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I manage to drag the men holding me several feet toward the door, but they plant themselves and stop me. Through the opening, I can see my father being forced across the yard. His feet keep catching against the uneven ground, and one of the men has to grab him harder by the arm to keep him upright.
His face turns toward me. He looks terrified.
I have never seen my father afraid like that.
“Boone!”
“Dad!”
His hand reaches toward me.
Mine reaches back.
There are only twenty feet between us, but with two grown men holding me in place, it might as well be the entire mountain separating us again.
“Let me go!” I scream at the men restraining me. “You know me! You know him! What the hell are you doing?”
Neither of them answers.
One looks away.
That hurts almost as much as watching my father being taken because these are people who watched me grow up. They ate at our table and shook my father’s hand in the street. They know exactly how frail he is, and they know that since the day I returned, I’ve been here caring for him.
Yet they hold me while he begs them to stop. My father is forced toward the waiting wagon.
“Please,” I choke out. “Lucien, please.”
Lucien finally looks at me.
I hate that he’s made me beg.
“I’ll pay you,” I gasp. “Everything you spent on him. I have enough. You can have all of it.”
“I don’t want your money.”
“Then take the house.”
His expression barely changes.
“The land. Bramble. Everything.” I pull against the hands still holding me, but they don’t give an inch. “Take whatever you want.”
“You know what I want.”
Behind him, they force my father into the wagon.
“Boone!”
His voice breaks.
So does mine.
“Dad!”
The wagon begins moving before I can understand that they’ve actually put him inside it. I stop feeling the pain in my arms and the way my boots are sliding uselessly against the floor. All I can see is my father twisting around in the back of that wagon, desperately trying to keep me in sight while the horses carry him toward the road.
I fight until there’s nothing left.
The wagon reaches the road.
