The next morning, we still hadn’t heard from Lia. If Ree noticed we were one short as we slid into our booth at the Not-A-Diner, she didn’t comment on it. “What can I get you?”
“Just coffee.” Dean’s voice was barely audible. He hadn’t slept and wouldn’t until Lia was out of that place.
“Coffee,” Ree repeated, “and a side of bacon. Cassie?” “Coffee.”
Ree didn’t even ask Sloane and Michael what they wanted. She gave us a look. “I heard your friend has fallen under Holland Darby’s spell.”
I wondered if she’d also heard—from her grandson—that we were with the FBI. You might not say anything if you had. You know how to keep a secret. You know when to keep your mouth closed.
“Lia’s coming back.” Dean’s voice was quiet, but his expression was hard.
Ree eyed Dean. “That’s what I thought when my daughter joined Darby’s flock. She split town, and I never heard from her again.”
“You weren’t surprised when your daughter left.” Michael was entering dangerous territory, pressing Ree on this, but I let him do it.
“Her daddy hightailed it out of Gaither when I was pregnant. Sarah was always more like him than me—full of big dreams and restless in her own skin, always looking for the promise of something more.”
“Holland Darby is big on promises,” Dean commented, assessing Ree. “You’re not.”
Ree pursed her lips. “We, every one of us, reap what we sow. I hope your friend makes it out, but don’t let her choices pull you down in the meantime. Life is full of drowning people, ready and willing to drown you, too.”
The door to the diner opened. With a harrumph at the person who stood there, Ree disappeared back into the kitchen. Beside me, Dean laid one hand over mine.
The person who’d just walked in was Kane Darby.
I knew, from the moment that his gaze landed on our table, that he hadn’t seen me the day before at the apothecary museum, but that he recognized me now.
“Gut-punched,” Michael told me under his breath, his eyes methodically scanning Kane’s face, his posture. “Like he can’t decide whether to smile or throw up.”
Staring at the man, I could suddenly remember riding on his shoulders when I was very small. If Michael had read my expression, he probably would have said that I looked gut-punched, too.
“If you need an icebreaker,” Sloane told me, pitching her voice in a whisper, “you should tell him that eighty percent of Americans believe that a weevil is similar to a weasel, when in reality, it’s a type of insect.”
“Thanks, Sloane.” I squeezed Dean’s hand once, then stood, crossing the room until Kane Darby and I were standing face to face.
“You look like your mother.” Kane’s voice was muted, like he thought I was a dream and if he spoke too loudly, he might wake up.
I shook my head. “She was beautiful, and I’m…” I searched for the right words. “I can fade into the background. She never learned how.”
I realized, as I said those words, that there was a part of me that had always believed that if my mother and I were more alike, if she’d been less of a performer, if she hadn’t been the center of attention just walking through a room, she might still be here.
“Women shouldn’t have to fade into the background to be safe.” Kane’s response told me that he could read me, nearly as well as I could read him.
“You heard what happened to my mom?” I asked, my voice hoarse. “It’s a small town.”
I assessed him for a moment, then went straight for the jugular. “Why did my mother leave you? We were happy here. She was happy. And then we left, with no warning, in the middle of the night.” Until I’d said the words, I hadn’t realized that I had any memory of leaving Gaither, other than dancing with my mother on the side of the road.
Kane looked at me, really looked at me this time, instead of just seeing my mom in my features. “Lorelai had every right to leave, Cassie, and every right to take you with her.”
“What happened?” I repeated the question, hoping for an answer. “This town wasn’t a good place for your mom, or for you. I kept things
from her. I thought I could shield her from what it meant to be with me, here.” “Your father isn’t well-liked in Gaither.” I spoke out loud, instead of
profiling him in my head. “You broke away from him, but you stayed local.” I thought back to the memory of Kane sweeping me into his arms after a nightmare. “When my mom and I left, you didn’t follow.”
Did you resent her for leaving? Did you keep track of her? Did you find a way, years later, to make her yours?
I couldn’t ask a single one of those questions out loud. So instead, I asked him about Lia.
Kane glanced around the diner. “Can we take a walk?”
In other words, he didn’t want an audience for what he was about to say.
Knowing I would catch hell for it, I followed him out the door.
“My father prizes certain things.” Kane waited until we were a block away from the diner before he began speaking. “Loyalty. Honesty. Obedience. He won’t hurt your friend. Not physically. He’ll just slowly become more and more important to her, until she’s not sure what she’d be without him, until she’ll do anything he asks. And any time she doubts herself or doubts him, there’ll be someone there to whisper in her ear about how lucky she is, how special.”
“Were you lucky?” I asked Kane. “Special?”
“I was the golden son.” His voice was so even, so controlled, that I couldn’t hear even a tinge of bitterness underneath.
“You left,” I commented. When that didn’t engender a response, I pressed on. “What happens if Lia wants to leave?”
“He won’t stop her,” Kane said. “Not at first.”
Those three words sent a chill down my spine. Not at first.
“I wish I could do something, Cassie. I wish that I’d had any right to keep your mother here, or to go after her once she was gone. But I am my father’s son. I made my choices long ago, and I accept what those choices have cost me.”
I’d wondered why Kane Darby had stayed in Gaither. What if staying isn’t an act of loyalty? What if it’s penance? My mind traveled back to Mason Kyle, Kane Darby’s childhood friend.
What choices did you make? What exactly are you repenting?
“I never stopped thinking about you.” Kane stopped walking. “I know I wasn’t your father. I know that, to you, I’m probably just some guy who briefly dated your mom. But, Cassie? You were never just some kid to me.”
My chest tightened.
“So, please, listen to me when I say that you need to leave Gaither. It isn’t safe for you to be here. It isn’t safe for you to be asking questions. Your friend will be okay at Serenity, but you wouldn’t be. Do you understand what I’m telling you?”
“You’re telling me that your father is a dangerous man.” I paused. “And that my mother left this town for a reason.”
YOU
Five admires his handiwork as blood drips down your arms, your legs. It will be hours before the others return. Hours before they ask you if Cassie and her friends should die.
No. No. No.
That’s Lorelai’s answer. That will always be Lorelai’s answer. But Lorelai isn’t strong enough to bear this. Lorelai isn’t here right now.
You are.
