Chapter 21 #2
Her father had left his mark on this house the way he’d left it on the two of them, in dents and divots a person could paint over but never fix.
“He put his fist through that wall once because dinner was cold. Mason stepped in front of me. Took the next one on his shoulder so I wouldn’t.
He was maybe fourteen.” Hadley squeezed her arms past the point of pain.
“The last thing on this earth Mason ever wanted was to end up like that man. And it’s killing me, Sam, because I’m the reason he’s driving into trees at five in the morning. Me. I did that.”
“There’s more than enough blame to go around,” Sam muttered, and he didn’t have to draw her a map.
She understood why he shared in her misery.
He’d been in the woods that night, and he’d known all along that someone…
something else…had been lurking in the shadows. “Starting with the man six feet under.”
Hadley realized that she’d been so busy investigating Roland Mercer that she hadn’t set up a visit with Kalen Telfort. She still needed to ask whether his father had kept that coat, burned it, or buried it. She was leaving loose ends, and that wasn’t like her.
Hadley brought both hands up over her face and held them there, breathing as rhythmically as possible until she had her emotions under control. She then lowered her arms and asked him a question that he wasn’t going to like.
“Were you drinking with him last night, Sam?”
“In case you didn’t notice,” Sam said, lifting the mug an inch, “I’ve switched to coffee. And no, it isn’t laced.”
He stared down at the contents again, as if even he couldn’t believe it wasn’t some form of alcohol. Clearing his throat, he adjusted his shoulder against the doorframe, as if he wasn’t comfortable with what he was about to share with her.
“I made a decision last night.” Sam met her stare, and his pain practically radiated from his rugged features. “I’m driving out to Emberwood this afternoon to attend my first AA meeting. When Mason sobers up, I’m hoping to take him with me.”
“And what made you come to this decision, Sam?”
Hadley had a hard time believing that he was suddenly about to change his entire life just because Mason had driven off the road and into a tree. She’d grown up with two alcoholics, and setting down the bottle wasn’t like folding away a basket of laundry.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Sam replied with a dry laugh.
“No one knows this, but Gus had some chest pain last night. It was after closing, and he came downstairs as I was sweeping up the place. Let’s just say it was bad enough to scare me.
He wouldn’t hear a word about the hospital, stubborn old goat, but I couldn’t just lock up and leave.
I needed to make sure he wasn’t going to drop dead in some back booth.
Anyway, I sat with him for hours. He got to talking, the way he does.
Said it’d be a shame if that bar didn’t outlast him.
That the townsfolk needed a place like the Watering Hole to keep them connected, and the responsibility fell on me to keep things going when he couldn’t.
I’ve known for a while now that I’m in his will, and I…
well, I can’t be the reason his vision dies when he does. ”
Sam lifted a hand and used his sleeve to wipe away the moisture in his eyes. He even took a sip of his coffee, and she assumed it was to clear the lump from his throat. He loved that old man, and if Gus was the reason Sam needed to get sober, then so be it.
She wasn’t going to offer him platitudes, though.
He was about to walk through hell, and as much as she wished her brother would join him, she didn’t believe Mason was anywhere near having such a similar epiphany.
“That’s why I was on the road at five this morning, Hads. I was headed home.” Sam’s gaze was drawn to the stairs. “I spotted Mason’s truck, nosed into that old oak. He was out cold behind the wheel.”
The last of the anger drained out of her all at once, but all that had done was leave her tired.
Hadley drew a steady breath and held it, hoping a little oxygen would get her through the rest of the conversation.
She wasn’t sure what the future held for any of them, but Gus had a point about a special place in the town’s history for people to come together.
Only her brother hadn’t attempted to cross that threshold.
Would he be accepted by anyone? By some?
He would never know, and she wasn’t sure that was the place for him to be, considering the path he was currently traveling in his life. The same could be said for Sam, but there was a very good chance the pub would be the fuel toward his success.
“I’m sorry,” Hadley replied softly, though she genuinely meant the apology. “For coming in here like that. For assuming.”
“Nothing to be sorry for,” Sam said with a small shrug. “There’s not a soul in this town who doesn’t know I’ve got a problem. No use pretending otherwise.”
He gestured toward her with his mug.
“Watching you this past year, coming back here, planting yourself in a town that you left behind at the age of eighteen. Well, it made me think maybe I could do the same. Start over in the same place with the same people who know the worst of me.”
Hadley blinked hard against the sting behind her eyes. Sam had her all wrong. All she’d thought about lately was how she’d made a mistake, and how maybe it was time to rectify the decision she’d made last year.
“Making amends isn’t easy,” Sam said, as if he could hear her thoughts. “But it beats the alternative, doesn’t it?”
“I honestly don’t know, Sam. And that’s part of the reason why I told Mason to take the money and run.
” Hadley curled her fingers into her palms. The slight bite of her nails kept her grounded.
“I told him to take every cent the state gave him and put this town in his rearview mirror. I can’t be selfish about it.
I moved back here hoping for something that I don’t even know exists.
Maybe that I’d get my brother back? I think I always knew that boy was gone, but I kept wishing for him anyway. ”
Sam shook his head, slow and certain.
“You have it all wrong, Hads.” Sam had full conviction in his tone.
No doubt whatsoever. “Mason won’t leave this town.
Ever. He’s as much a part of this place as the corn is.
As the Threshing Man, if you want to put it that way.
This town took away what future he had, and he’s still here, still getting up, still trying to drive home.
He might not be too good at it yet, but he’s trying. ”
Hadley averted her gaze, blinking away the tears that she couldn’t keep at bay any longer.
“He’s struggling. No question about that,” Sam said, pausing long enough to get what he wanted from her.
Her full attention, as if he needed her to understand that she was never leaving this town, either.
“There’s a small piece of him that won’t ever let them win.
That won’t let this ground have the last of him.
Whatever else Mason does, he’s not going to hand himself over.
Not to the bottle, not to the Threshing Man, not to the memory of your daddy. Not to any of it.”