All at once, I know what I said to Brothers in the barn was a lie. I don’t have it in me to forgive the Caudills. I don’t have it in me to forget either. No, tonight, I’m going to lay it all out. It’s time to wrap this up and move on.
I came to stand and deliver, and by God, I will.
For the kid nobody protected.
For Cherry, for Kyle.
But most of all, for Della and Landis, a boy I’ve never met. An echo of myself years ago.
The crowd on the platform shifts. Brothers glances over his shoulder and blinks slowly, his hand falling on Leland’s shoulder. Now’s your chance, his eyes say. I shift closer but don’t face her. She keeps her back to me, spine stiff.
“Who is with Landis?” I whisper.
She turns briefly, like she’s just looking around. “Kayleigh.”
“What’s her plan?” I say.
“She said she’s got this. I think she means to take him to Byway herself.”
There’s a low whine in the distance of my mind. From the corner of my vision, I see Leland break away from Brothers and go back to Della. I back up, jostled by the soldiers behind me. All I can see is his hand sliding around her waist, the way his mouth almost grazes her temple as he says something in her ear.
She shrinks.
My stomach turns. The Della I know is bright, quick, brave. Standing beside Leland, she’s a shadow of herself. Her denial to label what Leland did to her as assault is understandable, but it’s clear she metabolized it as such. He might not have done it violently, but what he did was still intimately violent. Her body knows.
I want to kill him.
Brothers appears at my side, eyes wide. “Jen, do you trust me?”
“No,” I say.
He takes me by the shoulder, pulling me off the platform and into the crowd. “I need you to trust me just this once. For Della.”
Our eyes meet, and I see everything that went down between us. It’s sad we’re so broken that even with wolves at our heels, I still can’t trust him.
“Della thinks Kayleigh is taking Landis out of the house tonight,” I say.
“I guessed. That girl is so fucking stubborn.” His pupils are blown. Goddamn, he’s afraid for her. “If Kayleigh is caught, if he finds out it was her, he’ll kill her when he gets back tonight. We can’t just fight here tonight, Jen. We have to finish this.”
“For her? Or for you?”
He glances sideways at me, eyes sharp. “I’ve lost a lot of people. I’m not losing her.”
He turns on his heel and starts moving back to our platform. I go after him, taking him by the shoulder and pulling him to face me. He’s sweating, his shirt drenched, but not from heat. I’ve never seenhim like this before. I didn’t know Brothers Boyd knew how to be afraid.
“He might not know it was her who took Landis if we can get her back to the house in time,” I say.
“There’s no one else it could be. Kayleigh is the only person in that house with Landis tonight,” he says.
My stomach sinks. “Kayleigh is… She knows how this is going to end.”
“Either we all keep running from the Caudills forever, or we finish this tonight,” he says. Sweat etches down his temple. “I was…I was thinking about marrying her, but now…I just want her to live. That’s all I’m asking.”
I see him, not as the Good God Boyd, but as a man, not unlike myself. It breaks through the bitterness inside.
“You really love her,” I say.
His throat bobs, lids flickering. “Fight Leland instead. I can convince him to get in the pit with you. If you get the chance, kill him.”
