After saying goodbye to Leah, Kaine leaned back against the pillows again and watched Megan, whose coloring page really was a work of art. Blended colors, bright pinks and yellows, oranges and purples, created a beautiful kaleidoscope of happiness. It matched the joy in Leah’s voice when Kaine told her Danny could finally rest in peace. But it didn’t match Kaine’s heart, or the fact that her world was still as tumultuous as a puddle of gray-and-black ink.
“So everything is okay now, right?” Leah had asked.
“It will be,” Kaine replied, and left it there. She decided not to burden her sister anymore. Besides, being so far away, Leah could do little to help her. The reassurance she gave was interpreted by her sister as Kaine needing time to heal. Kaine let her believe that was the case. And it was—among other, far more intimidating factors.
Kaine fixed her stare on Megan’s sweep of a blue pen, but her mind was consumed by the events of the evening. Danny’s killer was in custody. Danny. She drew a shaky breath. In the end, it had been her fault, in a roundabout way. He’d suffered, for her. The truth was both startling and brutal. Tears burned her eyes. Who else would end up suffering because of her, caught up in the whirlpool trap of abuse that was her life, surging forth from the past and whipping its way into the present?
Chapter 31
Jvy
She knew where to find Joel. It was the same place that called to Ivy in the dark cavern of her own sorrow. A mist floated just above the ground, embracing the bases of the tombstones. Some of the markers were tilted from time and the earth settling the graves deeper into their eternal beds.
Joel’s broad shoulders were covered in a gray cotton shirt, with darker gray stripes that raced down his back to his trim waist. His shirtsleeves were rolled and cuffed, exposing his forearms. The trees that draped over the cemetery rustled as a light breeze awakened them. Joel dragged his hand across tired eyes.
Ivy’s heart twisted, the truth seeping into her conscience with the brutal sting of how wrong she had been. In her grief, she had drawn conclusions without understanding events. The years of harboring her defiant offense against Joel Cunningham, her dearest friend and the only one who knew her as well as Andrew, had taken its toll. But not only on her.
She watched as Joel squatted in front of Andrew’s simple white stone, reaching out to rest a palm on its top. A strange cough emitted from his throat, the kind someone made when fighting back tears. Ivy couldn’t fathom a man like Joel weeping. He would hold his grief deep inside and expose it to no one. He would do what needed to be done. He would exist and he would survive. He was strong, as evidenced by his broad shoulders that bore the weight of time and pain, that had borne abandonment, rejection, and her own bitter accusations. Yet, he was here. He had returned home, to her and to Andrew.
Joel rocked forward, his knees sinking into the moist ground. He rested his other hand on Andrew’s grave marker and bowed his head. Ivy hesitated as she approached him, as if to speak would break the reverent silence. Her foot snapped a twig, and Joel raised his head to look over his shoulder. The rims of his eyes were red as if he hadn’t slept. She hadn’t either. The debacle at the orphanage, ending in a visit and stern warning from Sheriff Dunst, was enough to put them both on edge. Beyond that, Mr. Casey’s revelation regarding the night of Andrew’s funeral exposed Joel’s vulnerability and Ivy’s ill-placed defiance. Sleep was a friend to no one in times such as these.
There was much unspoken emotion as Joel’s blue eyes bore into hers. He was obviously in pain, holding it deep inside, just as he had always done.
“I still miss him.” Weariness tainted Joel’s voice.
Ivy stood over his crouched form.
“Do you doubt that?” His eyes were half accusing and half begging her to believe him.
“No.” Ivy’s whisper squeezed around the lump in her throat.
Joel drew his hand back from Andrew’s marker and stood. “I’ll never forget that day.”
Neither would Ivy. That spring day long ago when the three of them laughed and coaxed one another out onto the ice that covered Wilkes Pond. The moment the ice cracked and then gave way beneath Andrew’s feet, his six-foot frame, so strong and athletic, becoming helpless against the elements. Ivy could still hear herself screaming Andrew’s name, could still picture Joel sliding across the ice and launching to his belly, reaching for his friend Andrew. She had screamed at Joel to save her brother, waited for him to dive into the frigid water, to do what must be done to bring Andrew back to them. But Joel hadn’t. He’d remained sprawled on his stomach, arms plunged into the water toward Andrew. A horrific silence followed, a nothingness that would forever echo around the pond.
Ivy had slipped and slid across the ice in her own frantic dash to get to her brother. Joel vaulted to his feet, the ice continuing to crack beneath their weight as he wrapped his arms around her. Ivy wrestled against his grip; her screams filled the air. Dragging her away from where Andrew had disappeared, he saved her from dying along with her brother. But all these years later—Ivy clenched her teeth against the memory—all these years she had seen it so differently. Joel had kept her from saving Andrew, and Joel had left him in the pond to die.
“That night? Here? I wanted to be with you at the grave.” Joel’s words ripped into her past and present agony. But he hadn’t been here.
“Why didn’t you come? Why didn’t you fight Mr. Casey?” She lifted her eyes to the man she had loved so fervently as a younger version of herself.
“Ivy,” Joel whispered and shook his head in regret. “Every time I left the orphanage at night to meet you and Andrew, I was never caught. We were free, Ivy.” He reached out and took her hands, tightening his grip. His calluses reminded her of his strength. The strength she’d so desperately needed the day of Andrew’s burial.
“So what changed? That night?” Ivy stared at their clasped hands, thinking how she’d wished they’d been able to grab hold of Andrew like this and pull him to safety.
“When we’d made plans to meet here, after the funeral, to say goodbye to Andrew together, Mr. Casey had already received word I was with you that afternoon. That I’d been on the ice and not helping the other boys cut wood for heating the orphanage. Mr. Casey stopped me that night, detained me. I couldn’t get away, Ivy. I couldn’t be with you.” Agony reflected in Joel’s face, the kind that must have eaten at his soul for years and left behind a pain he couldn’t verbalize.
“But you tried. . . .”
“You were worth the risk to me,” he said, searching her eyes. “You were always worth the risk to me.”
“Why did you leave?” Ivy asked, even though she knew the truth.
Joel gave a short laugh of disbelief. “I didn’t have a choice. Mr. Casey made sure I was on that train and it pulled out of the station without me jumping off.”
All night she had wept over her brother’s cold grave, shivering and waiting in the damp snow. In the morning, Ivy returned home only to be told by her father that Joel had left Oakwood.
“I hated you for leaving.” Ivy swallowed a shuddering breath.