Page 80 of The Words We Lost

His perplexed expression only makes my confession more difficult.

“The day you came to my office at Fog Harbor, SaBrina was getting ready to fire me. My productivity since Cece’s death has been subpar at best, and Chip has been covering for my slow production for months and months. But then you showed up with a birthday invitation in Port Townsend and...” I fail to extinguish the burn at the base of my throat. “And SaBrina told me that if I accepted the invitation and used my time here to find the missing manuscript, I could keep my job.”

For close to a minute, Joel doesn’t move. Not a blink, not a muscle twitch, not a single acknowledgment that he’s even heard a word I’ve spoken. And then, in one controlled movement, he rises fromhis chair and crosses the length of his office, as if he suddenly can’t stand to be near me.

“You’re saying the only reason you agreed to come back was because of the manuscript,” he calmly confirms. “Not because Cece asked you to, and not because I asked you to. But because SaBrina asked you to.”

I want to deny it, but I can’t. “I—I would have lost my job and the life I made there, my home.”

“That city has never been your home.”

“It’s the only thing I had after everything broke.”

“No, Ingrid, it’s the only thing youchoseafter everything broke. There’s a big difference.” His gaze is pained as he takes me in. “I thought we ...” Whatever he’s about to say, he shuts it down with a hard shake of his head. “I won’t be signing anything over to SaBrina for verification.”

“I understand that’s how you feel—it’s how I feel, too, but ...” I can barely force my next words out. “She threatened to leak the existence of Cece’s memoir to the media if she doesn’t get a chance to see what’s in our possession for herself.”

“Of course she did.” He slams the base of his fist on the bookshelf he’s standing beside and refuses to meet my gaze for so long I fight a true wave of nausea.

“We need to come up with a plan,” I plead gently. “If the public finds out there’s an unpublished manuscript by Cece floating around here, regardless of the content, it will start the chaos all over again. They’ll come. And they’ll look for Wendy.”

He grips the back of his neck, a mix of shock and disappointment on his face.

“I’m so sorry,” I say with a quivering lip.

Slowly, as his gaze connects with mine, I see the face of a man I begged to keep my dad safe, to protect at all costs. The same face I’d blamed for so much of my heartache and pain these last five years.

And now here we are again. Only this time, I’m the one who put his family at risk.

The realization guts me.

He starts for the exit.

“Where are you going?”

“Where I should have gone months ago. To Marshall’s.”

“Joel, wait, please.” I push to the end of the chair, testing my legs. They’re no longer shaking, and yet they still feel absolutely boneless. “I know you’re upset. You have every right to be. But we need to work together on this. For Wendy’s sake.”

His back is to me when he shoves his hands into his pockets and speaks to his closed office door. “Why did you really agree to stay after the birthday party, Indy?”

I open my mouth, try to respond, only to close it again.

He twists to face me. “You came here to save your job, but is that the only reason you stayed?”

My throat burns to tell him something other than the truth, something pure and upright and noble. But I won’t lie to him again. My reasons then may not be the same as my reasons now, but even still, the truth is I stayed for me. I’d set out to redeem my professional reputation, and instead all I’d done is hurt a family who’d taught me more about love and loyalty and forgiveness than anyone I’d ever known.

When my silence lingers another few seconds, Joel finally says, “That’s what I thought.”

27

I need to move.

It’s the only thought in my head when I find my bike parked outside the staff entrance. Allie must have unloaded it from the back of the club car, then thoughtfully placed the wooden box into the wire basket for me to take back to the cottage. Only, I don’t want to go to the cottage.

I slip onto the seat, and the instant my feet hit the pedals, my calf muscles ignite with a familiar fury, honing in on a rhythm they know well. When Dr. Rogers suggested this outlet for me, he encouraged me to fight the spirals in my mind with the spinning wheels of a bike. But this is one spiral I know I can’t outride. My warring thoughts are not rooted in a past I wish I could change, but on a future I desperately want to make right.

By the twelve-minute mark, the hem of my cotton shirt is already stuck to my damp lower back as I’ve been more focused on the intensity of my ride than on my destination. But the minute I near the marina, the prickle of awareness in my chest becomes as evident as the sun breaking free from the clouds overhead. Its refusal to hide fuels the mission I’ve rejected since the first time my therapist dared bring it up. Suddenly, my destination is as dialed into my internal GPS as the coordinates carved into the flesh above my heart.

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