Next Time Away novel · Chapter 12 of 24

Chapter 12: The Price

I put Greta's seat in the crook of my arm and walked out of the shed.

"Stay inside," I said to Jonas.

"No."

"Please."

He stopped in the doorway with his hands at his sides.

The van's window rolled down as I crossed the gravel.

Dagny sat with her braid over one shoulder and a thermos in the cup holder, and the heater breathing out of the dash.

Elsie was not with her.

"She's at my sister's," Dagny said, before I could ask. "I thought you and I should talk like women."

"Talk."

"She told you, didn't she?" Her voice was warm and sad. "She tells everybody. She's an honest little thing. I've been trying to teach her not to."

"What did she tell me?"

"Don't." Dagny smiled. "I know what you found out. I saw you take the drawing out of her bag."

I said nothing.

"So here is where we are," she said. "I'll put it simply, because you're tired."

She held up one finger after another as she went.

"Soren drove drunk and killed his brother, and there's no clock on that. If it comes out, he goes to prison. My daughter loses the last man she calls family, and you lose your husband."

"I've already lost him."

"You haven't." She tilted her head. "He's been coming to my bed since April, honey. He comes because he owes me, and he'll go on coming. That's the part you don't understand. He cannot leave me."

The wind pushed the carrier against my knee.

I had known it, I realized.

I had known it for months, and I had not let myself say it.

"Here's the offer," Dagny said. "You keep quiet. You keep your house and your name."

"And?"

"We all live there together, a big family, and I'll even let you have the nursery back. Jonas keeps his dock, and nobody ever hears the truth from either of you."

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