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It’s hard for me to say this out loud. “I always got lost down there as a kid, and then I just got so busy managing the ranch, I forgot about it for a while. But then Dad got sick, and I found out about the tax issues. I wanted to do a walk-through and take full stock of the property. That’s when I found the town…the body…and that shotgun casing I know damn well came from Dad’s gun.”
“Shit.”
“Yyyep. That just about covers it.” I need a swig of my beer to keep going, wetting my dry mouth and giving me a little more liquid courage. “He was so far gone by then, Holt. Too far gone to tell me anything clear. But right before he died, he came back a little. He told me to find the man’s gun, and something about a rock. He said he had to do it.”
Holt drops his head.
I take a shaky breath, blinking my blurring eyes again and again, hard. “I just can’t figure out why. So I’ve been trying to keep anyone else from finding out ever since.”
“He must’ve had a good reason,” Holt says. “Dr. Potter wouldn’t just shoot a dude over nothing, Libby.”
“I want to believe that so bad you don’t know how much it hurts.”
“I can guess.”
Holt’s looking at me fiercely.
I feel like he really sees me, right now.
And there’s not a hint of judgment in his eyes.
“You’ve been carrying this around since he died,” he says. “Haven’t you?”
I nod miserably. “I never thought it’d come to this. He always told us not to go down there, but I always thought he was just trying to keep us from getting lost or hurt. And then when I found out the real reason…”
“It shook your world,” he whispers. “He couldn’t even clear his own name to you, once he died. So you’d rather live with not knowing at all.”
I nod again.
It’s too hard to speak this time.
But Holt offers his hand, stretching it across the table.
“That’s not wrong, Libby,” he murmurs. It’s gentle. Sincere. Two sweet things I totally don’t associate with Holt Silverton. “We all want to remember the people we love as their best selves. What the hell good would it do changing that now, after he’s gone?”
“Y-yeah.”
Don’t take his hand, I tell myself.
Only, I need it.
My fingers slip into his, letting Holt’s warmth and the roughness of his fingers envelop mine.
He doesn’t say anything.
Just squeezes my hand gently, reminding me he’s here, grounding me.
Maybe, just maybe, reminding me that people can start off not being all that great…but they can learn to be better.
I’m still tripping over words, but his grip makes it easier.
“He had to have killed that guy before I was born, or near enough. My whole life, I’ve grown up thinking I knew who Dad was…when he was someone else.”
“Maybe he wasn’t,” Holt tells me. “Maybe he was the man you thought he was. Maybe he killed that man in self-defense or to protect somebody. Maybe someone else shot Bostrom with Mark’s gun, but he witnessed it. He could’ve had a thousand reasons, honey, and a thousand reasons more for hiding it. Sounds like he regretted it all his days.”
“Regret doesn’t undo murder,” I whisper.
“It doesn’t,” he concedes, tilting his head—but only holds my hand tighter, his thumb stroking along the back of my palm in long sweeps. “But protecting himself doesn’t make a man evil. It doesn’t change the way he loved you. You and Sierra both.”
My lips quiver.
Nope. Nada. Not gonna cry.
“But that’s just what I don’t want,” I force out. “Maybe he wasn’t some big hometown hero like your brother and his buddies…but people remember him kindly. I don’t want to ruin it. To turn that ugly. If the bank takes the ranch, or if people come out to inspect it—”
“They’re going to find out, and without all the answers, they’ll assume the worst,” he finishes.
“Yeah. That.”
With a small smile, he gives my hand another squeeze.
“We’ll just have to get to the bottom of it ourselves. Prove your old man only fired under real duress, and then this whole thing gets sorted like it should. His name stays clear, the case closes, and you can save Potter Ranch.”
I blink.
Again.
And then just one more time, like maybe if I just blink enough the world will clear up and what he just said will make sense.
“Pardon?”
He grins at me.
“Don’t you ‘pardon’ me,” he teases. “Talk like you know where you came from.”
I kick him under the table.
Not hard, but he obliges me anyway, squinting his eye up with an exaggerated “Ouch.”
Okay.
That gets a laugh.
I also realize we’re still holding hands, and the inside of my chest goes molten-hot. I pull back quickly, clearing my throat, curling my hand against my beer, hoping it can help cool me off.
