Caitlin burst into tears. She turned and saw Finn dragging himself out from behind the leather couch and into the open, where he could see what was going on.
“Look at us!” she screamed at him. “After all that we’ve done for you, after we tried to be there for you, no matter what you’d done—look what you’ve done to us!”
37
AUGUST 2016
Violet fell to her knees on the bunkroom floor and scooped up Bear into her arms, sleeping bag and all, hugging him to her as tight as she could. Tears of relief and elation and anger and sadness poured down her face and into his baby-soft curls. He mumbled something into her chest, and she pulled back enough to let him tilt his face up to hers and open his sleepy eyes.
“Mommy,” he said, smiling, and closed them again as his little arms wrapped around her—just as they always had, right where they belonged.
“Oh, baby, I missed you so much, so much, so much…”
“Mommy, why are you crying?”
She buried her face in his hair. She had to keep it together, for Bear. He probably didn’t understand what had gone on, or where she’d been. Who knew what Finn might have told him? And she didn’t want to wake the twins if she could help it.
“I just … I couldn’t find you, Bear Cub,” she whispered. “A lot of people have been helping Mommy look everywhere for you!”
“I was with Daddy.”
“I know you were, sweetheart.”
“I was missing you.”
She blinked away fresh tears. “Me too, little man. Me too. But it’s okay now. I’m here.” She rocked him back and forth, and he clutched her tighter. “I’m not going anywhere,” she promised him. “You’re staying with me.”
Violet could hear faint sounds of shouting coming from the living room. For too many days, she’d been determined to have the chance to be face-to-face with her husband, to confront him head-on. And yet now that she was here, all she wanted to do was curl up in this sleeping bag with Bear and let the rest of the world just fall away.
Even as Bear clung to Violet, his eyes were rolling back into his head. There was no telling how exhausted he’d been and for how long. Now that he was safe in her arms, he drifted back to sleep as if it were the most natural thing in the world—and it was. Even with the twins starting to stir in their bunks. Even with the yelling down the hall. Even though Violet knew that soon the cops would be on the way, and the feds, and they’d take Finn away, and Bear’s world would be changed forever.
Violet had to talk to Finn first, whether she wanted to or not. That was why Caitlin had brought her here instead of carrying Bear to her. And though she wanted to hate Caitlin for it, she also knew in some back corner of her mind that Caitlin was probably right. This could be her only chance to talk to Finn in private, to try to get real answers to her questions. She’d been willing to let him walk away if that was the only way she could get Bear back. But now that she was here, now that Finn didn’t have a choice in the matter, she wasn’t going to dissolve their life together without at least an explanation. He owed her that much.
She pulled at a blanket that had been tucked into Bear’s sleeping bag and wrapped it around him, discarding the bag on the floor. She stood, and his head rolled easily onto her shoulder, his legs wrapped around her middle, his arms loose around her neck. He shouldn’t hear what was about to be said, but he was going to have to come with her anyway. She wasn’t about to let him out of her sight. She just hoped he’d sleep through the worst of it.
She forced her legs to move, one foot in front of the other, down the hall, to the place where the living room met the kitchen. There, she stopped and stared in horror. Finn was cowering on a blood-smeared floor. His pants were soaked through. Seeing Bear in Violet’s arms, he rushed to cover his legs with the blanket that had been draped over him when they’d walked in. Caitlin was standing, sobbing, midway between him and George. She swiped angrily at her tears with the backs of her hands.
“Oh my God,” Violet said, her eyes widening as she caught sight of George setting a gun on the kitchen counter. He backed away from it as if it might attack him on its own. “What happened?”
Finn looked at Violet as if she were some foregone conclusion he’d been avoiding. “There was a … misunderstanding,” Caitlin said. She turned away, still sniffling, took George by the elbow and pulled him toward the sliding glass doors. “We’re going to go outside and let you talk. But you don’t have long. We need to call an ambulance.”
Violet stared in disbelief as the door shut behind them. An unnatural silence filled the room. She crossed to the couch and gingerly laid down Bear, who tucked his hands under his chin and curled up into a ball without waking. Reluctantly, she turned back to Finn.
“I know we have to talk, but he stays with me,” she said quietly. “I promised him.”
Finn nodded, and she stood looking down at him, trying to bite back her rising concern. How long had he been like this?
“I guess you know everything,” he said with a grimace, and she couldn’t tell if he was bracing himself against the pain of his wound or against whatever she was about to say.
“What’s everything?” she asked, careful to keep her voice calm. “How would I even know the answer to that?”
I don’t know anything! she wanted to scream. We promised to love each other forever, and I don’t even know if you ever loved me at all!
When he didn’t reply, she sighed and lowered herself slowly onto the floor next to him. “I think I got the basics.”
He nodded, but still did not speak.
“For one thing, I’m thinking moving to Asheville was a bad idea,” she said.
“It didn’t help matters,” he admitted.
Would you have been able to love me somewhere else? Could we have been a family?
“You should have told me. All of it. Any of it.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
Outside on the porch, she could see Caitlin try to put her arms around George. He shrugged her off and walked into the darkness, and Caitlin followed.
“Did you ever even try to tell me? Did I … I don’t know, miss something?”
“No.”
This sullen teenager routine was only making Violet resent Finn more. But she also knew that eventually, the intensity of that resentment would fade—didn’t it always, no matter who did the betraying or how bad things seemed? And then what would she be left with, besides unanswered questions?