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FIFTEEN
Lance
“The letters,” Mason tells me, coming to stand beside me at the bottom of the stairs where I sit, waiting for Waverley.
She disappeared moments ago to get her welly boots so we can feed Mingo.
She told Scarlet we were going to visit her nana and papa’s graves after dessert, and I prepared myself to betray my child, knowing I couldn’t outright lie to Scarlet’s face, but she barely even nodded in reply, gently bending down to kiss the top of Waverley’s head.
If I thought she’d let me pull her into a hug right there in the kitchen and tell her everything is okay, I would’ve. Before the blood in my veins could reach my heart and beat.
The nightmares always rocked me. It normally took me hours to get myself back from the shaking, trembling mess to a semblance of a man again. Today was quicker. Maybe because it was cut short before it could get as bad as they have in the past. Or maybe because I had a table of people waiting for me downstairs.
People, who after all I’ve put them through, are still here.
The idea that Waverley, my flesh and blood, was waiting on me… it gave me a place to be. A reason to pull myself together.
Seeing Scarlet so visibly affected wasn’t something I anticipated when I sat down at the table. Her face was deathly pale, her eyes unwilling to hold on a single person in the room.
She was deep in her own mind and still is now.
Because of me.
I take the letters from Mason. “Thank you for getting these.”
“Of course. We were passing anyway.”
My fingers curl around the thick stack, desperate to tear into them, to inhale every word, every detail. I can’t help but wonder how much of what Scarlet can’t tell me is currently held in my hands.
To think I had them all that time.
I could have known Waverley had I just let them in.
“I have a question,” Mason says, watching me with a wary gaze. “It’s been years, so you might not remember. But back before… before—”
“Before I went to prison,” I say for him.
He nods. “I gave you the deeds to this place. The documents signing the estate over to Scarlet.”
“You did,” I confirm, narrowing my gaze on him.
He stares back, a hint of shame tainting his face. “Where are they?”
I twist my head around the banister. Scarlet and Nina are in the kitchen, their chatter carrying through the house. “They’re in a safe place,” I say, quietly enough no one will hear. “I can get them for you.”
His jaw clenches and unclenches. I can’t decide if he’s mad and is about to hit me, or if he’s ready to burst into tears. I pray for the former.“Why didn’t you give them to Aldridge?”
I roll my lips, wondering how honest I want to be. I decide the whole truth is the fairest option, considering the sensitivity of the topic. “Because I couldn’t, and wouldn’t, see her hurt any more than she already was. She’d just lost your dad. It wasn’t the time to take more names from the house—from her. If I hadn’t been there that night in your office, and you gave those documents to her… you’d have lost her, Mase. And I don’t like to think what that might’ve meant for our friendship.”
He drops his eyes, staring at his feet.
“And I knew…” I wait for him to meet my eyes again, Waverley’s feet thundering down the stairs at my back. Mason frowns down at me, a pained look on his face. “I knew you’d come home.”
His nostrils flare, and I take it as my cue to get up.
Waverley grasps my hand as she passes, pulling me with her. “Crutches,” I groan, wincing as I stand.
She sighs. “I forget you’re slow.”
