Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 86706 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 434(@200wpm)___ 347(@250wpm)___ 289(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86706 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 434(@200wpm)___ 347(@250wpm)___ 289(@300wpm)
His eyes held a torment I’d never witnessed before. “You’re sure? You’re sure he’s my son?”
There was only one way to give him the assurance he needed. I went to get the box where I kept all of Jacob’s belongings—the journals and his photos. After I returned with it, I took two of the latest photos of Jacob and walked them over to Tristan.
He looked down at the first image and was transfixed. I was certain he didn’t need any more proof, because he could see for himself what I always had. Jacob had his eyes. Jacob’s face was a younger version of his own. In the photos Cheyenne had given Jacob, Tristan was the spitting image of Jacob at the same age. Had Jacob had a chance to grow into a man, I suspected he would have looked even more like Tristan as time went on.
Still staring down at the photos, he simply said, “I can’t believe this.”
He continued staring at the images of his son, the one he’d never know. This wasn’t about me—or us. It wasn’t about the dumb mistakes I’d made. Tristan was in shock, and I needed to let him process.
After several minutes, he finally looked up at me again. “Why didn’t Cheyenne contact me after he went to see her? I mean, she told him who I was. He could’ve come to find me, so why didn’t she contact me at that point?”
“According to his journals, she left things up to him. And Jacob wasn’t sure if he was going to find you. She apparently told him to let her know if he decided to reach out, and she would contact you first so you would be prepared.”
“Why didn’t he come find me the second he knew?”
“I think he was afraid...”
Tristan shook his head. “I can’t believe this.” Then anguish crossed his face. “Does Cheyenne know he’s dead?”
I sighed. That was the other difficult part of this. “No one knew he went to find her until I read his diary a month before I found you. Jacob never told anyone about meeting with Cheyenne, and he died a year ago. I did try to find her first. But she was gone. So she doesn’t know.”
He narrowed his eyes. “What do you mean gone?”
“She’d moved from the address I had for her, the one Jacob had written down. And the person who lives there now didn’t know where she’d relocated. I never had a chance to tell her. I decided to try to find you instead.”
He held his stomach. “I feel sick.” When I came over to comfort him, he warned me away. While that hurt, I understood. I wouldn’t have wanted anyone to touch me, either.
“Tell me what you need, Tristan. I’ll do anything to help you get through this.”
He looked at me like I was crazy. “What I need you can’t give me. I fucking need to turn back time. I need my son not to be dead. I need Cheyenne to have told me the goddamn truth more than two decades ago. I’ll never get what I need.”
My voice was barely audible. “I’m so sorry.”
He stared back down at the photo. “She needs to know he died.”
“I know.”
Tristan rushed toward the door. “I have to fly to Iowa.”
“Will you be able to find her?”
He paced. “I’m sure her family still lives in Spirit Lake. Someone will be able to tell me where she is.”
“Are you going to try to find her before you go to Europe?”
“I feel like I have to.”
My heart raced. “Do you need me to go with you?”
“No. I need to do this alone.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure. You need to work. And you’ve done enough.”
I’ve done enough. I wanted to throw up. “Do you mean that in a bad way?”
His expression softened. “No, Emily. You were the only one who had the decency to tell me I had a son.”
“You should hate me right now for the way I let my feelings get in the way of everything. I only made things more complicated, and I’m sorry.”
He scrubbed his hands over his face. “You didn’t do anything wrong. But I understand now why you felt it couldn’t work between us. Everything makes sense, and yet nothing makes sense. The last twenty-plus years of my life were a complete lie.” He placed his hand on the doorknob. “I should go.”
“What if you can’t find her before you have to go to Europe?”
“Then I’ll go on tour with my fucking heart in my mouth and figure out a way to finish it. But I won’t rest until I tell her. And I won’t rest until I look Cheyenne in the eyes and ask her to explain why she never told me about the most important thing to ever happen in my life.”