48. Chapter 48
forty-eight
“Mercy, where are you?” I leave a message on her voicemail, my voice sharper than I mean for it to be. She doesn’t even know Grant came and went. She doesn’t know anything. Yesterday she sent me that quick text— Going out of town. I’ll get in touch.
No explanation. No hint of where or why. And now? Radio silence.
I stare at my phone as if I can will it to ring.
Where was she yesterday? Why didn’t she tell me more? Why didn’t she call?
“I’m going to drive to Mercy’s,” I tell Mom.
She looks up from her book. “You planning on taking Bowie with you?”
“Of course. He’s my American Express. I can’t leave home without him.”
She nods toward Dad in the recliner. “Well, your American Express is asleep in Pop-Pop’s lap, and Pop-Pop’s asleep with him.”
They’re dozing together, oblivious to the football game on TV.
“I won’t be gone long. I just haven’t heard from her.”
Mercy’s house is locked, her car gone. Bennett Realty is closed.
I’ve got a sick feeling. So I call her again. “Mercy? Where are you? Call me.”
My third message of the day.
Tell me she didn’t pack up and leave. No, she couldn’t. Wouldn’t.
She has friends in Austin. Maybe she’s there.
I have to work tomorrow. I drive by the school. Everything looks normal again, like the fire never happened.
My car has a mind of its own. I end up at Calder’s, my heart pounding in my throat.
What will I say?
That Grant’s gone, for good. That whatever he thought that hug meant—it didn’t. I’ll clear the air. We’ll go back to being us. I won’t let Calder Bowie Boone shut me and Bowie out.
Pulling up, I see Tanner’s truck is here, too.
He’s sitting on the porch, eyeing me like I’m a snake slithering onto the porch. “He’s not here.” He tugs on his beer without ever breaking eye contact.
“His truck’s here.”
He nods toward Copper grazing in the pasture. No Midnight.
“He’s riding?”
A tight nod.
“I need to see him.”
Tanner’s jaw flexes, his eyes still boring into me. “I think you’ve done enough, Laurel.”
Something behind my ribs clenches tight. “What does that mean?”
He doesn’t blink. “Means a man can only be shredded so many times until he’s had enough.”
I stare, dumbfounded. When I find my voice, it’s small. “Tell him Grant left. Our marriage is over.”
“I’ll convey the message.” Cold. So cold.
“Tanner?” My throat tightens. “You won’t stop being my friend if …”
I can’t bring myself to say it.
His brows lift, a flicker of surprise before he looks away, taking a slow breath.
When he slowly brings his eyes back to meet mine, he says, “I’ll always be your friend, Laurel. But he’s my brother. Hurts to see your brother bleed—and you’re the only person alive who can do that to him.”
Tanner leans forward, resting his forearms on his knees, the bottle in his hands, studying me.
His gaze narrows, like he’s deciding what he’s going to say.
“I don’t know if you realize this, but he was in a bad place when you left for Houston.
Couple months later he drove down there to tell you he’d do long distance—whatever it took. ”
“He told me.”
“Yeah, well, when he got back… he was different. Darker. Said he saw you happy, and he knew there was no point. You’d moved on. Not much later he damn near killed a guy.”
“Who?”
“Todd Milligan.”
I draw in a quick breath. “The State Senator’s son?”
He nods, working his jaw. “Yeah.”
The pounding of my heart drowns out the chorus of field crickets as my mind spins— staring at Tanner as he digs in the cooler, the bottles clinking harder than necessary, and pulls out another beer.
It’s like he started a story and he’s decided he’s finishing it. “Calder was in jail when his parents were killed in a car wreck. They were coming back from seeing him.” He closes his eyes, shaking his head once. “That’s the only time I ever saw him break.”
My knees go weak, and I grip the porch rail. It just keeps getting worse. “I wish I’d known.” It’s barely a whisper—all I can muster. “I didn’t find out until… I don’t know. A lot later. Too late to send flowers.”
“You and Mercy were in Europe when they died.”
The summer before our sophomore year. I was having the time of my life, oblivious to what was happening here. My stomach churns.
“Besides.” Tanner leans back, resting his beer on the table beside him. “You were the last person he needed to see.”
“Why?”
“For fuck’s sake, Laurel. Have I got to spell it out? The fight that put him there was over you.”
My breath stalls in my chest. “Why?” It comes out small as tears spill from my eyes.
Tanner shakes his head, cutting his eyes away before he forces himself to look at me—takes a long breath, and whispers, “Because pretty boy Todd was stupid enough to say he could have you on your knees for him.”
We hold a long stare as the truth settles between us like dust.
“Calder… lost it,” Tanner grits out. “The last thing he needed was for you—of all people—to see him brought to the funeral in the back of an Erath County sheriff’s car.
When he got out of jail, he started building himself back stronger than he ever was before. He was doing fine until you came back.”
Tanner glances at the pasture, checking to see if Calder’s riding up—like he wants to say it all before he gets back.
“Yesterday? I watched him tear into a burning building like a madman when he saw Dabbo’s car—heard him yell for you, saw him carry Bowie out and go back in for you—and you fall into your husband’s arms right in front of him. ”
“It was a fucking hug, Tanner!” My pulse pounds in my throat. “I didn’t hug him back! You of all people should understand that!”
He shakes his head again—like he’s still stunned by what he saw. “He. Walked. Into. A fucking fire—for you.”
Oh, God, when he puts it that way…
“I had sense enough to leave him alone.” He lifts his beer slightly, not pointing it at me now, just holding it like a truth he can’t soften. “That? Turned him into stone. The kind that’s made under heat and pressure.”
“Metamorphic,” I whisper, wiping tears.
“Yeah. That.”
Something like dread or panic washes over me. I can’t tell the difference. I came here thinking I could fix something. I didn’t even know what I broke. “So that’s why he didn’t finish school.” The words scrape out.
“Locked up when the second semester started. After they died, he lost interest.”
“It’s why he hunts with a bow and arrow.”
“Convicted felon. Can’t possess a weapon.” He tugs on the beer, back to staring a hole into me as I struggle for air.
“Why he was so terrified seeing those pictures—if Grant knew the man holding Bowie had served time, he’d use that against me.”
“Ding-ding-ding,” Tanner says nastily.
I hear Calder that night at the house—If you lose him because of me, you’ll hate me.
He wasn’t pushing me away—he was protecting me. He ran from me to save me.
Everything in me goes numb. Every choice I’ve made has blown back on him, and he’s just… taken the blows. One after another, and I was always too self-absorbed to see what they cost him.
Out of nowhere, I see that scrap of denim snagged on the barbed wire, wind and dust beating at it year after year. I thought it was just Texas. Now I understand. Calder’s that stubborn, strong shred of denim, and I’m the wire he could never free himself from.
Until yesterday, when it finally hurt so much he ripped himself free.
As I turn to walk away, rage overtakes me. “Maybe you had sense enough to stay away, but I don’t. I’m not letting go!”