Chapter Thirty-Seven

His legs were lead. His head was concrete. His heart had mutinied. It was somewhere lost in time. It was listening to Johnny Cash with his father before his dad’s friends came over. It was watching the end of the pirate show. It was wandering up and down the Strip without him.

He made a beeline for the exit, pushing past Clara and the other correctional officers, putting blinders on to avoid the rest of the visiting families. The second he left the facility, the door falling shut behind him, he crumpled on the hot stone steps. He didn’t care one lick that you could fry an egg on them.

Let him burn. Let him feel. Let the pain erase the foolishness, the shame, the utter shock.

He dropped his forehead into his hand, replaying his mother’s last words. Wishing he could go back and redo them, erase them, rewrite them.

Make them make sense.

Not that this—his life visiting a women’s correctional center each month—would ever make much sense. He shut his eyes, but all he saw was the blood in the driveway. All he heard were the screams when she found the body.

Were those fake too? Had she practiced them? Did she go to some abandoned house somewhere to rehearse her reaction to finding her husband shot dead?

His stomach seized, and he coughed—a dry, hacking bark.

Then, he flinched.

A hand was on his back, rubbing the space between his shoulder blades. He lifted his head to see Clara. “Rough visit?” she asked gently, kneeling next to him.

“Yeah,” he muttered.

She nodded sagely. As if she’d seen it all. “That happens sometimes. Can I get you a Coke from the vending machine? Or a Diet Coke?”

He shook his head then realized his throat was parched. “Coke would actually be great.”

Two minutes later, she returned with two cold sodas. With a weary sigh, she settled in next to him on the steps, handed him a can and cracked open hers, taking a hearty gulp.

He did the same, narrowing his focus to the coldness of the beverage and the bubbles in the drink. “She did it,” he said heavily as he turned the can around in his hand.

Clara patted his knee. “They all did it, Ryan. That’s why they’re here.”

“Fuck,” he muttered. “I really thought…”

“Of course you did. You love her. She’s your mother. If you listen to the ladies in there,” she said, pointing her thumb at the concrete building, “there’s not a guilty one among ’em.” Clara shook her head in amusement, her brown curly hair bouncing with her. “Amazing, isn’t? A whole facility full of the innocent? Judge made a mistake. Someone else did it. Framed, I was framed,” she said, rattling off the stories the inmates told.

The last one seared into him like a cattle brand.

“That one. That was hers,” he said. Framed.

Sure, there were details he didn’t know, like twisty rat tails coiled together, which would likely take years to unravel. He didn’t know why those men made her go through with the murder, or what their motivation was. He didn’t know precisely who played what role. He didn’t know how far back in time the planning went, or where the other two men were.

But he knew this much—his mother was involved in his father’s murder.

His eighteen-year obsession had an answer.

“You’ll still come see her, right?” Clara asked.

He shrugged. “I don’t know. I mean, what’s the point?”

Clara answered in a plain, simple voice. “That’s what we do for family.”

“But she did it,” Ryan pointed out. The specifics didn’t need to be outlined. The who, what, why, where and when could be sorted out by others.

“Right,” she said slowly. “But that’s not why you come see her. You don’t come see her because she’s innocent of a crime. You come because you’re a good man. Because you have compassion. Because even the criminals of this world need someone who cares about them. Maybe she’s in for life, and she’ll never have a chance to be redeemed on the outside. But maybe the fact that you come here helps her to be a better person in this place. Maybe she finds her redemption behind bars, because of you.”

“Do they? Find redemption?”

Clara shrugged. “Some do. Some don’t. You still gotta come to work every day, right?” she said, then drained more of her soda.

He did the same, then rose. “Better hit the road.”

She nodded. “I’ll be looking for you around these parts.”

He managed a half-hearted smile of acknowledgement. He didn’t know if he’d ever be in these parts again. He didn’t know where the ground was, where the sky ended, or how to find his way back home after hearing her confession.

The only thing he knew for sure was how to avoid the speed traps, so he turned on an app when he got in his truck.

A little more than four hours later, he’d dodged a speeding ticket, but hadn’t been able to stop playing the cruel song on repeat in his head—they made me do it, they made me do it, they made me do it.

Did she set the wheels in motion, then try to cancel? But they forced her? How would that even work?

Gripping the wheel tighter, he cursed up a storm. He’d been such a fool. For so damn long he’d clung to a big what if. That possibility had tied him up, tethered him, and obsessed him.

Today, he was cut loose. Left adrift and unmoored.

Glancing at the green sign on the highway, he registered that he was five miles from his house. He wanted to see his dog, but he also didn’t want to be alone. The closer the truck wheels turned to the exit, the less he wanted to be by himself.

He needed company. He needed someone.

Though he desperately wanted to see Sophie, he didn’t want to see her like this. Not when his head was messier than it had ever been, and not when his heart was twisted into tattered strands.

The time he’d spent with Sophie over the last few weeks was like shedding a skin, molting his old self, leaving it behind.

But now?

Hell, he didn’t know if he was coming or going. If he was the guy he’d been before or the man he’d become with Sophie.

Limbo. This was the utter hell of limbo. He was stuck in it like quicksand, and he didn’t want to drag her down with him.

He needed the three people in his life who’d known him before, during and after.

As he turned on his blinker to exit the highway, he called Shannon, gave her the rundown, and she told him she’d gather the crew.

Then his phone rang, and it was Sophie.

* * *

Passport? Check.

Luggage packed? Done.

Flight checked into? Good to go.

After zipping her suitcase, she left a small toiletry kit on top of it, which she would tuck inside tomorrow morning. Then she called the car service that would take her to the airport at the crack of dawn, to confirm that everything was set for her pickup.

When she hung up, she scrolled across her home screen in case it revealed a missed call from Ryan. It had been ten hours since he’d left, and she was eager to know how his day had gone. The more time passed, the more nervous she became about what had happened in Hawthorne. But she wasn’t a teenager debating whether to call a boy she liked. She was a grown woman dating a man, so she dialed his number as she walked into her kitchen to grab a glass of water.

“Hey,” he said, his voice hollow.

She had never heard him sound so dead. “Hey to you. So how did it go?”

He sighed heavily. “Let me pull over.”

The sound of the car engine stopping greeted her ears as she turned on the tap. Then he told her his mother had confessed. She gripped the counter, and set down the water glass. Words sputtered out. “Oh my God, Ryan. I can’t believe she told you that. How? Why? How are you doing?”

“I don’t know. I honestly don’t know how I’m doing. It’s like my world is upside down. Because I believed in the possibility of her maybe being innocent for the longest time, and now it’s been twisted and turned inside out. I don’t know what to do now, or what to think about anything,” he said in that same monotone.

Her heart ached for him, and she wanted to comfort him, and hold him close. She wanted to be the one he leaned on. “Do you want me to delay my trip so that we can spend time together? So I can be there with you as you deal with this? I can easily push my flight back a few days if you need me.”

If you need me.

Oh God, she desperately wanted him to need her. Her pulse raced with longing for his yes.

“No,” he said quickly. “I can’t let you do that.”

“I don’t mind. I want to be here for you,” she said, trying to comfort him.

“It’s okay. I need to go see my sister and brothers now anyway.”

“Of course,” she said, and she understood logically why he’d want to go see them. She just wished her stupid heart didn’t hurt the tiniest bit that he hadn’t needed her. “Go. See them,” she said in her cheeriest voice. He didn’t need to detect her worry right now. He had enough on his plate.

“I should probably call your brother, too. I guess I’ll see you…” he said, but his voice trailed off.

She picked up the thread, crossing her fingers. “Do you still want me to come by later? Or do you want to come here?” she asked, ready to kick herself for sounding like a lovesick teenager.

“Soph,” he said, his voice heavy. “I’m not in a good place right now. I think I just need to give John the news then be with Shan, Michael and Colin. Everything—the visit, the pattern, the stuff she said—it’s hitting me hard and fucking with my head again. Let me deal with this and then I’ll see you.”

She gulped. “Of course, of course. This is a huge thing and you need to talk to them.”

“When do you get back from your trip?”

“Next week.”

“I’ll see you then. We’ll do something special. Finally ride the roller coaster at New York, New York together. Okay?” But he didn’t sound as if he was looking forward to their reunion. He sounded as if he didn’t care.

“Sure,” she said, nodding several times, trying to convince herself that he still cared.

“Yeah. I just…right now…”

“You need to take a step back,” she said, filling in the gap.

“Not from you. Just from…”

“Feeling so much?”

“Maybe. I don’t know. I just need to see them right now.”

“You go. Drive safely. I love you.”

“I love you,” he said, but he didn’t sound as if he believed it, and the deadness in his tone made her want to cry.

When he hung up, she let the tears fall, even though they felt selfish, even though they felt like weakness. The tears fell for herself, and for him, too. For all he was dealing with. For this new bombshell dropped in his lap. His family couldn’t catch a damn break, and she hated that the tragedy in his past was tearing new fissures in his present.

A little later, after she’d dabbed her cheeks and dried her eyes, she let the reel of the last few weeks play, trying to understand the man. He’d been private and circumspect at first. When pushed, he’d become open and vulnerable. But what if the talking was more of the exception than the norm?

Had he returned to the man he was before?

Three and out. Over and done. Protect your heart. Don’t get close to anybody but your family.

Even then, family could stab you in the back. He’d learned the hard way.

Call her overdramatic. Call her a conclusion-leaper. Or call her a cool analyst of the situation.

That very morning, Ryan had left her a note saying he would come see her tonight. Because I can’t stay away from you, Sophie. I swear, I can’t.

She could live without seeing him tonight. She wasn’t seventeen. But what worried her was the complete 180-degree shift he’d made in ten hours. He’d left his house determined to find his way back to her that night, no matter what. But when everything changed, so did his desire for her. His family story had prevented him from getting close to her in the first place. His family background wasn’t going away. It was only becoming more complicated, with more players, more names, and more threads.

More time.

More space.

More moments to retreat.

Hunting for information, she sank down on a kitchen stool, and called her brother. “I know you can’t give me the details of the case, and I’m not asking for them, but I need to know—is this going to end anytime soon?”

John exhaled loudly. “Sophie, you know I don’t have an answer. Even if this were an open-and-shut case I wouldn’t have the answer. These things can go on forever. Oddly enough, this case was something of a rarity in the first place when his mother was arrested and tried in a matter of months the first time. Most cases go on for a long time, especially when they’re reopened, and involve gangs and crimes committed over the years.”

Years.

That word clung heavily to the air, like thick smog.

What would that be like? Every time there was a new wrinkle, would Ryan retreat? Would she always be the one who had to step closer to him? To offer the shoulder to lean on?

She’d offered it tonight, and he hadn’t taken it.

Would he ever want it or need it? And would she be satisfied if he always turned elsewhere for comfort? Compared to him she’d had an easy life. As he reeled over his mother’s guilt, here she was jetting off to Frankfurt to check out her new car, for Christ’s sake. But that was all the more reason why she wanted to be the supportive one—because she could. She could be here to hold his hand when he needed her. But he didn’t seem to want that.

To keep herself busy, she called Holden and met him for a drink at the Mirage.

“I have news,” he said, his eyes lighting up after he’d ordered his white wine.

“Do tell,” she said, glad to focus on something else.

He leaned in to whisper. “I met someone.”

She clapped twice. “Tell me everything. What’s he like?”

Holden wiggled his eyebrows. “Actually, he’s a she.”

“A she? Like she used to be a he?”

He laughed and shook his head. “No. I meant I’m seeing a woman.”

“You are?” He nodded, but the answer seemed so strange, even though this had always been a possibility. Somehow, it had been easier to think of him with men than with women.

“What’s she like, then?”

“Oh, she’s lovely. Natalie is very sweet and friendly.” As he waxed on about the new woman in his life, Sophie tried to ignore the strange new sting in her heart from this conversation. Seeing Holden through the lens of a preference for men had been far more manageable for her ego, it turned out. Now, her confidence was suffering another blow, unexpectedly, with this realization that she wasn’t the right woman for Holden either.

But there was more to this hollow ache in her heart. A new worry took root—the fear that Holden would slip away from her, too, as he cozied up to Natalie. Because Sophie couldn’t help but wonder how this new lady would feel about him being so friendly with his ex-wife, and if this most predictable relationship in her life was about to become unpredictable, too.

She loathed instability.