Sable Peak (The Edens)

“Daddy! No!” Allie kicked and screamed.

“Mom,” I hollered.

She already had her arms outstretched to take Allie. “I’ve got her.”

I handed off my daughter, then tore off after Vera, but in my soaked flip-flops, I’d never catch her. So I kicked off the sandals and bolted for my tent, snagging the tennis shoes I’d had on earlier. By the time I had them on, Vera was nowhere in sight. “Fuck.”

But Vance was chasing after her. I’d caught sight of him before he’d disappeared past a cluster of trees. Foster, Jasper and Dad were hot on his heels. Griffin and Knox, who hadn’t stopped to change their shoes, joined the chase.

I outran them all, passing them without a word as I sprinted to find her.

When I caught up to Vance, my lungs and legs burning, he just pointed ahead to where a flash of red-orange streaked in the distance.

“Vera!”

She ignored my shout and kept running, faster than I’d ever seen her move. Like if she were quick enough, she could escape the past.

She ran.

I let her run.

But she was done running alone.

I pushed my body harder, faster, and when I finally caught up, I didn’t stop her. Every fiber of my being wanted to grab her and put this to an end. Except she wasn’t done yet. She needed to keep going.

So I settled in behind her, keeping pace.

She ran.

And I followed.

By the time her strides slowed, I was sweating and breathless. Her run became a jog, then a walk. Then she buried her face in her hands and the wail that escaped her palms tore through my heart.

“Peach.” I wrapped her up, hauling her into my chest.

“Let me go.” A sob broke from her mouth as she tried to wrench her body free.

I held on tighter. “I love you.”

She fought me again, squirming and jerking, trying to wiggle loose. She could fight all she wanted.

I wasn’t letting her go.

“I got you.”

Her shoulders began to shake and the protest leeched from her body.

“I love you.” Nothing else mattered. On the hardest days of her life, I’d be here to remind her that I loved her.

“Mateo.” Another sob cracked clear, then she sagged against me.

“I’m here. I’m not letting go.”

“It hurts.” She sobbed without stopping this time, the cries cleaving me in pieces.

“I know, darlin’.” I held her tighter, a lump forming in my throat. Her pain. My pain.

“It’s open.”

“What’s open?”

She cried harder. “The box. It’s open and it hurts.”

Oh, God. This was killing her. For too long, she’d kept it all locked up. “Let it out.”

“I c-can’t.”

“Yes, you can.” I buried my nose in her hair. “Give it to me.”

“She killed them.” Her entire body went slack, so I turned her in my arms and cradled her against my shoulder as we dropped to our knees. “She killed them. Hadley and Elsie. She killed my sisters. She tried to kill me.”

Her mother.

It was what I’d assumed, but to hear it from her lips was like having a whip slice into my bare back, cutting to the bone.

Was this the first time she’d spoken the truth? She’d never told anyone that before, had she? She’d just locked it away. She’d run from the truth.

Pain, rage, lit my blood into a wildfire, but I didn’t so much as move. I kept my arms locked around Vera, knowing we hadn’t even started yet.

It took her a while to stop crying. The forest moved around us, oblivious to the magnitude of this moment. Birds flew and chirped. Trees swayed and pine cones clacked against branches as they fell.

And I just held Vera, feeling eyes on my back.

Dad. My brothers. They wouldn’t approach. They’d keep their distance and give us this moment. But they were close, ready to help me pick her up when the time came.

“I was on the swim team,” Vera whispered with a hitch. “I was a good swimmer. We lived on a lake. I loved to swim. We had a boat. Dad taught us to waterski. And he’d take us to a quiet spot so we could jump in and swim.”

The lake. That was the trigger. She’d seen Allie in the lake.

A lake, like the one where she’d lived. Where her sisters had drowned.

Fuck. Why hadn’t I thought of that?

“I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry, Vera. I shouldn’t have brought you here.” I should have taken one look at that lake when we’d arrived this morning and turned this camping trip around.

She nuzzled deeper, like if she crawled into my chest, that would make it all go away.

If I could take it from her, I would in a blink.

“She was acting strange when we got home from school that day.”

She. Not Mom. She.

“I’ve never seen anyone high like that. I didn’t hang out with the kids who smoked pot but I’d seen them high before. This was different. Not just from weed. And it was more than just being drunk, but I wasn’t sure. I didn’t drink. Ever. Not just because Dad was a cop and he taught us about being responsible, but because I didn’t like getting in trouble.”

A good girl. My good girl.

I hated her mother for putting her through this. I hated her father for letting this fester. Six fucking years this had lived inside her and she’d dealt with it all on her own.

“She was drinking wine.” Vera shuddered as more wounds ripped open. “At four o’clock in the afternoon. I thought she was just drunk. She didn’t drink like that. At least not normally. But there’d been something wrong with her. Twice I’d come home and she was drunk. Not slurring or out of it, but almost … hungover. I tried to hide it from Hadley and Elsie.”

Maybe her mother had started drinking the minute her kids had left for school. And sobered up by the time they’d made it home. Or by the time Cormac, an adult who knew what drunk and high looked like, had made it home.

“I didn’t tell Dad.” Her voice cracked. “Why didn’t I tell Dad?”

The guilt that came with that question was about as hard to stomach as her pain. “This isn’t your fault.”

“I should have told him. Before.”

Before her mother attempted murder.

“Dad was at some coaches meeting at the school,” she said. “Concussion training, I think, for the volunteers. She was acting off, so I told Hadley and Elsie to go upstairs and do their homework until he got home. There was a thunderstorm. It was loud and the rain was hard.”

I was right. That was why she’d gotten scared the night of the storm weeks ago. Because there’d been a storm that night.

“She got frantic. Every time there was thunder, she’d pull at her hair and start talking to herself. It scared me. Every time I tried to talk to her, calm her down, she’d look at me like I was a stranger. She didn’t have a clue that I was her daughter. I was about to call Dad and have him come home but then she screamed. She screamed so loud, Mateo. I had to cover my ears.”

Fucking hell. Her mother had gone off the deep end, and she’d had to witness it all.

“She ran outside. Right into the storm. It was still early. Gray. The storm blocked out the sun but it wasn’t dark yet. She ran for the dock and climbed on the boat, untying it before I could stop her. I tried to get her to stop. We all did.”

Vera’s body began to tremble and she burrowed deeper.

I stroked her hair, holding her so impossibly tight that my muscles locked in place. They’d be stiff when I finally let go.

“I wish I could go back to that moment.” A fresh wave of tears soaked my skin. “I would do anything to keep my sisters off that boat.”

“I’m sorry,” I murmured.

“She took off. Drove away from the dock so fast it threw me to the floor. Elsie almost tipped over the edge but Hadley caught her. The waves were … impossible. The water just kept coming into the boat, crashing over the hull, and she was out of control, going faster and swerving in all directions. I finally managed to get to my feet and pull her away from the steering wheel. I was going to drive us home but then she said something about swimming lessons. I didn’t understand.”

Vera pulled away from my chest, staring up at me with so much regret in those beautiful eyes I wanted to scream.

It wasn’t fair that she’d endured this. It wasn’t fucking fair.

“Swimming lessons?”

She nodded, her chin quivering. “She took Hadley’s arm and pushed her to the edge of the boat. A wave rocked us hard and then my sister was just … gone.”

I closed my eyes. “Christ.”

“I dove in after her, and it was so cold. It made it hard to breathe and took me a minute to snap out of it. But I swam for Hadley as fast as I could, trying to keep my head above the waves. They were too big. It was too cold. I turned back to look at the boat and Elsie was gone. I was going to swim back and find her too but she drove away. She … left us.” Her face crumpled. “She left us.”

Sitting on my lap, cradled in my arms, Vera broke to pieces.

The sobs that wracked her chest shook her entire body. They were endless. Each time I thought they’d stop, a fresh wave would hit and start the anguish anew.

Was that how it had been that night? Wave after wave slamming her toward the depths.

“I lost them,” she cried, clinging to me. “I lost them, Mateo. I couldn’t find Hadley. I tried to find Elsie but she was gone. I lost them.”

“This is not on you, Vera.”

“I should have found them. I was their big sister. I was on the swim team. I should have saved them.”

“Look at me.” I took her face, pulling it away from my shoulder. “You did not lose them.”

She squeezed her eyes shut. “I left them. I thought they’d swim for home, so when I couldn’t see them, that’s what I did. I kicked off my shoes because it’s hard to swim in shoes. They probably didn’t think to take off their shoes, did they?”

“I don’t know, darlin’.” I kissed her forehead, catching tears with my thumbs.

Fuck you, Norah Gallagher. For what she’d done to her daughter, I hoped that woman had landed in an especially hot corner of hell.

“I thought I’d find them.” Vera’s breath hitched. “I stayed on the dock for hours, letting it rain and waiting for them to make it. The boat was gone. I thought she might have sunk it. I wanted her to sink it.”

To sink with it.

“Then Dad was there. He was soaking wet. I’ve never seen him so scared. But he was alone, and I knew … we were alone.” She crumpled again, curling so tightly she fit like a ball in my lap. “They were so scared. They died scared. Because I didn’t save them.”

My heart broke. Over and over and over again.

“I’m sorry, Vera. I’m so sorry.”

She cried for so long I started to worry she’d never stop. But eventually, the shaking in her shoulders stopped, and with it, the tears. Her body slumped against mine, not even having the strength to sit upright. Too much heartache and it was shutting her down.

I shifted and picked her up, cradling her against my chest as I walked to a nearby tree. Then I sat at its trunk, using it as a backrest even though the bark dug into my bare skin. It was nothing compared to what Vera had endured alone.

The strength she’d had at seventeen to swim home. To keep swimming. To not give up. Damn. I’d never hurt so much for another person and been so proud at the same time.

I held her, unmoving, until she eventually leaned away to meet my gaze.

“She was an addict.” The life had drained from Vera’s voice. It was flat and dull. “I never talked to Dad about it. He tried, in the beginning. But I shut him out. I just … couldn’t.”

“Understandable.” I tucked a lock of hair behind her ear, then untucked it.

“When Vance and Lyla found me, Dad told them the truth. They didn’t know I was listening, but I was outside our shelter, eavesdropping. I heard every word.”

She inhaled a long, deep breath. It was the first time she’d filled her lungs in hours. The breath to start another story.

One more story.

Her father’s.

“Dad met her at a bar in Alaska. Whenever they told us the story, he said he took one look at her and left his friends in the dust. Proposed to her the next day. Love at first sight. That’s what I believed for most of my life.”

“Not anymore?”

She stared at me, her eyes softening. “Not for them.”

But for her. She’d loved me from first sight. For the rest of my life, I’d regret not being able to say the same.

“How did they actually meet?” I asked.

“In that bar. He went to the bathroom and found her passed out with a heroin needle stuck in her arm.”

“Heroin?”

Vera nodded. “He took her to the hospital. The next day, went to check on her. He said once she was out of rehab to give him a call, and he’d buy her a cookies-and-cream milkshake.”

“Did he?”

“Yeah. They started dating. She got pregnant with me, so they got married. Dad thought everything was fine, but he came home from work one day when I was nine months old and she was passed out drunk on vodka in the bathtub. She’d left me in my crib for hours with a dirty diaper and no food.”

The mental image was jarring. Maybe because Allie was so young. I could still see her at that age. I could hear her crying from her crib, arms outstretched, when she’d wake up from a nap and want me to come rescue her.

“Apparently, they got her on some medication for postpartum depression. They moved to Idaho so they wouldn’t have those long, dark winters in Alaska.”Belongs to (N)ôvel/Drama.Org.

I’d lived through one of those winters and it was brutal. Montana might be cold six or more months out of the year, but at least the sun was usually shining.

“According to Dad, her family was toxic. I don’t remember them because Dad refused to let them be around us after we moved. We never went back to Alaska, even though that’s where his parents lived. They came to Idaho to visit us until they died. Dad used his inheritance to buy us that house on the lake and get the boat.”

Every added detail was like another tiny cut. Another dash of salt on an open wound. Did Cormac regret every decision he’d ever made? My heart softened for her father. In his shoes, I would have blamed one person.

Myself.

“They waited awhile before having Elsie and Hadley. Dad wanted to make sure she was okay. That she’d be a good mother.” Venom dripped from Vera’s voice. “She was a good mother. She’d leave me notes in my lunch box. She’d braid my hair and talk to me about the boys I liked. She’d hug me whenever I was close. She’d kiss my temple and tell me she loved me to the moon and back. I loved her too.”

Loved. Not love. Vera’s love for Norah had drowned with her sisters.

“A friend of hers from Alaska came to visit. They went to lunch. Dad didn’t go along. He told Vance he didn’t think much about it. But that must have been the turning point for her to start using again.”

Cormac hadn’t noticed? I held that question inside. I had a lot of blame to put on that man. For my sister. For Vera. But a friend of mine from college had been addicted to meth. I hadn’t known about it until he’d gotten arrested for breaking into his grandparents’ house to steal some jewelry and pawn it for drug money.

Addicts were good at hiding their vices.

“Dad came home that night and found her alone,” Vera said.

So Norah had made it home with the boat while her daughters had been drowning in the lake and Vera had been swimming for her life.

“Dad asked her what was going on, and she kept talking about swimming lessons. She thought he was a lifeguard and asked him to get her kids from the pool. He went outside, found the boat on the shore, not tied up. After he put it all together, he strangled her.”

I flinched.

The way she said it, so cold and detached.

Her father had murdered her mother, and Vera spoke about it like the truth that it was. Did she ever resent him for that? No. Probably not. Not after what Norah had done.

“Dad went looking for us. Ran the boat almost out of gas. I was on the dock when he got back.”

And then he’d swept her away from the world. He’d hidden her and let the world think she was dead. That he was a man who’d murdered his family.

Would I have done any different? Would I have taken Vera away from that horror? He would have gone to prison. At seventeen, she would have been left as a ward of the state. That, or sent to live with family. Possibly Norah’s toxic parents from Alaska.

Did she have other family? Vance seemed to be her only link to the past, and he wasn’t a real uncle, just a friend.

Then there would have been the media attention. A tragic case like that … reporters would have been crawling all over her. They sure as hell had when she’d appeared years later, not dead. They would have suffocated her.

Maybe Cormac had done the right thing taking her away after all.

“Mateo?” Her face was splotchy, her eyes red and puffy. She was still beautiful, even tear soaked and jagged.

“Yeah?” I ran my knuckles down her cheek.

“Will it always hurt?”

“I don’t know, Peach.”

She leaned her head on my shoulder, her hand coming to my heart like she could feel it twisting. “I think yes.”

Yes. It would probably always hurt. But she wouldn’t be hurting alone, not anymore.

We stayed against that tree for hours, just holding on to each other. Finally, when Vera shifted to stand, we climbed to our feet and made our way back to camp.

Every tent, including ours, had been packed up. Jasper was putting the last cooler in his rig before slamming the tailgate shut. The other vehicles were loaded, and my parents’ fifth wheel was hooked to their truck.

The moment Dad spotted us, he walked over with the keys to my truck in his hand. “Allie is riding with us. We’re moving campgrounds.”

Thank fuck. Not a chance I was making Vera stay by this lake. “Where to?”

He reached out and ran a thumb across Vera’s cheek, giving her a smile. A father’s smile. “The Eden Ranch.”