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“Fuck,” Micah rubbed his eyes. “Fuck.”
“Can you get Rachel? This is about your parents.”
Micah blinked, confusion replacing the fear in his eyes. He hesitated for a moment before nodding and heading off to fetch Rachel. While we waited, Connor and I exchanged a glance, both of us knowing that this conversation would be hard.
Rachel appeared a few minutes later, her face lighting up with a ready smile as she approached. She was pregnant, not far from her due date, her hand resting on her belly. Micah led her over to a table by the fence overlooking the valley, the breathtaking view stretching out before us.
Micah pulled out a chair for Rachel, encouraging her to sit. She lowered herself, still smiling, though there wasa hint of worry in her eyes now, sensing the seriousness of the situation.
“Okay,” I began, struggling to find the right words. “I don’t know where to start, but… I’m just going to say it. I’m looking into the possibility that the bones in the well might be your mom’s.”
The shock on their faces was immediate and palpable. Rachel’s smile faded, her eyes widening. Micah’s expression crumbled, the strength he’d been holding onto slipping away as the reality of what I’d said hit him.
“No, she died in Canada at a retreat. She had cancer,” Rachel said, her voice trembling.
“That might not be accurate,” I tried to be gentle. “We don’t have the full picture yet, and we’re waiting on DNA analysis, but I wanted to give you a heads-up and to ask if either of you recall anything about your mom and dad around that time… anything at all.”
Rachel’s eyes filled with tears, and she looked away, trying to hold herself together. Micah’s jaw clenched as he stared at the ground, his hands curling into fists on the table.
“Nothing,” he said. “Just that Dad was angry, and I … spent a lot of time outside with the horses. I couldn’t see Mom ill.”
I glanced at Rachel for her comments, and she took a shaky breath.
“The night he took Momma to her place in Canada, I was nine. I was sleeping, but I heard Dad crying. They were going on holiday and told me they were going to fix her cancer if they could, but…”
“We knew she was dying,” Micah finished for his sister.
“She told us she was sorry, that she loved us. Then… she wouldn’t wake up. I remember… tablets on the floor… I remember she looked so peaceful just sleeping like that.”
She paused, wiping at the tears that had begun to fall, and leaned into Micah who hugged her gently.
“Dad was drunk, angry, shouting about how he’d planned it all out, how it was going to cost him nothing, but now he had to move her, how she was supposed to walk out and die somewhere else. He was ranting about the money, suicide, and murder, and I got scared, even though Mom was still sleeping. And I … I don’t remember anything else except that Micah was ill that night.”
Micah was surprised. “I was? You remember that?”
“I wanted you to hear it all to make it disappear, but you were fast asleep.” She pressed her hands to her belly.
“Rachel, I’m sorry,” Micah whispered, and she reached over to touch his face.
“Never be sorry for having one less awful memory of what he did to us.”
They hugged, and when they drew apart, I didn’t have the heart to ask them anything else.
The silence that followed was heavy, filled with the memories neither of them wanted to revisit. I could see the pain in their eyes, the confusion, the anger at not knowing the full truth. And all I could do was sit there, knowing that whatever comfort I could offer would never be enough.
“If it is her, then we’ll do everything to find out what happened,” I promised. “Whatever it takes, we’ll find out.”
Rachel nodded, her tears still falling as she reached for Micah’s hand, gripping it. Micah didn’t say anything; he just sat there, his face a mask of determination and sorrow. He was holding it together for Rachel, for the baby she carried, but I could see the cracks forming in his armor.
Scott, Rachel’s husband, came out of the house then. He took one look at his wife and bristled. “What the hell?” he asked as he helped Rachel stand.
“They think it might be Mom in the well… the bones…” He and Micah helped her back to the house, and Connor stood beside me, his presence a steadying force.
“That fucking sucked,” he muttered. “And none of it helped.”
“It might have,” I said, tiredly. “What if Rebecca knew she was close to dying? The family didn’t have money. It would have been one more burden on her kids, and they already had to live with Edward, a bastard. What if she knew he was going to hurt her, so she took enough pills to leave peacefully? Maybe the well wasn’t his first choice. Rachel said she heard him say she was supposed to walk and that he had plans.”
“That is fucked up.”
