Page 15 of The Light We Lost

“You could be working.” I laughed, unable to help myself. He was the worst employee I’d ever had. Graham—Bait and Gamewas a family business. My grandfather started it, and Dad inherited it from him. I’d never imagined filling those shoes myself, but when Dad died almost three years ago from a heart attack, it had landed on my and my brothers’ shoulders. We’d run it together for a time. Even Shay, Brooks’s wife, had stepped in to help. But as time wenton, so did life. My younger brother, Levi, was away at art school in Boston, and Brooks was busy with a career in the Forest Service. Plus, he was a family man now. Everyone was moving forward.

And I was here.

“Speaking of calling the police . . .” Jake leaned against the doorframe, his build wiry beneath his stained jeans and flannel. “You didn’t happen to call them last night, did you?”

I stared blankly at a spreadsheet, not seeing a damn thing. “I did not.”

He hummed under his breath, and any other day I would’ve waited to hear what he might say, but I’d rather get this over with. “Indy’s here to help her parents, there’s nothing more than that. I don’t know why she got arrested.” I’d only called Indy’s dad to let him know she’d been arrested, not to ask him why.

“Oh, I’m sure we can both agree it was someone being petty and dragging up the past.”

The past had been dragged up, all right. And it was taking everything in me not to suffocate in it. It was then I understood why Jake was here. We’d seen each other at our lowest. Some days, it felt like we were still there. He was trying to make sure I didn’t get lost again. “Indy and I are still married.”

He raised his brows, rubbing a hand through his scrappy gray beard as he absorbed the information. Pressing his lips into a hard line, he pulled out a chair and sat, quietly listening as I gave him the rundown on last night. It wasn’t until I finished reading the letter Dad wrote us that he said, “Your dad always had a funny sense of humor.”

“Sense of humor?” I clenched out. “Not only did he steal my divorce papers and shred them—but he sent out a damn fake paper confirming our divorce. He should be rotting in jail.”

“Kind of hard for a dead man to sit behind bars.” Jake didn’t miss a beat, and I wasn’t even mad. He had a real talent for always calling it as it was, as had his late wife, Wren. It was probably why they’d gotten along with Dad so well. “So what are you going to do about it?”

“What do you mean, what are you going to do about it?” I tossed the papers on my desk. “I’m going to divorce Indy. That’s what.”

“Nothing he said mattered?”

“Nope.” He was referring to the letter Dad had written specifically to me. “It doesn’t matter, because if it did, he would’ve told me the truth when he was alive. He wouldn’t have chosen the coward’s way out and written it in a letter for me to find who knows when. He would’ve told me when it counted, not when it’s too late.”

He let out a deep breath, and I could see by the way he watched me, he was carefully choosing his words. “Your dad was many things, but a coward wasn’t one of them. I’m not saying what he did was right, but I imagine he had his reasons—”

“He had no right.”

“I’m not saying he did,” Jake said, his voice rising. “We both know how you were before your dad died, Nolan. You weren’t exactly reachable, not when you were bound and determined to destroy every last good thing you had. And maybe your dad felt just desperate enough to do something stupid—but did you ever stop to think he did it because he thought it might work?” I shook my head, not wanting to hear a lick of what he had to say. But he didn’t care. “Maybe he planned to tell you. Or he thought when either you or Indy came to your senses he’d own up to what he’d done. He might’ve written those letters when he realized it was too late and he couldn’t tell you the truth. I don’t know. That’s the truth—none of us will ever know. But what we do know is thewhy. He told you why. And that’s because what you and Indy had was—”

“Terrible,” I finished for him. “We were like fire and gasoline together, and I’d never put either of us through that again.” I laughed, the sound dry and empty. “Why would you even want me to? When it all goes to hell again, do you want me to go back to how it was before? Staying out all night, drinking all day? I was a selfish prick—”

“You still are,” Jake muttered, and at that, I cracked a smile. Maybe I was—but I was different now. I made time for my family. I ran the business. I didn’t drink, and most nights I went to bed at nine. I didn’t pick fights. I told all the right jokes. Hell, every once in a blue moon, I dragged my ass to church.

I was a changed man.

But I was not naive enough to believe I’d survive Indy again.

“I’d do anything for a second chance.” The longing in his voice was enough to make me pause. Enough to make me look at the man who longed forsomeone. His hair was gray, mirroring the scruff along his jaw. His skin was tan and loose, deep crow’s feet beside his eyes. Jake could be a thorn in my side, but losing his wife had taken a toll on him. I’d seen it.

“That’s different,” I said, reminding myself of the truth. “You and Wren were married for forty years. I can’t even tell you how long Indy and I were married, given most our marriage was spent apart.”

“Nine years.” He coughed into his sleeve, and when I gave him a confused look, he said, “You’re still married. If my math’s correct, I’d say you guys are nine years and counting.”

“Just because you’re old doesn’t mean I won’t kick your ass,” I muttered, half considering it when he grinned. “The point is, you and Wren deserve a second chance. You deserved more than a lifetime together, and I’m sorry you didn’t get it. But Indy and I don’t deserve one.”

Jake was seventy years old, but I’d grown up with him and his wife. They were as family as you could be without blood. Wren had been a force of life, one who’d left her mark before she passed away from cancer nearly two years ago. My brother and sister-in-law had even named their daughter after her. It was people like her and Jake who deserved second chances.

Not me.

“Fine.” He seemed to accept the truth. He and Wren had had a once-in-a-lifetime love, and I was glad he didn’t try to say what Indy and I had was the same. Our love was impatient, wild, and we’d let it consume us until it nearly broke us both. “You want to be a sorry bastard, fine. I can’t stop you.”

I raised my arms, helpless. “You act like this is all on me. She wants this divorce just as bad as I do.”

I might’ve been the one who initiated the divorce, but both our fingers had been on the trigger—I just happened to be the one to squeeze first. And Indy coming into town like a hurricane last night proved how badly she wanted out.

Who was I to stop her?

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