PROLOGUE
Carmel Valley, California
Wednesday, April 2, 3:00 a.m.
Sixteen years ago . . .
She’s gone.
Katherine’s hand trembled as she gripped the barn door handle. Her whole body trembled. Her stomach churned so violently that she thought she’d be sick.
She’s gone.
And it’s all my fault.
So many things she could have done. Should have done.
Will do. But she didn’t know where to start.
However, she did know where she needed to be.
Alone. In the barn. In the place where they’d first huddled together as frightened twelve-year-old runaways to get out of the cold night. In the place where—much later—they’d come to talk about . . . everything.
Well, Wren would talk. Katherine would listen.
Katherine was a good listener. She’d had to be. She’d learned to hear the nuances in a person’s speech. To know if they’d help. Or hurt.
To know if they were lying or telling the truth.
She didn’t want to listen now. She wanted to be alone where she could scream her fury, where she could unleash her rage. Where she couldn’t hurt anyone else.
Because Wren was gone.
Her eyes burned and she swallowed the sob that rose in her throat as she slid the barn door open just enough to slip inside. She was so skinny, she didn’t need it to open much and she knew just how far she could slide the door before it creaked.
She didn’t let it creak. It would be all right if she did, but she still found something satisfying about sneaking in where she wasn’t supposed to be. At least not right now. She was allowed to be in the barn anytime she wished, but she was supposed to be sleeping right now.
Except she hadn’t slept in nearly two weeks. Tonight would be no different, so she’d given up trying.
Someone had turned the night-light on, its soft glow spreading through the barn, leaving shadows lurking in the corners. She wasn’t afraid of the shadows. She knew every one. This was her place. This was where she came to think.
Now it was where she came to grieve.
She breathed deeply, drawing in the scents of horses and fresh hay—and even fresher motor oil. The latter was unexpected. Usually the motor oil smelled old.
Tools were strewn on the floor around the old tractor that sat parked along the far wall. It had been broken for months. No one had had the time to fix it.
Looked like someone had been working on it tonight.
Someone who was still here.
She tensed, hearing the labored breathing coming from one of the empty stalls.
No, not breathing. Someone was crying.
She started to turn and run, but the cries became sobs. Deep, racking sobs that ripped at her heart.
At least someone else is missing Wren. Which wasn’t fair, she knew. Everyone in the big house missed Wren. How could they not?
She crept farther into the barn, listening intently, ready to flee at a moment’s notice, but now needing to know who’d come to her private place to grieve, even though she thought she knew.
The tuned-up tractor had been her first clue.
A big, burly man sat on the floor of an empty stall, back against the wall, shoulders heaving as he cried. In one of his massive hands was a piece of wood. In the other, his carving knife.
Harlan McKittrick. Her foster father.
She’d never seen him cry, not in the three years that she’d lived here, not even at the funeral today. He’d been stoic, his expression immovable, like a statue’s. He’d held his arm around Mrs. McK as she’d cried her eyes out. He’d spoken a few words over Wren’s coffin in his deep, gravelly voice, about peace and eternity and God.
Katherine had wanted to scream then. She’d wanted to hit someone.
She’d wanted to hit Mr. McK for being so . . . together. For being unfeeling.
But she could see now that she’d made a big mistake. The man was not unfeeling. He’d just saved his grief for when he was alone.
Just like I did.
She took a step back, intending to leave him in peace, to find somewhere else to scream her rage, but his head shot up and he met her eyes in the dim light.
For a long moment, neither of them moved. His tears continued to fall and she was poised to run. Finally, he wiped his face with his shirtsleeve.
“Kit,” he said gruffly.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’ll go.”
He shook his head. “No, you don’t have to. This was your place, hers too. I should have known you’d come here tonight.”
Her cheeks heated. She’d been caught out of bed at three a.m. There were rules, even here. “I’ll go.”
“No, honey. I’ll go. Mrs. McK is probably wondering where I’ve got myself off to. You can stay.” He rose, wincing as he stretched his back. “I’m too damn old to be sitting on barn floors. I came out here to do some whittling, but . . .” He trailed off with a sigh. “It kind of hit me. You know how it goes, huh, Kitty-Cat?”
He always called her Kit or Kitty-Cat. Not ever Katherine, and she’d often wondered why. But she didn’t hate it. She might have even liked it. A little.
Talk to him. Say something to make him feel better. Because Mr. McK was a nice guy. And McKittrick House was so much nicer than any other place she’d ever lived. And she’d lived in a lot of places.
Mr. and Mrs. McK were good people. They never yelled, never hit. Never . . . took advantage of the girls or the boys, like so many of the other fosters had.
They’d let her stay even though she was not . . . good. They’d let her stay and they’d told her to call them Mom and Pop McK if she wanted to, just like all the other kids did who’d come through their big, warm house that always smelled like apple pie and clean laundry and lemon furniture spray.
She never had, though. She’d stuck with “Mr.” and “Mrs.,” anything to keep them at arm’s length. They’d never made her feel bad for doing so.
Now she wanted to make him feel better, because he was crying and it shook her hard. He was big and rough and gruff, but he was crying.
For Wren.
She pointed to the carved wood in his hands. “What are you making?”
He seemed surprised that she’d asked. Which was fair. Katherine didn’t talk much. She never asked anyone anything remotely personal. Never answered any question with more than “Fine” or “Okay.” And when they’d offered to adopt her, to make her an official McKittrick, she’d said only “No, thank you.”