When she said it like that…
“I didn’t mean it to come off like that.”
“I know there’s no love lost between us,” she whispered. “I know. But that doesn’t mean that I didn’t care. I wrote you every single day, Gentry. I cared. I cared a lot. You saved me from a fate worse than death. And I’m really sorry for what happened afterward. But I deserved to know that I hadn’t killed you.”
“You didn’t,” I promised.
She turned her back on me and opened the door to her RV using a key code on the lock pad.
Her dog barreled out, stopped to growl at me, then started wagging his tail.
The day before I was sentenced, I’d seen a man in the parking lot of the Walmart selling dogs.
There was one left, and I thought… “Sage needs a dog to protect her.”
It’d been a spur-of-the-moment decision.
I’d paid a grand for it—not like I’d be needing my money anytime soon anyway—and then taken it to her house and dropped him off.
I’d spent a total of thirty minutes with the puppy.
But it looked like he still remembered me.
“Hey, boy.” I held out my hand and let him sniff my fingers.
He barked, tail still wagging.
He didn’t come to me, though.
“Neo.”
The name must’ve been a release of some kind because the dog shot toward me, sniffing me excitedly.
I gave him a good scratch and then looked back toward Sage, who was watching it all with no emotion on her face. “I knew you were the one that got him for me.”
I shrugged.
“It meant a lot,” she admitted. “Thank you. He’s been my best friend.”
I nodded. “Sage…”
“I think I’m good.” She went on, “You can go.”
I sighed. “I was just going to tell you a few things since you know now.”
She crossed her arms over her chest and waited.
I scratched at my head, realizing that I should’ve known this wasn’t going to be easy.
Yeah, I should’ve told her everything the day she got here.
I shouldn’t have waited.
“I pulled some strings to get you here.”
Her eyes zeroed in on my face so intensely that I shifted from foot to foot.
Her long brown hair was up in a messy bun on top of her head, and there was quite a bit of it falling out all around her face.
