Chapter 2
My hand stayed on the door.
For several seconds, nobody spoke.
Rain tapped against the porch roof.
Ryan finally looked up.
His eyes were red.
“There was someone in the back seat.”
His mother grabbed the handles of his wheelchair.
“That’s enough.”
I stared at her.
“Who?”
Ryan swallowed.
“Emma.”
Everything inside me went cold.
Emma was my younger sister.
Thirty-two years old.
Funny.
Stubborn.
The one person in my family who had stood beside me when Ryan left.
The same sister who had called him every ugly name she could think of.
I laughed once because the alternative was screaming.
“That’s not funny.”
“I’m not joking.”
“My sister is in Denver.”
“No.”
Ryan’s voice cracked.
“She isn’t.”
I stepped onto the porch.
“Where is she?”
His mother tried to wheel him backward.
I caught the armrest.
“Where is my sister?”
Ryan’s face collapsed.
“St. Vincent’s.”
I felt the world tilt.
“What happened to her?”
“She was hurt.”
“How badly?”
He looked away.
That told me enough.
I grabbed my car keys.
Ryan’s mother blocked the steps.
“Sarah, wait.”
I shoved past her.
She caught my wrist.
“You need to hear everything first.”
I ripped my arm away.
“If my sister is in a hospital and you knew, then there is nothing you can say to me right now that won’t make this worse.”
Ryan called after me.
“Sarah!”
I turned.
He was crying again.
But this time, I saw something underneath the tears.
Fear.
Not fear that I would abandon him.
Fear of what I was about to discover.
I drove through the rain so fast I barely remembered the trip.
At the emergency entrance, I ran inside and asked for Emma Bennett.
The woman behind the desk typed.
Her expression changed.
“Are you family?”
“I’m her sister.”
She asked for my identification.
Then she called someone.
That terrified me more than anything.
A nurse came down.
She led me to the intensive care unit.
Emma was behind a glass wall.
Machines surrounded her.
A tube ran into her mouth.
One side of her face was bruised purple.
Her right arm was wrapped in a cast.
There were stitches across her forehead.
I stopped walking.
My knees almost gave out.
“Oh my God.”
The nurse touched my shoulder.
“She’s stable.”
“How long has she been here?”
“Twenty-three days.”
I turned toward her.
“What?”
“She was admitted the night of the accident.”
Twenty-three days.
My sister had been lying in intensive care for twenty-three days.
Nobody had called me.
Nobody.
I pulled out my phone and dialed my mother.
She answered on the fourth ring.
“Sarah?”
“Where’s Emma?”
Silence.
I closed my eyes.
“Mom.”
More silence.
“You know.”
It wasn’t a question.
My mother began crying.
“Sarah, I wanted to tell you.”
I nearly dropped the phone.
“You wanted to tell me?”
“It was complicated.”
“My sister has been in intensive care for three weeks.”
“I know.”
“And you knew?”
“Yes.”
The hallway seemed to stretch in every direction.
I leaned against the wall.
“Why?”
“Emma asked us not to tell you before the accident.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“There are things you don’t know.”
“Then tell me.”
My mother whispered, “Not over the phone.”
I almost screamed.
“Stop protecting everyone from consequences!”
A nurse glanced toward me.
I lowered my voice.
“Get here.”
“Sarah—”
“Now.”
I hung up.
Then I walked into Emma’s room.
I sat beside her bed.
Her hand felt cold.
I held it anyway.
“You idiot,” I whispered.
“You were supposed to be in Denver.”
A tear fell onto the blanket.
“What were you doing with my husband?”
The machines answered for her.
An hour later, my mother arrived.
She looked ten years older.
Mom had always been the person who kept peace.
Growing up, she would rather swallow an insult than confront somebody.
That used to seem gentle.
Now it looked like cowardice.
She sat across from me.
“Emma wasn’t having an affair with Ryan.”
The fact that she said it before I asked made my stomach twist.
“Then why was she in his car?”
“She was trying to help you.”
“By hiding everything from me?”
Mom looked at Emma.
“About a month after Ryan left, Emma found something.”
“What?”
“A folder.”
“What folder?”
“Papers from Dad’s estate.”
My father had died four years earlier.
He owned three rental properties and a small construction company.
He left the company to my brother, Mark.
He left one rental property to Emma.
And he left me the lake house where Ryan and I had spent nearly every summer of our marriage.
Or so I thought.
Mom reached into her purse.
She pulled out a folded photocopy.
I recognized the lake house address immediately.
Underneath it was my name.
Then Ryan’s.
Then a signature.
Mine.
Except I had never signed it.
“What is this?”
“A transfer agreement.”
I stared at her.
“No.”
“Emma found it in Ryan’s home office.”
“He didn’t have a home office.”
“Jessica’s apartment.”
My eyes lifted.
Mom nodded.
“She went there.”
“Why?”
“Because she suspected Ryan had taken documents from your house before he left.”
I looked back at the paper.
The transfer supposedly gave Ryan authority to sell the lake house.
The property had been left solely to me.
There was no reason for Ryan’s name to be involved.
My chest tightened.
“When was this signed?”
“Three months ago.”
“I didn’t sign it.”
“I know.”
My mother took another paper from her purse.
This one showed a pending sale.
Seven hundred and forty thousand dollars.
My mouth went dry.
“The lake house is worth maybe five hundred.”
“Not anymore. The county approved a resort development nearby.”
I looked at her.
“How did Ryan know that?”
Mom hesitated.
That was when I understood.
“You told him.”
Her face broke.
“I mentioned it before he left.”
I stood up.
“You told the man who cheated on me that my property was about to become worth hundreds of thousands more?”
“I didn’t know what he was planning.”
“And Emma did?”
“She started putting things together.”
“So she confronted him.”
“Yes.”
“Twenty-three days ago.”
Mom nodded.
“She called me from Ryan’s car.”
I stared at her.
“You spoke to her that night?”
“She said Ryan had agreed to return the original documents.”
“And Jessica?”
“She was driving.”
My skin prickled.
“Ryan told me Jessica was in the car.”
“She was.”
“Then what happened?”
Mom looked toward Emma.
Her voice dropped.
“I heard them arguing.”
“You heard the crash?”
“No.”
“What did you hear?”
Mom pressed both hands together.
“Jessica accused Emma of trying to destroy their future.”
My jaw tightened.
“Then?”
“Ryan told Jessica to slow down.”
“Then?”
“Emma screamed.”
Mom started crying.
“She said, ‘What are you doing?’”
I could barely breathe.
“And then?”
“The call ended.”
I walked toward the window.
Rain streaked down the glass.
“Why didn’t you call me?”
“Ryan’s mother called me from the hospital. She said the police believed it was an accident.”
“That doesn’t answer me.”
“She said Ryan might never walk again. She begged me not to make things worse before we knew what happened.”
“So you protected him.”
“I was trying to protect you.”
I spun around.
“From what?”
Mom flinched.
I pointed at Emma.
“She is lying unconscious because everyone in this family decided I’m too fragile to hear the truth.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No.”
I shook my head.
“You’re sorry because I found out.”
Before she could answer, Emma’s monitor changed.
A nurse hurried inside.
Emma’s fingers moved against mine.
I froze.
“Emma?”
Her eyelids fluttered.
The nurse leaned over her.
“Emma, can you hear me?”
Her eyes opened slightly.
Confused.
Terrified.
She looked at me.
A tear slipped down the side of her face.
I squeezed her hand.
“I’m here.”
Her lips moved around the breathing tube.
The nurse told her not to try to talk.
But Emma kept trying.
She lifted one shaking finger.
Pointed toward my mother.
Then toward me.
I leaned closer.
“What?”
Emma struggled again.
The nurse reached for a writing board.
But before she could place it near her, Emma scratched three letters against my palm with her fingertip.
R.
U.
N.
I stared at her.
Emma’s eyes widened.
Then she pointed toward the doorway.
May you like
I turned.
Ryan’s mother was standing there.
