“So,” she says simply.
“So what?”
“You and Ivy.”
“There is no me and Ivy,” I say flatly.
Lillianna smiles. “The way you were looking at her suggests otherwise.”
“Drop it, Lilly.”
Her lips turn down. “Why?”
“Because there’s nothing between us. She’s here because of Madison, not me.”
“Why not both of you?”
“What’s the point? When this is over, she’s going back to New York. I’ll be returning to Canada.”
“You don’t know how this will all end. And stop worrying so much about tomorrow. Enjoy today. You deserve a bit of happiness and fun.”
“No, I don’t.” My self-exile in Quebec gave me way too much time to reflect on what a shitty person I am. I want to change, but that doesn't mean I can. Or that I deserve something good.”
“Because of what you did to Sebastian?” Lillianna asks, her voice gentle but direct.
“That. And other things.”
“You’re not Dad,” she says, resting a hand on my mud-covered arm. “You never were. You just thought you had to be that way to survive in this family.”
I don't reply. The truth of her words cuts too close to the bone. “I’m getting in the shower,” I tell her.
She pats my arm and grimaces at her now-dirty hand. “Good idea. You look like something the dog dragged through a swamp.”
I climb the stairs to my room, and Lillianna’s words follow me.You’re not him. You never were.
I wait for the usual rebuttal in my head. The list of reasons why she's wrong. The catalog of every way I've proven I'm exactly like him.
It doesn't come.
Just mud drying on my boots and the echo of Madison's laugh on the ridge. Ivy's warm eyes when she said "see you at dinner" like she actually wanted to. The memory of wind and speed and not thinking about Quebec or escape or anything except the trail ahead.
For the first time in three years, Lillianna's words don't feel like a lie I want to believe. They feel like something I might actually be becoming.
Maybe that's progress. Or maybe one muddy afternoon doesn't erase three years of rot.
Yet as I pass Ivy’s door, hearing the shower running behind it, I wonder if staying away from her is really the selfless choice, or just another form of cowardice. And if choosing happiness—even temporarily—would really make me my father’s son, or finally, truly, my own man.
Chapter Eleven
Thorne
The smell of bourbon lingers in my nearly empty glass, mixing with the late afternoon shadows stretching across the grim evidence laid out before us. I stare at the satellite images spread across my library table. Neck-deep in my father's sins, I'm tempted to break my one-drink rule. With aerial photos of contaminated groundwater and EPA bribes staring back at me, a second and third drink are looking damn appealing.
“The dump site’s groundwater contamination extends at least half a mile from the original facility,” Sebastian says, tracing his finger along a blue line representing the water table. “And based on test results I received yesterday, it’s been leaching slowly for years.”
Madison slides another satellite image toward him, this one marked with handwritten notes in careful script.
At first glance, a fourteen-year-old’s presence at the table doesn’t make sense, but it’s her evidence we’re reviewing. Plus, the little blackmailer has a helluva memory.
