Page 22 of Wrangled
A surprised bark of laughter escapes me, making her grin. Only I can’t stop the laughter, though it sounds manic to my ears. Before you know it, I’m sobbing in the arms of the woman who stood by me from the beginning of all this mess.
“I’ve got you, Calliope. Let it out, sweetheart.”
I’m afraid I couldn’t stop if I tried. By the time I cry myself out, my eyes feel swollen, and my throat is raw. When I pull back, Jen’s eyes are red too, and that makes me feel emotional all over again. I take a few deep breaths and finally get myself under control. “I’m sorry.”
“I think that was a long time coming.”
“I thought I was over all of this shit. I promised myself I wouldn’t be weak anymore, but being back here in this damn place brought everything rushing back again.”
“Dealing with things and moving on are all good until you step back into the scene of the crime. This would have hurt if it had been months, years, or decades. If two things in this world refuse to be confined to a timeline, it’s trauma and grief.”
I nod. She’s right, but I still feel frustrated with myself.
“If it had been anyone else having this reaction after what they had been through, what would you have said to them? Would you have thought they were weak?”
“No, of course not.”
“So why are you holding yourself to a higher standard? That young girl who still lives inside you has been through enough without you punishing her too.”
“It’s annoying when you make this much sense.”
“Gives you a new appreciation for my husband, doesn’t it?”
I chuckle, feeling wrung out but also lighter than before. I guess crying is cathartic after all.
“So while we clean, I want you to give me the skinny on Laurel and Hardy.”
“Who?”
“God, you make me feel old,” she mutters, grabbing a cleaning cloth and a bottle of disinfectant from the haul I carried in. “Dale and Porter. I wasn’t expecting that level of anger.”
When I don’t answer, she turns back to me. “But you were, clearly.”
I grab a cleaning cloth before heading to the fridge. “In Dale’s eyes, I killed my father. He has every right to be angry.”
Before I can open the fridge, she tugs my arm with her surprisingly firm grip and spins me around. “That’s the first time you’ve admitted it out loud. I fucking knew it. I always knew it, and yet part of me hoped I was wrong.”
“What are you…” I drift off when I realize what I said about Dale.
“It doesn’t matter now.”
“The fuck it doesn’t. You were innocent. I could have?—”
“Done nothing. It was orchestrated this way. Nothing you could have said or done would have changed anything. Why do you think I was turned down for parole, not once but twice? My father had connections everywhere. My guess is Porter tried to pick up where my father left off, but he’s not quite as formidable as he was.”
“You never met him before?”
“I’ve never met Porter before today,” I reply, mixing the truth with a lie.
“This Dale situation concerns me. He was the prosecution’s star witness. If he lied about you being the killer, then he must be worried about you fingering him now.”
“He should be worried. Because there were three of us there that day. One of us died, one went to prison, and the other one pulled the trigger.”
Idon’t think I’ve ever shocked anyone into silence before. After my revelation, Jenny walked off and started cleaning furiously, like a madwoman. By the time she was done, my house sparkled like new, and I had barely worked up a sweat.
“Jen—”
She holds up her hand. “That insidious madman stole fifteen years of your life. You were locked behind bars while he lived and breathed the air on your fucking ranch. How are you not livid?”
