Hunter crossed the grass toward us.
“Dad chose the one day I couldn’t question him.”
“Crystal?”
I turned to him. “Dad lied.”
“About what?”
“Abigail.”
His face drained.
He looked at Joyce. “What does she mean?”
“I don’t know yet,” I said, holding up the envelope. “He left a confession.”
“Dad lied.”
Hunter’s eyes fixed on my name across the front. “Then open it.”
“Not here.”
“Where do you want to go?” Hunter asked.
“Dad’s house.”
He glanced toward the line of cars waiting to follow the hearse.
“After the burial, Crystal.”
“Where do you want to go?”
I looked down at the envelope.
I wanted to tear it open on the church steps.
I wanted answers more than air.
But Dad’s casket was already being carried toward the hearse, and people were turning to watch me.
I slid the envelope into my coat pocket.
It felt heavier there.
Hunter held out his hand. “Come on.”
I wanted answers more than air.
I almost told him I didn’t need help.
Then the bells started ringing.
My knees weakened, and I grabbed his hand before I could stop myself.
He didn’t look surprised.
He only tightened his fingers around mine and walked beside me.
At the grave, every word about Dad’s kindness tightened my chest.
When the final prayer ended, Hunter looked at our clasped hands.
I almost told him I didn’t need help.
“Do you want me to drive?”
I nodded.
Outside the cemetery, Hunter held out his hand.
I gave him the keys but kept the envelope pressed beneath my palm.
“You wait outside at Dad’s house.”
“I will.”
“Do you want me to drive?”
Dad’s house still smelled like cinnamon candy.
His jacket and reading glasses waited where he’d left them.
Hunter stopped in the hallway.
“Do you want me in the kitchen?”
“No.”
“Do you want me to leave?”
I looked toward the porch, then back at him.
“Do you want me to leave?”
“No, just stay here. Please, Hunter.”
“All right.”
He stepped outside and left the door open a few inches.
I walked to the kitchen table.
Abigail had colored there the morning she disappeared.
A purple animal with six legs still clung to the refrigerator beneath a faded magnet.
“It’s a horse,” she’d insisted.
He stepped outside.
Dad had laughed. “Then it’s the finest horse I’ve ever seen.”
I used to love that memory.
Now, I pulled out the chair where Dad had peeled apples for her because she hated the skin.
The envelope crackled in my hand.
Hunter called through the doorway, “Crystal, do you want me to open it with you?”
“No.”
I used to love that memory.
My voice came out too sharp.
I softened it. “Not yet.”
“I’m right here.”
I tore the envelope open.
Three pages slid across the table.
The first line stopped me.
“Crystal, I lied about where Abigail went.”
My chair scraped backward.
“Crystal, I lied about where Abigail went.”
“Dad, what did you do?”
Hunter pushed the door wider. “What does it say?”
I held up one hand. “Give me a minute.”
“Crystal, she’s mine too.”
“I know, Hunter. Give me a minute. Promise.”
I forced my eyes down the page.
“What does it say?”
Dad wrote that the backyard fence had been damaged for weeks.
Beyond it, an overgrown path led to a drainage channel.
A nearby property owner had paid him to repair a separate safety barrier near the steepest section.
Dad bought the supplies, took part of the payment, and kept putting the job off.
“He was supposed to fix it,” I said.
Hunter came one step inside. “Fix what?”
“The barrier.”
Dad bought the supplies.
I kept reading.
That afternoon, Dad’s phone rang about a medical appointment he’d missed.
While he argued, Abigail slipped through the broken fence.
He saw the yellow ribbon in her hair and followed her.
Then he heard her call out.
My breath caught.
I kept reading.
“Hunter, he knew where she went.”
“Keep reading,” he said softly.
He called her name but heard only water below.
Then he saw her yellow ribbon caught on the broken barrier.
Instead of calling for help, he climbed down alone.
He searched for almost 20 minutes.
By the time he came back, I was standing in the yard, screaming Abigail’s name.
“Hunter, he knew where she went.”
I remembered his shirt.
Mud covered the front.
There was a tear near one sleeve.
I’d asked him what had happened.
He’d pointed toward the far side of the property.
“She ran toward the lake,” he’d said.
I remembered his shirt.
The paper shook in my hands.
“He sent us the wrong way.”
I saw the shoreline again, with Dad beside me, telling officers Abigail loved water and could never have reached the drainage path.
He had aimed the search away from her.
I read the final page aloud.
“He sent us the wrong way.”
“By evening, the rain had started. The channel flooded before midnight. I almost told the officers, but I knew they’d ask why the barrier was still broken.”
Hunter stepped into the kitchen. “He knew rain was coming?”
I nodded. “He watched them search the lake anyway.”
I continued reading.
“He knew rain was coming?”
“Then the cameras came. Then Abigail’s face appeared in every window. Every hour made the truth harder to tell. I told myself the water had already taken her and that speaking up would change nothing.
The truth was, I didn’t know that. I only knew telling them would expose what I had done.”
My voice broke on the final paragraph.
“I called my silence love because cowardice was harder to admit. I let you comfort me for five years when I should’ve been asking what my fear took from you.”
“The truth was, I didn’t know that.
I handed Hunter the pages.
He scanned the last lines, threw down his phone, and reached for the glass vase.
“Don’t.”
“He sent us away from her, Crystal.”
“I know. Put it down.”
“He let us destroy ourselves. Our marriage…”
“Don’t add another broken thing to this house.”
“He sent us away from her, Crystal.”
Hunter lowered the vase. “How are you standing?”
“I’m not. I’m choosing what happens next.”
