what all those books you read were about, right?” Archie asked.
Aubrey lifted a shoulder. “I’m not sure how much a book prepares you for the real thing.”
“You’ll do great,” Archie said, leaning forward and patting his sister’s shoulder as she took an enormous bite of grilled cheese. “And you’ve got the entire staff at Kasper Ridge to help out. Lucy and Penny will be a big help, they’ve both just been through it.”
Aubrey nodded, her face clearing a bit.
I envied them. The people at Kasper Ridge not only worked together, but they all had this history—like they were all one big family. I hadn’t met them all, but I’d heard the way Archie spoke about his friends, calling most of them by their callsigns. I wondered if Jake would have been here if he’d survived. He would have loved Colorado.
It was several hours more before we were bundled up and sent on our way, our little crew now including a very tiny new member who slept most of the way up the hill.
It was odd arriving back at the resort. For a brief while, I’d been part of this little family, celebrating this incredible event. And now I was just me again.
Archie had dropped me off at the resort before driving Aubrey and Wiley down to their house to help them get settled. He’d given me a warm smile as I’d gotten out of the car, but with the audience in the back seat, neither of us had said anything more. I didn’t know when I’d see him again, and in some ways, that was a relief.
My mind spun as I rode the elevator up alone to the room I shared with Christine.
I stepped into the room and Christine looked up from her bed, where she was typing furiously on her laptop.
“Hey!” her eyes were bleary, like she’d been in that exact position for too long.
“Hey,” I said, checking my watch. “Figured you’d still be conferencing.”
She lifted a shoulder. “I’m pretty much conferenced out. There were some small group things this afternoon, but I really need to get words in, so I’ve been up here a while.” She set aside the laptop and stretched. “Tell me everything.”
I let myself fall back across my own bed, staring at the ceiling for a moment as I stretched. “There’s kind of a lot to tell.” I contemplated how much to tell her, and realized how much I needed to confide in someone.
“I’ve got no plans. Talk.”
I did. I told her about finding the arch at the camp down the road from town, about the initials carved into the post and the arrow that led us to the number.
“515, I think. Maybe 525?”
“And that is . . .”
“A room number? Maybe? Hopefully he’ll let me know when he goes to look around.”
“And now we can talk about him.” She drew out the word “him” in a sing-song way that told me she already knew what I was going to say.
“Well, when Aubrey went into labor, everything shifted. We had to get her to the hospital, and then we got stuck in the storm. Not that Archie would have left anyway.”
“Right. You texted. ..I’m curious about what happened between then and now.”
“They had a boy!”
“Great. But quit dodging the question.”
“Yeah.” I paused, trying to figure out how to explain everything that had happened, and the complicated feelings I had about it all.
I started at the beginning—the moment we left the hospital. And I talked and talked for what felt like hours, telling Christine more than I’d intended.
“After we... you know,” I said, feeling the heat climb my cheeks as Christine’s eyebrows waggled. “Archie told me why he’d left the navy. But the thing was, I already knew why.”
Christine shook her head. “I’m confused. What are you talking about?”
I sucked in a deep breath, but it didn’t steel me for what I needed to say. “I already knew why he left the navy because that reason was the event that killed my brother.”
“Archie Kasper was there?” I’d told Christine about my brother before.
“He was in the plane that caused the accident.”
Christine slapped a hand over her mouth as her eyes widened, but a second later, she slumped down again and shook her head. “But, you knew that? When you came here? Or did you just figure it out?”
“I knew.”
“When you kissed him? You knew?” Her bewilderment confirmed the wrongness of my actions.
I nodded, staring down at my hands on the duvet cover. Guilt made me heavy, dark. “It’s part of why I came here in the first place.”
“To meet him? Or to seduce him?”
“To meet him. To learn more, I guess. And I pitched a story to get me here, but then my editor suggested that if I could get in on the hunt, I could get the cover. And that would pretty much unlock the next level in my job. My life.”
Christine shook her head slowly and I knew she was realizing how complicated it all was. “So the attraction between you... that’s real?”
“Totally real.”
“Wasn’t part of the plan?”
“God, no.” The atmosphere in the room was laden with everything I’d revealed. Dense and expectant.
“That’s a lot,” Christine said finally. “I’m kind of trying to sort through it all.”
“I know. Sorry.”
She sat up, swinging her legs over the edge of her bed to face me. “First, I’m so sorry about your brother. I knew he’d died in an accident, but I’d never really known the details. I understand why your father is so bereaved—you really never got any closure. And it makes sense that you’d come here looking.”
“Right . . .”
“But,” she said, holding up a finger. “You’ve kind of dug a hole with Archie.”
I hung my head, guilt swamping every other emotion inside me. “I know.”
“Why didn’t you say something when he told you the story?”
I looked for words that would explain how I’d felt in that moment. “I guess...I thought if I told him when we first met, he’d probably distance himself. And then I wouldn’t learn more about the hunt—so no cover story, and he’d never tell me more about what happened with my brother.”
“Okay, but once you’d gotten to know each other? Like, maybe after the kiss?”
I sighed, wretched misery making me wish I could do things over again. Better. The right way this time. “I don’t know,” I moaned. “I’m just selfish, Chris. I didn’t want to ruin everything. And I haven’t felt this way about anyone in so long. Maybe ever.”
That perked her up, her shoulders straightening as her eyes widened. “What way?”
“Like...” I dropped my head into my hands. I was pathetic. “Like I can’t wait to see him again. Like when he’s next to me, the world feels complete somehow. Like when we’re apart I’m actually...pining for him? I’m dying for any reason to say his name, to talk about him. Like, could I love him, maybe?” What should have been a happy realization felt like one more weight lumped on the pile pressing down on me.
“You’re asking?”
I lifted my head and looked at my friend. “You’re an expert in love. You tell me. Is it even possible to fall in love that fast?”
Christine laughed gleefully. “Oh god, that’s hilarious. Em, if I was an expert in love, would I be preparing to return to my one-bedroom apartment and my three guinea pigs, or would I be returning to a significant relationship?”
“Psychiatrists are experts in all kinds of disorders they do not themselves have,” I pointed out.
She made a face at me. “Nice comparison.”
“You know what I mean.”
She stood and went to the windows, staring out at the snowy hillside behind the resort. “You can definitely be in love this quickly,” she said, her voice slow and thoughtful. “But in this case, I wonder if it’s just the fascination with the guy because of all the circumstantial stuff. The hunt, his involvement with your family history.”
“He’s hot too.” I was trying to lighten the mood, but the joke felt flat, superficial.
“People don’t fall in love with people because they’re hot.”
“I know.”
She turned to face me. “You have to tell him.”
“I know.” Misery felt like it was making itself right at home inside me, like it was picking out curtains and choosing furniture, preparing to stay there forever.
As Christine and I got ready to go down for dinner with our fellow conference goers, I practiced turning words over in my mind. I needed to figure out how I was going to confess the truth to Archie, but nothing felt right.
I was in too deep now, and there were no good answers. If I told Archie about my family now, about my relationship to his worst moment, he’d think I’d manipulated him. And if I waited, it would get worse when I finally came clean. Was there, I wondered, any way I could just not tell him? Like...ever?
“You have to tell him,” Christine said again as we left the room.
“I know.” And I did. I just didn’t know when or how.