I don’t know how much time passes before I hear Silver’s voice. “Lee!”
She stares down at me, tears streaking her face, and relief pours through me. She’s still here. I didn’t lose her. I leap off what’s left of Xavier’s partner and pull her to me, holding her like my last anchor to sanity.
She’s right here, real and solid in my arms, sobbing intomy neck. I jerk her away to look over her frantically. “Are you hurt anywhere? Did they hurt you?”
“No.” She grabs my face, looking me in the eye. “I’m not hurt. I’m okay.” I pull her against me again, unable to let go for a long minute until her muffled words reach me. “I’m sorry, Lee. I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay. It’s going to be okay.” I let her go and nod to Arlow, who moves to be near her.
Isla lies in a heap. Her empty eyes survey the scene, the tipped over chair with severed ropes, two dead men bleeding into the dirt, two devastated people watching me kneel beside her. I untie her feet and hands and sit beside what’s left of my wife.
Minutes tick away. All I can do is stare at her face. There’s no sign there that a bullet pierced her skull, no blood on her cheeks or lips, only pooling out under her head to soak into the dirt. I brush my fingers over her lids to close her eyes. Now, she’s only asleep. I only see her asleep next to me. The urge to shake her awake is there and I have to restrain myself. She’s dead. This time it’s real. After mourning her for all these years, I’m starting over.
She wasn’t dead. She left you.
No. They took her. I stare at the slight lines near her mouth. They’re new, showing that she’s aged, that she’s lived while I was trying not to die of guilt. She loved me. She was terrified and told him what he needed to hear so he’d let her go, that’s all.
I dig my fingernails into my scalp. Then why, when themoment came, did I sacrifice her? Because it was her or Silver. I jerk when Arlow’s hand falls on my shoulder. “Lee.” His voice is full of sympathy but firm. “I’m so fucking sorry. You can lose your shit as much as you need to later, but right now, we have to move.”
No, I don’t want to move. I don’t want to walk away from the sight of her face. “Just get Silver out of here and don’t come back.”
Arlow kneels down beside me. “Look at me.” I drag my eyes away from Isla. It feels like I’m in a trance, completely disconnected. “That’s not happening. We’re going to take them to my graveyard after we clean up here. I’ve already talked to Calli and she’s getting prepared. Silver’s going to leave to be with her and Lacey. I’m going to walk Silver out to her truck and then drive yours up here.”
My nod gets him moving while I go back to staring at Isla. Part of me is waiting for her to open her eyes like her corpse did in my nightmares. Or for me to open my eyes and realize this is just another nightmare. I’m vaguely aware of Arlow collecting everyone’s guns and escorting Silver away.
The moonlight shifts, illuminating her pale face as I sit in the destroyed barn and try to find a way to say goodbye, something I never got to do. “I’m sorry.” The words come out hoarse and broken. In the moment that I said Silver’s name and signed Isla’s death warrant, it didn’t feel like a conscious decision but a gut one, pulled from somewhere deep inside of me. I couldn’t let Silver die. I had to choose or I’d lose both of them. How many times have nightmares shown me thatfreezing up would destroy us all? That no decision is still a decision.
Time becomes immeasurable as I sit there thinking of all the things I’ve wanted to tell her over the years that I couldn’t. But the only thing that comes out again and again is “I’m sorry.”
“Lee.” Arlow’s voice seems to travel a long distance to reach me, but I look up to see him standing a foot away. “I found some landscaping cloth in your truck bed. We can use it to wrap them while we get them moved.”
Finally, I get to my feet and take one of the rolls. “I’ve got her.”
While Arlow rolls Xavier up and then the man who came with him, I gently move Isla onto a long sheet of cloth. Her head lolls onto her shoulder, and blood drips on the material with a light pattering sound. It takes everything I have to pull the cloth over her face. I scoop her up and take her outside. Arlow has already pulled back the retractable cover from the bed of my pickup, and I place her inside. We carry the guys out together, then go to retrieve Trinity.
“We can’t leave Xavier’s truck,” I point out.
“I know. Calli and I are going to come back for it. I’ve got it worked out. Just trust me.”
My brain won’t seem to function well enough to take control of things so he’s welcome to it and I’m grateful. The chair gets broken and thrown into the back, along with the ropes. All that remains in the barn is some blood soaked into the dirt. With luck, no one will even find it but if they do,blood in a ruined barn isn’t something most people would care about. They’ll assume it’s from an animal or that a hunter field dressed a deer here.
“Do you want me to drive?” Arlow asks, and I shake my head.
“I’m good.” I’ve never been farther from good, but Arlow’s place isn’t even two miles from here.
“Use the road past the graveyard,” he instructs when we get near his house. It’s barely a road and it leads back to one of his meadows where his beehives stand. My headlights land on Calli, who sits on an ATV with a trailer attached, waiting for us.
“Where’s Lacey?” I ask, climbing out.
“She’s fine. She knows everything, Lee, but it’s okay. She’s helping Silver dig.”
That focuses me. “What?”
“She’s helping to dig. It’s going to take us all night.” Calli licks her lips. “With…so many.”
My little sister is digging graves to hide the men we killed.
The cover on my pickup rattles as Arlow pulls it open. “Come on. Let’s get them on the trailer.” Once the bodies are stacked like wood, Arlow nods at me. “Park it back behind the tree line where it’s out of sight while you’re digging. It might be a little while before we make it back.”
