Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 93002 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 93002 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
It was hard sometimes to remember that we weren’t together anymore. That conversation at the gas station about the tracker had reminded me of our past dynamic, the way we used to finish each other’s sentences. It had always been like that with us, words and ideas flowing back and forth easily.
I’d screwed things up, and she’d dumped me, but it didn’t make that connection go away. I’d never had that with anyone else. Neither had she—when things were good, she’d told me as much.
I was determined to fight for her. For us. But her quiet on the ride home made me wonder—what if fighting for us was hurting her? Everything in me recoiled at that thought. I loved Sterling so much that I didn’t think I could find my way out of it. For the rest of my life, I’d love her.
I’d stayed in Sawyers Bend because I believed I could make her happier than she’d be without me. But what if I was wrong? She sure as hell didn’t look happy now. I knew without asking that most of the darkness in her eyes was about me, not the looming threat of the Learys.
I had to decide what to do about that—even if that meant leaving—but not until we’d seen this through. Not until I knew she was safe.
Following Sterling’s car, I passed through the gates of Heartstone Manor and down the long, winding road to the grand old house for the first time in a year. The asphalt of the drive was still cracked and crumbling at the edges, the result of Prentice Sawyer’s lack of maintenance in the final years of his life.
But where before weeds had grown enthusiastically through those cracks, now there wasn’t a weed in sight on the road itself, and those on the sides had been neatly trimmed. Heartstone no longer had the air of neglect I remembered from before. It was vaguely encouraging and unsettling at the same time. I hadn’t quite imagined things changing in my absence, but of course, they had. It had been a year.
As I absorbed the changes—the trimmed bushes, the fresh sand someone had swept between the pavers in front of the house— it felt right. I hadn’t liked Sterling living in Heartstone as it had been a reminder of her father’s neglect.
I liked that she wasn’t alone in a dusty heap of a house but surrounded by family in a home that was loved and cared for, even if all of it made me feel like everything we had together was so far in the past. She didn’t look back at me as she parked and got out of the car, striding up the steps to the front doors.
I parked behind her and followed her inside.
“Griffen’s probably in his office,” she said as I shut the door behind us.
I stayed at her side through the entry and down the hall, trying not to remember the last time I’d walked this way, the day I’d confessed who I was. The day that had been the end between us.
Sterling reached the door, finding it half open. She dropped a brisk knock on the heavy wood.
At Griffen’s call of “Come in,” she pushed the door all the way open. His eyes lit as they landed on her and narrowed when they hit me. “What’s wrong?” he said in a low voice, his eyes still on me, still narrowed.
I lifted my hands, palms out. “This time, it wasn’t me,” I said.
Sterling dropped into the chair opposite Griffen’s desk. “I have good news and bad news and then some really bad news.”
I sat in the chair beside her, waiting to see how she was going to spin this to her brother. Sterling wasn’t reckless, but she didn’t want to be told what to do, which meant she wouldn’t want Griffen alarmed.
“Give me the really bad news first,” Griffen said.
“The good news,” she said, as if he hadn’t spoken, “is that we found the next clue.”
“And the bad news?” Griffen asked, resigned to doing things Sterling’s way.
“The bad news is that I have no fucking clue what to do with it because there wasn’t a key or a clue for where to find the key,” she said with an annoyed roll of her eyes.
“Well, you figured out the first two, didn’t you?” he asked.
“True,” she said, flashing him a grin. “But I had an idea where to start with those.”
Griffen sat back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest. “You’ll figure it out. It may take time, but you’ll get it.”
She smirked and tossed her hair over her shoulder. I couldn’t help but smile. I’d hated seeing her sad. I loved her like this—saucy, vibrant, having fun teasing her older brother.
“So,” Griffen asked, raising an eyebrow, “the really bad news?”