Antler Crown, Silent Departure novel · Chapter 8 of 24

Chapter 8: Say It Out Loud

The cabin sat at the end of a gravel road, with a green metal roof and a long porch that faced the water.

Malcolm unlocked the door and stepped aside to let me go in first.

Inside, everything was new.

A leather sofa, a rug that still had the fold lines in it, and a kitchen island with three bar stools that had price tags on the legs.

The seller had let them move in early, and I had paid for the stool nearest me.

On the mantel was a framed photograph.

It was Zack and Lacey on this porch, laughing, with their arms around each other.

A date was printed in the corner. It was August, two months before our wedding.

I put the frame face down on the mantel.

In the loft bedroom, someone had made the bed with a patchwork quilt.

I recognized the quilt, because Dot had made it.

She had given it to me three Christmases ago, and I had lent it to Zack in the spring when he said he was cold at his apartment.

I pulled it off the bed and folded it over my arm.

"Don't," said a voice from the stairs. "That's ours."

Lacey stood on the bottom step with a duffel bag over her shoulder.

She had been staying here since the weekend.

I could see it in the sweater on the couch arm and the coffee cup in the sink.

"It's my grandmother's," I said. "She made it."

"Zack gave it to me."

"Zack can't give away what isn't his."

"He can give me anything," Lacey said. "You don't get it. He picked me. You can have your money back from that cabin, and your quilt, and the whole wedding, and he's still going to pick me."

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