Page 72 of Turn That River Red

“The name,” she says when I’m done. “You think it could be an anagram?”

“Huh.” I drag the file over to and look down atJohnny Dobsals, typed out nearly on the thirty-year-old paper. “What makes you say that?”

Mercy chews on her bottom lip, long lashes fluttering. “I used to come up with anagrams of my name,” she says. “Right after I married Reverend Gunner.” She looks down at her hands, her hair falling in her face, and I can’t stop myself from reaching over to brush it away, smoothing it over her shoulder. She glances at me, and smiles, and it makes my heart get all warm and tight. “Mercy’s not the name my parents gave me,” she says. “I was named Kayley until the Gunners took me in and renamed me. But I kept my last name, Hendricks. Mercy Gunner isn’t mylegalname.”

“Your legal name is Kayley Hendricks?”

Mercy nods. “But that was—so long ago. I barely even remember my parents. Kayley doesn’t feel like my name anymore.” She takes a deep breath, and I can feel her bravery surging up inside her, like she’s a victim about to make her final stand. “When I was little, I thought that the Gunners changing my name, that was how they claimed me, you know? So after I—” She bites her lips again, and she speaks, it’s barely in a whisper. “After I was married, I had this fantasy that I could change my name and I’d be free.”

I feel something I haven’t felt in a long, long time. Empathy. Pity. I can see Mercy scratching out fake names on a sheet of paper, tears on her cheeks, and it doesn’t do anything but make me want to pull her into my arms and kiss her, slow and sweet.

“Stupid, I know,” she whispers.

“It’s not stupid.” I take her hand, braiding her fingers through mine. She looks down at it with mild surprise. “You don’t have to change your name,” I tell her. “I’m not letting him have you again.”

Withthosewords, my pity for Mercy disappears, and I just feel the hot flush of need to slaughter Sterling Gunner and the other one who fucked her—Sullivan. It’s a much more familiar feeling. A much morecomfortablefeeling.

Mercy smiles a little. “Thank you.” She hardly says it out loud.

This time, I do kiss her, rising up just enough that our lips meet. I half-expect her to pull away, but she doesn’t. She parts her lips. She lets me in.

“Come on,” I whisper against her mouth, pulling her up to stand. She comes with me, eyes shining and bright, the way they were when she still thought I was just a preacher. I guide her to the bed and lay her down, kissing her the whole time. I’m not going to fuck her.

I just want her to not be sad anymore.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

AMBROSE

When the sun rises the next morning, flooding my bedroom with lemony light, Mercy’s asleep in my bed, and I know the name of Charlotte’s Hunter father.

I slept a little too, after I kissed Mercy’s sorrow away and she drifted off to her human dreams. Just for an hour or so. When I woke up, Max was curled up next to Mercy and Roxi was curled at my feet and it was nice, all four of us in one bed. So nice I just stayed there with her, petting her soft golden hair, my thoughts working through anagrams of Johnny Dobsals. And I don’t know if it was the sleep or it was the sound of Mercy’s soft, heavy breathing, but I figured it out.

Johnny Dobsalsisan anagram—for a Hunter named Johnson Baldys.

I don’t know him well. I only met him once, years and years ago. Sometime in the late 40s, after the war was over. It’d been up north somewhere, Maine or Vermont, one of those leafy New England states.

And I don’t think I would have figured it out if Mercyhadn’t told me about inventing anagrams like it might be a way for her to escape Reverend Gunner.

“Muy bien, humanita,” I murmur into her ear. She stirs a little but doesn’t wake up. I’ll let her sleep. The dogs are scrabbling around in the hallway by this point anyway, ready for breakfast.

I slide out of bed, careful not to disturb Mercy, and grab my phone before padding out into the hallway, where Max and Roxi jump around me, tails wagging, tongues lolling. “You’re getting kibble,” I tell them. “But then we’ll do some training.”

They both know the wordtraining, and they take off like shots toward the back door. It’s been about a week since we did it last, since I couldn’t very well do it at the Church of the Well. Still, I want to feed them first.

I dump some of the grocery store kibble in their bowls. Max immediately abandons the back door for breakfast, although Roxi takes her time, eyeing me as she strolls into the kitchen. I shrug. “Gotta finish up that kibble first,” I tell her. “Then you get your reward.”

She relents—begrudgingly.

I brew some coffee and send a text to Charlotte, letting her know the names of her parents. Not even a minute later, my phone rings.

“Are you serious?” she asks when I answer. “This is them?”

“Yeah, I’m pretty sure. I’ll let you track them down. You need the practice anyway.”

Charlotte scoffs, and I hear Jaxon shout something in the background.

“What’s he upset about?” I pour my coffee, watching the dogs. They’re almost done eating.

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