Thought of Abby.
Anger replaced the guilt.
“Please... my dad... my...” Tristan was crying now, too. “My dad...”
“He’s not—”
“Drop the fucking knife!” A shadow appeared behind Tristan. “Drop the fucking knife, Tristan.”
Ivy saw a gun, saw Vaughn’s face.
Her eyes darted back to Tristan. He was crestfallen.
Broken.
Still clutched the knife, though.
“Tristan, it’s over.”
The blade finally slipped from Tristan’s hand, landed harmlessly in the grass. He started to move to his left, away from Ivy, but toward the edge of the cliff.
“Your father took everything from me, Ivy.” She could barely hear Tristan over the crashing waves.
“It’s over, Tristan,” Vaughn repeated. He, too, sounded defeated.
“It is over,” Tristan admitted. Then he gave Ivy the saddest smile she’d ever seen. “I’m no longer a prisoner.”
100 Prisoners problem. Prisoner’s dilemma.
You’re not the prisoner, Ivy thought.Your dad is the prisoner.
She realized Tristan’s intentions a moment too late.
“No!”
Ivy reached for him, but missed.
Tristan jumped.
“No!”
He didn’t scream. Didn’t utter another word.
Ivy made it to the edge in time to see Tristan land. Only, his body didn’t fall in the water.
The Shrewsbury River ran along the bluff, but there was a small embankment just below where Tristan had leapt, an outcropping of just a dozen feet of dry ground.
Tristan landed there.
A mist of blood coated the flowers that his mangled corpse hadn’t crushed.
Queen Anne’s lace, because of course it was.
Ivy felt an arm slip around her waist, gently ease her back from the cliff. She turned into Vaughn and cried against his chest as he hugged her.
“Abby?” she sobbed. “Is she—”
“Your friend’s going to be alright. I got to her in time. I got toyouin time.”
