The stillness that followed was deafening.
Grant reached out, gripping the edge of the table until his knuckles turned white. He thought of his father—the man who had coached his ball games, the man who had sat on the porch and talked about honor and the ‘weight of the mountain.’
“He told us it was a walkaway,” Grant rumbled, the sound coming from deep in him. “He sat right there at that fire pit and told us she just moved on. That it was a story.”
“Grant…” Caitlin started, reaching for his arm.
He didn’t feel her. He was looking at Burke.
The two brothers stood in the heart of their home, staring at each other across the wreckage of their family legacy. Everything they believed about their father, about the badge, about the ‘Scott way’ was fracturing.
“N372FL,”Burke said, his voice regaining a jagged, professional edge. “I’m going to run the tail number. I’m going to find out where that plane came from and who owned it in ninety-nine.”
“And then?” Izzy asked.
Burke closed the book. He looked like he’d aged ten years in ten minutes.
“And then we go to the house,” Burke said. “We don’t wait for tomorrow. We go tonight.”
Grant grabbed his hat from the counter, his jaw set in a hard, rigid line that mirrored the mountain peaks outside.
“If he lied to us, Burke,” Grant said, his voice a low, dangerous vibration. “If he let that girl disappear to protect Wade Hollis… then the Scott name doesn’t mean a damn thing in this valley.”
He looked at Izzy—not as a guest, not as a city girl, but as the woman who had brought the truth home.
“Stay here,” he commanded, but his eyes were pleading. “Naomi has the gate. Don’t open the door.”
The two brothers walked out of the house, their shadows long and dark against the barn. The siren didn’t wail this time. They drove toward their father’s house in a quiet that felt like the end of the world.
29
Burton Scott — Evening
The headlights of Grant’s truck cut a lonely path through the dust of Scott Valley Road. It was only a mile and a half from Bridlepath to the elder Scott’s place, but tonight it felt like a hundred miles of bad road.
Grant gripped the steering wheel, his knuckles white in the glow of the dashboard. Beside him, Burke sat low in the seat, his eyes fixed on the dark silhouettes of the hemlocks passing by.
“Grant,” Burke said, his voice quiet.
“Yeah.”
“When we get there… let me handle the talking. At least at first.”
Grant cut a sharp look toward his brother. “Why? You think I can’t handle it?”
“I think you and Pop are cut from the same piece of jagged stone,” Burke said, finally looking over. “You’re both stubborn; you both have a temper like a dry forest in July, and right now, we need answers, not a fistfight. Just… let me set the scene.”
“Fine. But if he starts stonewalling us, Burke, I’m not sitting there.”
“He won’t stonewall us. Not if we show him what’s actually happening.”
They pulled up to the fence line where Burton’s old truck was parked. The elder Scott was out by the wire, his back to them, silhouetted against the fading purple of the sky.
Grant killed the engine. The stillness that followed was heavy, broken only by the rhythmic clink-clink of Burton working the wire.
They stepped out, the gravel crunching under their boots. Burton didn’t look up. He didn’t even pause.
“Pop,” Burke said, keeping his voice level as they reached the fence. “We need a minute.”
