Page 68 of One Merciful Moment

Wade frowned. "Tethers?"

Copper nodded. "The veil responds to connection. To the strongest pull in a person's life. Not want. Not fear. Not readiness." He pointed toward the houses lining the street. "Children have the strongest tethers. They're tied to their parents, siblings, and homes. That's why Kallie could walk through the veil when she was little. Her heart belonged outside Everstill... until it didn't."

"And when she came back?" Rex asked. "How was that possible?"

Copper's voice softened. "Her tether changed. Something in her life shifted. Something broke, and whatever was in Everstill was more powerful, drawing her back."

"Finn," Vaughn muttered.

"Yes." Copper continued. "Adults are different. Our tethers move. They shift with love, grief, trauma, and purpose. The veil feels that. It listens."

Wade scoffed. "Is that why all of us couldn't feel anything?"

"Your emotions were numbed so you remained tethered to Everstill." Copper looked at Boone. "Ashley wasn't pulled because she was ready. She was pulled because her heart was tied to someone here. The veil responds to love. The kind that changes your life. She might've come here because the veil needed her to stabilize Everstill, but she loved Boone. And that's why she left."

"That's fucked up." Rex leaned against the store. "Everyone could see Boone loved Ashley. Why couldn't he go with her?"

Boone's hands fisted in his pockets. It was his own fault he couldn't go. His choice. The last thing Ashley needed in her world was a drug addict.

"Boone's tether is here," Copper said. "Everstill is the place that steadies him. The veil won't pull someone who still needs the safety of this town."

"Will we never get out?" Vaughn bent over, bracing his hands on his knees. "I don't want to spend my life alone."

"The veil didn't take you because you're not finished here. Your tether hasn't shifted. When it does or when something out there pulls harder than what's keeping you here, the veil will open for you." Copper's steady gaze swept through the men. "The veil opens for the heart. Not the mind. Not the body. The heart decides who stays and who goes."

The men stood in stunned silence as the truth settled over them. Boone was to blame for being here and unable to leave. Love had nothing to do with it.

Copper clapped his hands. "All right. Enough standing around. Everstill has reset. That means we do, too. Brent, you're managing the store now since Moe and Jillian are gone. The rest of you, get the window fixed and the roof patched."

The men moved, grateful for something to do. Routine was the only thing that made sense in a town that pretended nothing had happened.

Copper turned toward Boone slowly. "Boone, walk with me."

They strolled behind the store, where the morning light didn't reach, and the shadows chilled the air. Copper stopped by the loading dock and looked at Boone with concern.

"There's something I didn't say in front of the others." Copper lowered his voice. "Everstill didn't just keep you because you're tethered here. It kept you because it needs you."

"Needs me?" Boone blinked. "I'm nothing but a used-up drug addict. I can't even leave because I'd go back to using."

"This town is built on balance. On the people who were brought here who hold it together. You're one of them. You're here because you keep the rest from falling apart." Copper clamped a hand on Boone's shoulder. "Everstill isn't done with you yet. Maybe not ever."

Boone stared at the ground. His jaw popped as he gritted his teeth.

He had no chance of leaving. He'd lost Ashley. There was nothing else to give.

Everstill could keep him, but it couldn't take any more.

He was empty.

Chapter 40

Ashley

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The morning sun warmed Ashley's shoulders. She stood in her grandmother's garden. The place she'd tended every summer since she was old enough to hold a watering can. This was her happy place.

Or it used to be.