They Sent Me to Prison for the Family Fire, So I Came Home to Sell the Ranch Out From Under Them novel · Chapter 21 of 24
Chapter 21: Sorry Is Not a Signature
Maite's POV
"I set the fire," Amaia said again, to the glass wall and the hundred faces behind it.
"I was twenty-one.
"I took a can of gasoline from the east shed, and I poured it along the back of the barn, and I lit it with a kitchen match."
Nobody in the conference room moved.
The buyer's lawyer had stopped writing.
"I wanted to stop the sale," Amaia said.
"I did not know a man was in the loft.
"He died, and I let another woman go to prison for what I did."
My mother made a sound as though something in her had been pulled loose.
"Amaia," she whispered.
"Mama, don't," Amaia said, without turning.
The bank manager had gone white about the mouth.
He looked at the deputy by the door, and the deputy took one step forward and stopped, because nobody had told him whom to take.
"Mr. Etcheverry," the bank manager said.
"Did you know of this?"
"I knew nothing of it," my father said.
His voice was steady.
It was the soft deep voice that had talked a hundred buyers into a hundred sales.
"I'm as shocked as you are."
"Papa," Iker said.
My father turned.
My brother stood just inside the door with his hat crushed in his fists.
He was gray to the lips, and he looked at his father the way I had looked at the transfer in the tent.
"I took the can out of Amaia's hands that night," Iker said.
"I told you in the morning.
"You said the girl in the car would do."
"Iker," my father said.
"You said it in the kitchen with Ama at the stove," Iker said.
"You said, if the Reno girl takes it, we keep the ranch."
A sound went across the room like wind through dry grass.
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–12 of They Sent Me to Prison for the Family Fire, So I Came Home to Sell the Ranch Out From Under Them are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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