Page 81 of Slow Burn
He waved the unspoken question away. “Sorry. He’s Lydia’s brother.”
“Lydia’s brother,” she repeated. Something about that felt significant, though she couldn’t pinpoint why at first. But her own thought about firefighters being the perfect arsonists because of their understanding of fire rolled back through her mind.
Could the reason Eric Ward had dragged his feet be that he wanted the culprit to stay buried?
“Lydia—your wife?”
Daniel went unnervingly still, as if that was an accusation in itself.
There was no denying that Lydia hated Jocelyn’s mama. She had a fair enough reason, even if the person she should’ve hated was the man across the room from Jocelyn. Was it possibleLydia had hated her mama enough to hurt her—accidentally or intentionally—and then she’d had to find a way to cover up what she’d done?
Natasha had mentioned driving by their house more than once. But who didn’t? It wasn’t in the back woods. But she’d saidmany times, like it was an unusual amount. Jocelyn turned away from Daniel’s intense gaze, brushing her fingers over her lips as she replayed that conversation.One day it was there; the next day, it was gone.
Jocelyn had taken it as a turn of phrase, a child’s observation of things without true knowledge of the frequency or the time that had passed. But if driving by was a regular occurrence, maybe they’d driven by that day. Could it have been when Daniel was there, trying to convince her mama to keep their affair going?
Had Lydia gone back later?
Jocelyn pulled the newspaper clipping from her purse, staring at it again. The person had highlighted the phrase “sad accident,” but just above that, a sentence cut in half she’d missed before was visible if she really studied it: “consistent with a blow to the head.”
Jocelyn swallowed, her mind spinning and spinning. “I-I have to go.”
Daniel’s hand stretched toward her. “Wait. Please, Jocelyn.”
She’d taken two steps back, but that tone, the plea in it stilled her movements.
“Will you forgive me? For-for everything I did and… didn’t do?” His voice broke a little. “I wish to God things had been different.”
There was that little twinge inside her, the knowledge that, damn it, she didn’t really know what had led him to make the choices he had. But her mama had suffered for it, and it wasn’t something she took lightly.
“I don’t know,” she answered truthfully. “Maybe someday.”
His lips flattened as he nodded acceptance of that answer, but his shoulders slumped.
She turned to go, ignoring the pull of sympathy.
thirty
“If this is to end in fire then we shall all burn together.” - Ed Sheeran
Cole was mad enough at himself over what he’d said to Jocelyn that he rage-worked through half the morning, knocking out so many tasks for the Nail that he left himself with nothing else to do before the rest of the crew rolled in for shift. And that was still a couple hours out.
He hated it. Hated himself. Hated what that conversation had done to her—done to them. Because, damn it, he cared if there was a them. He didn’t know what that would mean for her, or for him, or for this town.
She was just as reluctant to put down roots here as folks were to welcome her, but it seemed like a few people had started warming up, her sister in particular.
Would she consider staying?
Would he consider leaving?
He’d been chasing the approval of the locals for so long, not giving much thought to whathewanted. And what he wanted was that house he was building outside of town. The quiet inthose trees. The serenity of the creek that cut along the back of the acreage. The history in that land.
But asking her to stay felt like a mighty big request—especially when whatever this was between them was still fresh.
He knew he was getting ahead of himself.
And he was fixing to drive himself clean crazy.
He headed back to the supply closet, checking inventory again even though he’d already made a list of what he needed to order soon. Maybe he oughta go ahead and order everything while he had a minute.
