Rosewood Lane (Cedar Cove #2)(96)

She just stared at him.

Troy patted her hand. “Don’t worry about any of that yet. I’ll talk to Olivia and see what she thinks is best, all right?”

Again she nodded, without knowing what she’d agreed to.

Buttercup wanted inside the house, and Troy stood and opened the door for the golden retriever. The dog ran immediately to Grace and nudged her hands. Grace wrapped her arms around Buttercup’s neck.

While Troy went outside to meet Olivia, Grace picked up the letter. Where she found the courage to open it, she didn’t know.

April 30th

My dearest Grace,

I’m sorry. Sorrier than you’ll ever know. If there’d been a way to spare you the horror of this, I would have done it. I swear I would’ve done anything. I did try, but there’s no escape from the hell my life has become. I can’t carry the burden of my guilt another day. I tried to forget, tried to put the war behind me, but the memories have pressed in on all sides and there’s no longer any hope of escape.

Years ago while I was on patrol in Nam, we took enemy fire. In the aftermath, a few of us got separated from the unit. Desperate to find our way back to base, we stumbled into a small village. What happened afterward has haunted me all these years. A young woman and her baby stepped out of the shadows. Her infant daughter was clutched in her arms but I thought she was hiding a grenade. Only there wasn’t a weapon. All she had was her child. Instinct took over and I fired. I murdered a mother and her baby in my desperation to survive the war—my desperation to get home alive. I watched her fall, watched the horror come over her face and heard the screams of her family. Then there was more gunfire and more mothers and children and the shooting just never seemed to stop. Almost forty years now, and it’s never gone away. I hear their screams in the night. I hear those screams in my sleep, cursing me, hating me. The irony is that they could never hate me more than I hate myself

There’s no forgiveness for me, Grace. Nothing can absolve me from my sins. Not you, not our daughters and sure as hell not God.

I’m sorry, but it’s better for everyone involved if it ends here and now. I didn’t write Maryellen and Kelly. I couldn’t. I was never the husband you deserved and I wasn’t any kind of father. I love you. I always have.

Dan

Grace read the letter a second time, letting her eyes rest on each word, one by one, as she tried to assimilate what he was saying. By the time she’d finished, the knot in her throat made it impossible to speak and tears slid down her face.

“It’s Dan,” she told Olivia who knelt in front of her. Then, her cries surging from deep inside her, she started to wail. Huge sobs racked her shoulders, sobs that shook the very core of her being.

She’d wanted answers, sought resolution, but not this. Never this. Dan’s death from a self-inflicted gunshot wound wasn’t even close to what she’d expected. He’d been alone, trapped in a private hell. He’d been caught in a time warp, tangled in guilt and shame created by a war he’d never wanted to fight.

The tears flowed until there were none left inside her. “The girls…”

“Troy’s gone to get them for you,” Olivia told her. “They’ll be here any minute.”

“I thought he was with another woman.”

“I know.” Olivia stroked her hair as Grace leaned into her friend’s comforting arms.

“All this time he’s been dead.”

“Yes.”

“Almost from the first.”

“So it seems.”

“He left that one night and then he came back, remember?”

“Apparently he changed his mind.”

Grace sobbed. “He came back because he couldn’t make himself do it.” She recalled how angry he’d been, how Dan had lashed out at her and claimed he’d been in hell for the last thirty-five years. She’d assumed he was talking about their marriage when all along it had been the war.

So many things began to fall into place.

“Troy found his wallet and his wedding ring in the trailer.”

Grace lifted her head. “He left his wedding band at home.” She’d found it the night she’d thrown all his clothes out of the house. Finding the ring was what had triggered her tantrum. She’d believed at the time that he’d wanted her to discover it. She’d believed Dan had wanted to flaunt his new love. How wrong she’d been.

“That was the ring he charged on the VISA card,” Grace whispered.

When Dan disappeared a second time, Grace had returned home and found the bedroom a shambles. He was gone and he hadn’t taken anything with him, but he’d emptied the drawers, torn the room apart. What she didn’t understand then was that he’d been on a search. What he sought, she realized now, had been his wedding band. When he couldn’t find it, he’d gone into Berghoff’s and purchased another. For some confused reason—loyalty? guilt? both?—he’d wanted his wedding ring on his finger when he blew out his brains.

“Mom!” Kelly rushed into the room with Paul and the baby. Her daughter’s sobs tore at her heart, and Grace held out her arms. Maryellen was only a few moments behind. Together they formed a circle, arms around one another, weeping, sobbing, hugging. Then Grace kissed each one in turn and whispered, “We need to make burial arrangements. It’s time we laid your father to rest.”