“No. I tore it up instead.” I look at him through blurry eyes.
“I tried to give her a way out. She chose to fight instead.”
“So where does that leave us?”
“It leaves us knowing the truth. And it leaves us with enough evidence to bury her and the Carlston family if we have to.” He reaches over and takes my hand. “I won’t let them win, Alice. I won’t let them hurt you anymore.”
The certainty in his voice should comfort me, but instead I feel a spike of anxiety. He’s going to war with my mother.For me. What if it destroys him?
“Thank you,” I whisper. “For fighting for me when I didn’t even know you were fighting.”
“You don’t have to thank me.”
We sit in silence for a moment, and then Sawyer squeezes my hand. “That’s when I knew for sure.”
“Knew what?”
“That I was falling for you.”
My heart does something complicated in my chest, a mix of elation and terror. He’s falling for me. Present tense. Not fell. Falling. “Past tense?”
“No. Present tense. I am falling for you, Alice Campbell. Have been since the day we met.”
My breath catches.Say it. Just say it back.But the words stick in my throat, tangled up with all my fears. “Good. Because I think I’m falling for you too.”
It comes out quieter than I meant it to, less certain than his declaration. But it’s the truth.
We finish eating as the sun sets completely, and the silence between us shifts from comfortable to weighted. When I glance over at Sawyer, he’s looking out at the lights of Creeksprings below, but his expression is distant, troubled.
“What are you thinking about?” I ask.
“Just… wondering how we got here. A few months ago I was just going through the motions. Work, home, studying. Didn’t think about much beyond that.” He pauses. “Didn’t let myself think about much beyond that.”
“What changed?”
He looks at me, and there’s something vulnerable in his eyes. “One day I was getting some free coffee at a bank and you were there.”
I laugh softly despite the heavy conversation. “That’s a weird way to start a relationship.”
“Yeah, well, my life’s been pretty weird for a while.” His voice gets quieter, more careful. “I wasn’t really living before I met you. I guess I was just surviving.”
“Is it because of your wife?”
Sawyer nods slowly, and I can see him deciding something. Whether to let me in or keep this wall up. “Lila died three years ago. Car accident. But Ali, the thing is…” He pauses, and the silence stretches. His jaw tightens.“She was having an affair when she died.”
I feel my breath catch. Oh god. “Sawyer.”
“I found out a few days after her accident. Her coworker, the guy she was sleeping with, he came to see me. Told me everything. Said he couldn’t keep lying about it anymore.” His voice is flat, factual, but I can hear the old pain underneath it. “I couldn’t tell anyone because she was dead, you know? What was the point in ruining her memory? The weird thing I don’t even think I would’ve divorced her.”
He’s been carrying this alone for three years. I reach over and take his hand, squeezing tight. “I’m so sorry, Sawyer.”
Sawyer looks down at our joined hands. “I was a mess that night. After I found out about the affair. Drunk, probably would have driven home if Nora hadn’t shown up at the bar here in town. She sat with me, let me talk about how angry I was, how I felt like an idiot for not seeing it.” He glances at me. “Some people saw us leave together and assumed…”
“Did anything happen? I know it's not my business, but—”
“Nothing happened. Nora was just being a friend when I needed one. But in a town this size, being seen leaving a bar with a woman who isn’t your wife, even if your wife is dead…” He shrugs. “People talk.”
“People love to talk,” I correct bitterly.
