Chapter Five
Cassie woke slow—blinking heavily at the pale stripe of light cutting through broken blind slats, catching dust like drifting ash.
Bits and pieces came back in broken flashes: meeting Ollie on the road, seeing the wreck of her childhood home; Margie’s truck; Margie herself, guiding her inside and tucking her into bed. Pulling the quilt over her…
After that, just blackness. Blessed, empty blackness.
She didn’t know what day it was. Didn’t know if it was morning or afternoon, Sunday or Thursday. It felt like morning, but that didn’t mean anything.
Groaning, she sat up, the heavy quilt sliding onto her lap. Every part of her ached—shoulders stiff, ribs sore, eyelids heavy like they’d been bruised from the inside.
On the nightstand, a glass of water waited beside a bottle of aspirin.
Cassie’s phone sat there too, her charger neatly coiled beside it.
A few feet away, tucked under the windowsill, was her luggage—her leather valise, violin case, and crossbody bag.
She pressed her lips together, a swell of emotion rising.
Margie must have gotten her rental car here as well—that was Margie, always doing everything, taking care of everyone.
Out of habit, she checked her phone, feeling instantly sick at the long scroll of missed calls and unread texts. She flipped the phone face down and left it there.
The pine floor creaked beneath her as she shifted, swinging her legs out of bed. Only then did she realize she was wearing pajamas she didn’t recognize or remember putting on—soft flannel bottoms and a faded T-shirt from some long-forgotten county fair.
Her bare feet padded to the window, where she pulled up the blinds. Below, Margie’s infamous garden stretched just beyond the porch—still overgrown, still thriving, just as Cassie had seen it last.
Beyond the garden, the ridge rolled out in endless folds of green, mountains receding in blue-gray bands, each one fainter than the last. Farther out, the hills gave way to coal-scoured patches, the earth stripped bare in raw, dark wounds.
She stared, recognition and strangeness tangling. She’d grown up with this view, but distance had changed her eyes. What had once felt ordinary now struck differently, in a way she didn’t care to examine.
Dragging a throw around her shoulders, she moved into the hall. Patsy Cline drifted up the stairwell, mingling with the sharp bite of coffee. Two voices carried up from below—Margie’s familiar rasp and another, deeper one Cassie didn’t recognize.
Following the creaking steps down into the passageway, she paused just outside the arch. Seated beside Margie at the small oak table was a man in a denim work shirt rolled to the elbows, silver hair cropped short and combed neat. He looked familiar, though she couldn’t place him.
“You can come on in, Cassie-girl,” Margie said, dry as dust. “Ain’t no secrets at my table.”
Wrapping the throw tighter, she stepped into the well-worn room, a wash of déjà vu rolling over her.
The floor sagged a little deeper in spots, the old table bore fresh scars, and the black-and-white checked curtain over the sink had faded to gray, but it was more or less the same kitchen she remembered.
She sank into one of Margie’s mismatched chairs as Margie stood, pouring a fresh cup of coffee and setting it in front of her. “You hungry? You gotta be—done slept two days straight.”
She blinked, surprised. Two days? As if on cue, her stomach let out a loud growl.
“That’s answer enough.” Margie turned back to the stove. “I’ll have you some breakfast whipped up in no time. How’s a mess of biscuits an’ bacon sound?”
“Sounds good,” Cassie murmured, her voice still rough with sleep. In truth, she wasn’t sure she was hungry—her body felt hollow and queasy, like she was moving through a fever dream.
“I’m real sorry to hear about Connor,” the man said gently. “He was a fine boy, from a mighty fine family.”
Cassie sucked in a small breath. She didn’t want to talk about her brother. Just hearing his name was tugging at seams she was working hard at keeping closed.
“Thanks,” she said, fiddling with the handle of her mug. “Um, do I know you? You look familiar.”
He chuckled, roughened with fondness. “’Course you know me. You’d come to work with Birdie some days. Used to tear through that place like your shoes were on fire…”
Birdie. The pet name they’d all called her mama back in the day—yet another name Cassie never wanted to hear again.
“Charlie,” she said, recognition clicking. “You were a foreman at the factory.”
“Yep. And you were hell on two feet,” Charlie continued. “But polite about it. Always said you was sorry after tearin’ up the place.”
Margie snorted from the stove. “Damn near gave the whole floor a heart attack the day she was climbin’ the stairwell railin’ like it was a jungle gym.”
“I did not,” Cassie murmured, though it barely passed for protest.
“Oh, you did,” Margie said, pointing her spatula. “Char here had to fetch a ladder to get you down. Your mama was near tears. And you? Just sat there swingin’ your legs, askin’ for a MoonPie, please an’ thank ya.”
Charlie shook his head, laughing again. “Wild little thing.”
“Sure was,” Margie agreed, sliding a hot plate in front of Cassie. “There,” she said, brushing her hands together. “Bet you ain’t had home cookin’ in a while.”
Cassie looked down at the food, her throat tightening around the sudden and utterly unwanted ache in her heart. “Thank you,” she said quietly.
There was a pause, and then Charlie pushed back from the table, his chair legs scraping. “Well,” he said, adjusting the cuff of his shirt, “I’ll let y’all have your mornin’.”
“You don’t have to rush off,” Margie said.
He smiled at her, eyes crinkling. “Oh, I think the two of you got some catchin’ up to do. ’Sides, I got plenty of work ’round the house—you know how it is.”
Margie walked him into the hall, where Charlie leaned in for a soft kiss. “I’ll see you tonight,” he whispered, giving her hand a squeeze before disappearing, the screen door banging shut behind him.
Margie turned back to Cassie, cheeks pink. “Well,” she said, heading for the counter, “now don’t you start.”
Cassie raised a brow. “I didn’t say anything.”
“Uh-huh.” Margie grabbed her pack of cigarettes and lit one. “But you was thinkin’ it. Hell, everyone in this damn town is thinkin’ it. Guess I was s’posed to go to the grave with him?”
Him—the elder Nathanial Walker, road name: Maverick. Nash’s dad, former club president, and Margie’s biggest mistake.
When Connor had called with the news of Maverick’s death some years back, Cassie’s first thought hadn’t been for Nash, or even his mama.
It had been for Margie. Because once upon a time, Margie and Maverick had been high school sweethearts…
turned something far messier. He’d left her for Nash’s mother, only he never could seem to stay gone, and Margie… she never could seem to turn him away.
“I’m sorry about Mav,” Cassie said quietly. “I wanted to call—I really did. I just…”
She’d already been gone five years by then.
She’d told herself too much time had passed, that Margie wouldn’t want to hear from her after so long.
But the truth was uglier: she’d been scared.
Scared of the sound of Margie’s voice on the other end.
Scared of what Maverick’s death might stir up if she let herself feel it.
Scared, most of all, that if she called, Margie wouldn’t have anything left to say to her.
Margie watched her for a moment. “Nothin’ to be sorry about,” she said at last. “We’ve all got our paths to take. And, hell, if I’m bein’ honest, him dyin’ was probably the best thing that coulda happened to me.”
Pausing, Margie drew deep on her cigarette and let the smoke drift out slow. “Probably the only goddamn thing he ever did quiet, too.”
She leaned back against the counter, lips twitching into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “Some men you mourn, Cassie-girl. And some you just outlive.” Another pause. “Ain’t always easy tellin’ the difference, neither.”
Her words hit somewhere unhealed in Cassie. Bitterness surfaced first, before something quieter stirred—something she didn’t dare name. Clearing her throat, she groped for something—anything—else to hold onto.
“I met…” Her brow furrowed as she searched for the name. “Nash and Addison’s daughter. Yesterday—I mean, the other day. Well—met is probably the wrong word. I was on my way out. They were on their way in.”
Margie snorted. “Don’t I know it. It was Addy screamin’ that woke me—clued me in you’d run off.”
Cassie hesitated. “So…Nash and Addy…I guess that’s over with?”
Margie barked a laugh. “Good gracious, yes. That disaster fell apart ’fore it even started. Long story short, Nash gave it a go for Junie’s sake. Didn’t take.”
“Junie,” she repeated, tasting the strange, foreign shape of it.
“Juniper Rae Walker,” Margie said, her voice full of pride. “Ten goin’ on twenty-five. Smart as a whip; got her daddy’s mouth and her mama’s beauty—but don’t hold that last part against her. Girl can’t help where she come from.”
Cassie swallowed hard, tracing the rim of her mug.
Juniper Rae Walker, Nash’s…daughter.
—and for a second, she was somewhere else entirely—
Pacing her bedroom, counting back the days.
Nash was lounging on her bed, a motorcycle magazine spread out beside him.
“I think I’m late,” she blurted out.
He didn’t even look up, just flipped a page and said, “Then we’ll get married. Ain’t nothin’ else to it.”
“Ain’t nothin’ else to it?” she shrieked. She was barely eighteen; no way in hell was she getting married. No way in hell was she having a baby. She was supposed to be starting classes at West Liberty that fall, and—
Cassie blinked, and the memory went with it.
“Margie,” she said quickly, “how in the hell did Ollie Caldwell end up with a badge?”
Margie nearly choked on her coffee. “Lord—didn’t think he’d be the next name outta your mouth.”
“He stopped me on Black Bear.”