Silence settles over our small group, and I try to process this. Ginny is a part of my life. A foundational pillar. I feel like everything’s about to topple.

“But . . .” Jesse rubs my back with his hand. “No. She needs to come home and make her tree quilts and feed Felix and see the barn that’s going to be full of horses and complain about Jesse’s car being too loud, and . . .” Tears stream down my face. “She needs to come home.”

“I wish I could give you a—”

“She’ll wake up.” I wipe both eyes with my palms and set my jaw stubbornly. “You didn’t think I’d wake up, and I did.” Meredith gives me a solemn nod.

“Can I see her?”

Meredith takes a deep breath, sharing a glance with Gabe. “Come on, I’ll take you.”

I turn to Amber. “The horses need—”

“I’ll go bring them in. Feed the dog . . . all that.” She pulls herself to her feet, passing her parents without a word.

I follow Meredith as she leads me through the ICU, the sterile smell, the low buzz of machines and voices, the long, monotonous halls, all sparking my earliest memories.

“She’ll have some bandages on her head, but otherwise she looks fine,” Meredith cautions as we enter the room. The machine beside Ginny beeps rhythmically. The sound used to be a lullaby for me.

“Visits are supposed to be kept to ten minutes, but I’ll ask them to leave you alone.”

“Thanks.” It sounds hollow but that’s all I can manage, wandering over to the chair beside Ginny’s bed.

“I understand that you’re angry with us, Water. But please give Jesse a chance to explain. His motivation—all of our motivations—came from a good place. One that meant you well.”

I simply nod, unable to process my own personal turmoil right now.

The door closes softly.

And I simply stare at the small, frail woman lying there, unconscious, the lump in my throat growing larger and larger until I can’t swallow without tears springing to my eyes.

The reclusive, ornery woman who in reality was brimming with life. Who spent decades hiding behind dead trees and scraps of quilts and an abrasive disposition. If only she had let that tree bud again, maybe others would have had a chance to see it, too. Reaching forward, I slip my hand within hers. A giggle escapes. “Boy, will you be mad when you wake up and find yourself in here.”

And then I bow my head and cry, because somehow I know that Meredith is right, and I’m never going to argue with Ginny again.

Jesse and Gabe are still in the waiting room when I emerge, my cheeks sore from the burn of so many tears.

Sickness churning in my stomach, I’m terrified of what this vault inside my head doesn’t want me to see. But I also made a promise to Ginny last night, and I intend to keep it.

I settle eyes on Jesse. “I need to know everything. Everything.”

The weathered totem pole stands proud among the trees at the dead end of the road, its paint faded. A shiver runs down my back as I lock eyes with the hummingbird that sits on top, staring down its long, pointed beak at me.

Is that just a coincidence?

“When I was about twelve, a couple of teenagers from Sisters came up to Black Butte to camp. They had a campfire—they weren’t supposed to, it was too dry—and it started a forest fire. They died in it. I remember the day the town put this up here as a memorial,” Jesse explains, staring up at the totem pole.

“Why did you bring me here?”

He reaches for my hand and I let his fingers graze mine for a second before I pull it away. I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel about Jesse right now, except that there must be a good explanation for all of this.

With a heavy sigh, he drops his hand to his side and then begins a slow walk around, his gaze roaming the ground, as if he’s searching for something. Finally, he stoops over to pick up the remnants of a cigarette butt, studying it for a moment before flicking it away. “Because this is where I found you.”

“You found me?” My heart skips a beat as I take in the surroundings again. “Why did you lie?”

“It’s a long story.” Jesse’s jaw tenses. “But you got your wish. You got to start over.”

THIRTY-SEVEN

Jesse

then

Lifting her limp body up in my arms as delicately as possible, I start plodding through the snow toward my car, trying to hold her steady, my muscles straining against her dead weight. “It’s okay . . . You’re going to be fine . . . It’s me, Jesse . . . I won’t let him hurt you anymore . . .” I ramble. I doubt she can hear me but I talk anyway. I need to hear these words as much as she does. I need to believe them.

How the hell did Viktor find out? And exactly what does he know?

As carefully as possible, I slide her onto the backseat, thankful for the car’s wide frame. I’m afraid to let her go but I have to, if she has any hope of survival at all. Wrapping the wool blanket around her broken body, I rush to the driver’s seat to crank the engine and blast the car’s heat. If the severe beating hasn’t done her in, the winter cold certainly will.

My hands . . . I hold them up in the dim interior light. Like two slick red gloves, they’re coated in Alex’s blood. The front of my light gray hoodie—because I bolted out of my apartment too fast to grab a coat—is also covered. A quick glance in the rearview mirror confirms the crimson streaks smeared across my cheeks, where I wiped away my tears.

And I’ve got a badly beaten girl with ties to Viktor in my backseat.

Shit.

I can’t just show up at the ER with her, can I? There’ll be too many questions that I can’t answer. What if she dies? I just . . . My brain is a jumbled mess. I know she needs helps, but . . . I just . . . I can’t think straight. My hands tremble as I reach into my coat pocket for my phone, to do the only thing I can think of, because I’m in way over my head this time.

He answers on the second ring. “Jesse?”

“Dad?” My voice cracks over that one syllable. “I really f**ked up this time.”

“What do you mean?” His tone immediately takes on that authoritative edge. Normally, I clam right up when I hear it. Not this time, though. “It’s Alex. She’s . . . hurt. Bad.”

“What? Where are you?”

“Near Black Butte. I have her in my car and I’m heading toward Bend.” I throw the car into gear and, pinning my cell to my ear with my shoulder, I maneuver out of the dead end and head back, struggling not to speed too much for her sake. “I don’t think she’s going to make it.”

“You shouldn’t have moved her. Exactly where are you? Pull over. I’m calling an ambulance.”

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

“What the hell do you mean?” he snaps.

“It’s not that simple.” Fuck. Alex used those exact same words with me once. “Alex’s husband did this.”

He exhales loudly. “Well then, we’ll have him arrested. But first we need to get her to a hospital.”

“He’s Russian mob.”

“What?” My dad seems winded, like he’s walking fast. “Jesus, Jesse. How the hell did you get mixed up with that!”

“I’ll explain everything later. Right now I just need her safe.”

“Did this happen because of you?”

I shake my head.

“Jesse!”

“I don’t know! Just, please, Dad. Please help me.” I don’t know if he even hears that last plea, my voice is so hoarse, this engine so damn loud.

“The old tannery. How far away are you?”

“Maybe ten minutes.”

Those ten minutes feel like an hour. I half-expect the entire Deschutes County police force and handcuffs when I get to the run-down building on an isolated side road, abandoned for years. A single set of tracks leads me around back, to where the white cruiser sits with a prominent green star emblem on the door. My dad’s marching toward me.

“Holy . . .” He winces as he looks in the backseat.

“I know.”

“Shut your car off and pull her out. Lay her down here.” He points to the ground on his way back to his car.

I’m not going to argue with him, so I push my seat forward and scoop her up.

Another light, gurgling sound slips through her lips and I have to grit my teeth to keep the sob from tearing out of me as my dad calls our location in over the radio. “Just hang in there, Alex. Stay with me.”

As much as I don’t want to, I lay her down in the fresh bed of snow.

“Get out of here, now. Take this.” He pulls the blanket away from her body.

“But it’s cold out here. She needs it.”

“Does it have your DNA on it?”

Both of ours. All over it.

My hesitation answers him. He thrusts it into my hand. “Take it. Drive this car right into the garage. Bag everything on you, bag the rags, the blanket. Everything. And stay there. Don’t give anyone a reason to pull you over, Jesse. Go! Now!”

With one last glance at her, I dive into my car.

A blurry kaleidoscope of blue and red lights races past me about twenty seconds after I pull onto the main road. “You can survive this, Alex,” I whisper. “You’re strong.”

I’ll take whatever’s coming to me, but only if she survives.

“Your language skills aren’t too bad after all.” My hand runs through my damp hair. The small hot-water tank went cold long before I got out and now I’m sitting on my bed, shivering.

I hear a soft “fuck” slip through Boone’s lips. “Bad?”

“Yeah.” I don’t want to say much more over the phone. “I’m going to stick around here for the weekend. I’ll be back for work on Monday.” It’s the last place I want to be, but I need to face whatever’s coming to me. Me suddenly disappearing will only raise suspicions. “I don’t know what he knows.”

“I’ll keep an ear out. Take it easy. And I’m sorry. I could see how much . . .” He drifts off, probably as paranoid as I am right now.

I hear his unspoken words. “Yeah. I did. Thanks, Boone. For tonight.” If he hadn’t been there, if he hadn’t called me . . . she’d already be dead. “Watch yourself, too.”

I hang up with Boone and am left sitting on my bed, wearing only a towel, staring at hands that were covered in Alex’s blood only hours ago, my stomach a mess of nerves. I followed my dad’s instructions, stripping off my clothes and bagging everything, and then wiping up the small pool of blood in my backseat. Now all I’m left with is time. Time to play out how different things could be for her right now. I can’t be blamed for pulling over to help a woman out with her flat tire. That choice was a good one, an innocent one. But every choice I made after that . . . I could have told her that her muffler was damaged and walked out of that customer lounge. I could have parked my ass on the couch and watched baseball instead of going to The Cellar that second night. I could have said no to the Barracuda that Viktor dangled in front of me. I could have left her to Triple-A when her gas ran out. I could have not given her my number; I could have not gone to the hotel . . .

So many choices, and I kept picking the wrong one. All because I let a faceless girl kiss me on the side of the road.

Then again, maybe it never really mattered, what I did or what choices I made. Maybe the truth is that we were meant to find each other. A simple truth that would have kept finding its way to us, no matter which path I tried to turn down.

No matter how deep I buried the feelings she sparked within me with one damn kiss.

If you wait long enough, the truth always finds its way. Just like that stream. Just like water.

Alex is my truth.

I toss a few logs into the woodstove and then fall into the pillows still scattered around it, watching the flames devour the wood. Trying desperately to remember all the things she wanted to do to this place to make it her home.

She would have been so happy here.

“Jesse!”

My dad is crouching beside me. In the window beyond him, I see stars sparkling in the black Oregon skies. Nothing but glowing embers remains behind the glass in front of me. I’ve been staring at the woodstove all this time and I didn’t notice the fire go out.

“How is she?” My jaw hurts from clenching my teeth the entire day.

Silence hangs through the air, and I hold my breath against the answer I expect to hear.

“She’s still alive. I don’t know for how long. I don’t know how, but—”

Air sails from my lungs. “Can I go see her?”

“No, Jesse.” He shakes his head to emphasize his point. It’s an old habit of his, and that’s when I know it’s serious. “She’s still in the OR. Your mother’s doing everything she can.”

Jesus. My own mother is operating on her. “Does Mom know?”