Chapter 11: The Hand I Knew

Rafe's POV

I'd rehearsed telling her for a month, and none of it was any use.

She walked back into the shop with her shoulders square and didn't look at me.

Norman stood beside me in the lot with his hat in his hands, and neither of us moved.

"I'm sorry, son," he said.

I waited for ten years of anger to rise, and what came instead was tired.

"You said it to her first."

"I said it to the one who's owed it most."

That was fair, and I hated that it was.

"Go home, Norman," I said. "I'll hear the rest when she's heard mine."

He nodded and put the tank into my arms before I could stop him.

It was heavier than it looked, and the wing and the wrench were perfect.

I ran my thumb over the gold R.C. and thought of the Sunday that never happened.

I carried it inside.

Stephanie was in the bay, loading her cases into a crate without looking up.

"You've had enough time to think of something to say," she said.

"I haven't."

"Then say the true thing."

I put the tank down on her bench.

"I saw your flaps on a trailer in Spokane," I said. "Blue koi. Two weeks ago."

"And?"

"And I'd spent ten years watching Dutch Telford's tanks win shows. I'd seen every one. The design was never his."

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