He Gave Her My Home, So I Took Back My Life novel · Chapter 20 of 24

Chapter 20: Burn

Cal's POV

I had waited twenty months to hear someone in my brother's house say that it was real.

When they came, I didn't feel what I'd expected.

I felt very tired, and I felt the grass under my boots.

Graham stood on the stage with his mouth slightly open.

Delphine stood a yard from him with the boy on her hip, and she did not look at him.

"Delphine," he said again.

"I'm done, Graham."

"You don't know what you're saying."

"I know exactly what I'm saying." She was crying, and her voice was steady. "Nora, may I?"

Nora held out the microphone without a word.

Delphine took it in her free hand and faced the lawn.

"I keep the household books," she said. "I have for eleven years. In the week after Rhys died, there was a charge I couldn't place. A body shop in New Bedford, paid in cash, for the front end and the rear bumper of a green SUV."

Somebody in the crowd made a low sound.

"The shop gave me a receipt. I put it in a drawer." She breathed in. "I've kept it twenty months."

"Sheriff," Graham said, in a very reasonable voice. "My brother's widow is having a breakdown. She's grieving. This is not evidence."

"It's a receipt," the sheriff said.

"It's a kitchen drawer!"

The first crack came into his voice, and half the lawn heard it.

I walked.

I hadn't decided to.

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