“You made it,” he said, sitting up.
She closed the door, then stood there, a guarded expression on her face.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“I know what happened the night of the wreck.”
It was so out of context he couldn’t process it. “What?”
“Your brother let it slip and your mother filled in the rest. Why couldn’t you tell me, yourself, Dalton? Why did you let me think you were the one who caused Jim Bob’s death? Didn’t you trust me with the truth?”
He was still so groggy he was having trouble making sense of what she was saying. Or why she was talking about the wreck now. Or why his mother had even told her about it in the first place. “Hey, slow down.” He raked a hand through his hair and waved her toward the armchair beside the couch. “Give me a minute to wake up. Then we’ll talk.”
“I’d rather stand. I’ve been sitting for the last five hours.”
And stewing, he guessed. “Sit down anyway. Please.”
Wide awake now, he sat back, watched her settle into the chair, legs and arms crossed, her face stiff with anger. Shutting him out.
He should have known this would happen. He should have told her. Raney wasn’t one to settle for half answers. Hell. If she was that determined to hear it, he’d give her the whole truth, ugly as it was. “I didn’t tell you because I promised my folks I’d never discuss it.”
“And a promise given is a promise kept, right?”
He’d never heard that tone before. It awakened his own anger. “Yeah.”
“Well, not to worry. They released you from that promise, so now you can explain it to me. Why didn’t you tell anyone your brother caused the wreck? People like Timmy don’t go to prison.”
“Maybe not. More likely he would have been warehoused in some state institution. Which would have been as bad as prison for Timmy.”
“He might have gotten off with probation.”
“I doubt it. Commissioner Adkins wouldn’t have settled for that. If he’d known Timmy was driving the tractor, he would have filed a wrongful death suit and taken everything my parents had. Since I had nothing, he didn’t bother to sue me and took his pound of flesh by sending me to prison, instead.”
She studied him, leg swinging, arms crossed. “So you took the blame.”
He spread his hands in frustration. “Because I was to blame, Raney. I let him take the tractor to the other pasture. And I forgot to tell him to stop and look both ways before he crossed the road. Such a simple thing you forget to mention it, you assume a person would know.” He sighed and shook his head, the burden of guilt no lighter now than it had been two years ago. “But I didn’t remind him like I should have and Timmy didn’t look and because of it, a man died. In balance”—he lifted a hand, then let it drop back to his knee—“a year and a half in prison for me, compared to the horrors that might await Timmy in prison, or being sent to an institution. I couldn’t do that to my brother.”
They sat in silence. Then she said, “But if you hadn’t confessed, if you’d gone to trial—”
He cut her off. “I don’t play what-if games, Raney. Not with the lives of people I love, and not after the fact. I did what I thought was right. Period.” Couldn’t she understand that? Couldn’t she see what she was doing to the fragile trust between them?
In the distance, the announcer’s voice sounded. Dalton saw on his watch that it was after four o’clock. The lead-up to the finals had begun. “Are we done here?”
“Not quite.”
“What else do you need to know?” He tried to keep impatience out of his voice, but it was hard. Why now? All this was past history and rehashing wouldn’t change it.
“Were you ever going to tell me?”
“It was over and done with. I saw no reason to.” He rubbed a hand over his face, as if he could wipe the whole conversation away. How could this be happening? How could she see only the bad and ignore what they meant to each other?
“So, you lied to me instead.”
His head shot up. “I never lied to you, Raney. Not once.”
“You let me think you’d caused Jim Bob’s death. Isn’t that a lie?”
He felt half-sick. He didn’t know what to say or do, or how to make her see it didn’t matter anymore. All that was important was that they loved each other. He’d do anything in his power to make this right, but he couldn’t change the past.
“I understand why you did what you did,” she admitted. “I might even have made the same decision. But what I don’t understand, Dalton,” she added, her voice starting to wobble, “is why you didn’t trust me enough to tell me the truth. That’s what I can’t get past.”
“You’re right. I should have told you. I’m sorry.” What more could he say?
“I’m not sure that’s good enough.”
The loudspeaker blared out the opening music. He shut his mind to it. “Then what do you want, Raney? What can I do to fix this? Tell me, and I’ll do it.”
She just looked at him, tears filling her eyes.
He saw defeat. An uncrossable distance spreading between them. And the realization came—as unexpected and unimaginable as an incoming mortar round—that he was losing her.
Panic paralyzed him. He couldn’t breathe or think. “Don’t do this, Raney. Don’t let this be the end of us.”
Before she could respond, the trailer door opened and Alejandro stuck his head inside. “It is time. The horses are saddled and ready. We must hurry.”
“You do it,” Dalton told him. “You ride for me.”
“No!” Raney bolted from the chair. “You can’t do that to Rosco. Or to me. Do what you came to do. Go on,” she said to Alejandro. “He’s coming.”
Alejandro left.
Dalton rose. He started for the door, stopped, and turned back, watched the tears roll down
