A Merciful Death (Mercy Kilpatrick #1)(103)

“But Rose,” Mercy started, a dozen reasons crowding her mind. The child of a rapist. What will you tell the child? Will another man take on that child one day? Then she realized that if anyone could handle the situation, it was her sister. Her heart was enormous, and she possessed a true gift of forgiveness.

Even blind, she was more resolute than Mercy.

Rose didn’t know if she was pregnant. But her introspective expression told Mercy she hoped she was.

Their second big conversation had been about the death of Kenny, the first attacker.

They and Truman had agreed to keep it quiet. The only two other people who had known about Kenny were dead.

The police had found Jennifer’s and Gwen’s prom pictures in Craig’s apartment. They’d also found his fingerprints on the stolen weapons at Owlie Lake. In her interview, Rose had stated that Craig had told her he’d killed the preppers and the two girls. Craig Rafferty would probably take all the blame for what both men had done.

It’d been enough to start the wrapping up of the cases and offer healing to long-grieving families.

David Aguirre started a final prayer over Levi’s grave. Around her, heads bowed. Mercy stared at the gaping hole and struggled to pull up more memories of her brother. Why did I let fifteen years go by? His final moments in the dirt outside the Fahey home haunted her, and she hated that they would be a prominent memory for the rest of her life.

Around her everyone stood, and she stiffly moved to her feet, feeling decades older. Placing Rose’s hand on her arm, she followed her siblings and parents out of the first row of seats, blindly walking behind Pearl. Her family started to form a receiving line, and Mercy begged off, transferring Rose’s hand to Pearl and escaping to stand under a towering ponderosa pine between old gravestones fifty feet away. Her father still wouldn’t look her in the eye, but her mother had assured her he didn’t fully blame her for Levi’s death. Mercy had been stunned at her mother’s words. Blaming me is an option?

She carried her own minor guilt over Levi’s death, but she hadn’t placed him outside that house, and she wasn’t the one who had hid the identity of a possible killer for fifteen years. She, Truman, and Rose had agreed not to share Levi’s involvement with Craig. There was no gain for anyone in knowing what her brother had done.

The distance between her and her father might never be bridged. Her mother was coming around, but only as far as she was comfortable under her husband’s watchful eye. Pearl was similar, acting stiff around Mercy when her husband was present. Owen wouldn’t let his family acknowledge her, and Rose had admitted he was angry about Levi’s death.

I don’t care how my family feels. Not much, anyway.

She inhaled the baked scent of the pines, refusing to feel shame that she couldn’t stand in a line and listen to the mourners spout their banalities.

Today is about Levi. I said my good-bye.

She’d come to terms with what Levi had done to her and Rose. She hadn’t forgiven him. Yet. But she refused to harbor any hatred. What was done was done. Allowing anger to fester against her dead brother would only hurt her.

In a few weeks she’d ask a few people to share happy memories of her brother. Just not today.

“Aunt Mercy?” Kaylie appeared beside her. “I don’t want to stand in that line.”

The sight of her niece lifted her spirits. Levi was always present in Kaylie’s face and in her gestures. The more time Mercy spent with the teen, the more she saw the young Levi she remembered. It was comforting.

Two days ago Mercy told Kaylie her name had been the last word on Levi’s lips. The girl had fallen apart at the revelation, but Mercy had known it would comfort her later.

Now Mercy put an arm around her shoulders. “I can’t do it either. I think it’s okay if we stand back here and watch.” Kaylie’s mother hadn’t attended, and Mercy’s heart hurt for the teenager.

So alone.

“Your daddy loved you very much,” Mercy whispered, knowing the girl had heard the phrase a thousand times in the last few days. Mercy’s mother had brought Kaylie to stay in her home and fussed over her in a way Mercy suspected the teen had never experienced.

“I know,” Kaylie said. She took a deep breath. “I have a big favor to ask you.”

“Anything.”

“I want to come live with you in Portland.”

Mercy started. That she hadn’t expected. Levi’s last request rang in her head, and she shut it away. She hadn’t told anyone what he’d asked of her. “You have another year of school left. You should finish it here. Grandma and Aunt Pearl will take good care of you.” Her voice shook.

Kaylie shook her head. “They don’t get me. It’s always just been my dad and me. I don’t know how to fit in with a family.”

“Oh, Kaylie—”

“You don’t have to make up your mind yet,” she said quickly. “Think about it. I clean up after myself and I don’t need to be entertained.”

Can I take on a teenager?

She pulled the girl tight to her side, remembering how abandoned she’d felt as a teenager. She wouldn’t let that happen to Kaylie.

But she had her own life to straighten out first.

“Trust me,” Mercy said. “I won’t leave you alone. But I have some things to do, and then I’ll tell you what I decide.”