Page 82 of The Summer of Us

“You aren’t going to say anything?”

“No.”

“Ask me to do something for you?”

I barked out a laugh. “That had been my plan. But I can’t. I have to step back and let Sunny deal with her business on her own, as much as it kills me. I’ll be leaving Mission Cove today.”

“But you’ll be back?”

I shook my head. “No, the history here is too much to overcome.”

She looked down at the pictures in her lap, then stuffed them into the envelope. “I want these destroyed.”

“I don’t have a shredder.”

“A match?”

I indicated the fireplace. “Help yourself.”

She placed the envelope in the grate and I obligingly opened the flue, not really wanting to choke on the fumes. I handed her the box of matches and a piece of paper I crumpled into a loose ball. She bent, lighting the match, and we both watched as the flames curled and flickered, growing as they gained strength, the envelope catching fire, the edges coiling, the photos slowly disappearing into nothing.

Deciding it was as good a time as ever, I grabbed the other files and added them to the pile, watching as my father’s legacy of fear died in a pile of ash. I would destroy the USB drives. I wasn’t remotely interested in their contents.

It was over. And despite what I had lost, I felt lighter.

Martha turned, heading toward the door. There was too much bad blood between us for there ever to be anything but the most tenuous of business relations, but perhaps going forward, the hate would begin to dissipate. Maybe she could forge a new relationship with her husband.

Stranger things had happened.

She paused at the door.

“I knew your mother.”

I snapped up my head, prepared to fight.

“She was one of the kindest girls at school. Always willing to help someone out. She refused to let bullies win. She used to lecture them, pointing out their wrongs. Your father was one of the worst ones in school—that was how they met. He seemed to change, but I suppose he never really did.”

“I guess he hid it for a while.”

“Or maybe he tried, but his true nature won out. He was very selfish—even when he was younger. Your mother was the exact opposite. I think she thought she could make him a better person.”

“That obviously didn’t work.”

She smiled. It was the first real one I had ever seen from her. “Even angels can’t always perform miracles.” She tilted her head. “You are very much like her.”

No one had ever said that to me. No one ever spoke of my mother.

“Thank you.”

She turned to leave, stopping as she gripped the door, not looking back. “She would be very proud of you.”

Then she was gone, her footsteps hurrying away and fading.

I blinked at the empty doorway.

I wasn’t my father.

I was like my mother.