Kele Moon - Crossing the line

But Nova had looked him in the face and flat-out denied it.

Anyone who could teach Wyatt to lie in one afternoon, when he’d been terrible at it his entire life, was good at sticking to his story. No matter how many questions Wyatt barked at him, Nova just stared at him, unflinching, and denied any involvement besides helping him keep his story straight.

Nova was very good at what he did.

But he wasn’t a bad person. He was actually a really good person life put in a bad situation. It seemed very unfair that Wyatt’s mistakes were staining Nova Moretti’s soul worse than it already was.

He was still contemplating it when Adam walked in and shut the door louder than necessary. The thump of something falling off the bookshelf had Wyatt glancing back, but then Adam spoke.

“Did they tell ya when you’re coming back?”

“Few more days.” Wyatt turned back to Adam. “Sorry this stuck ya with so much extra work.”

“I’m just glad it’s all getting done.” Adam fell down into the one of the seats the investigators vacated. “How come you didn’t say anything ’bout your radio being broke that Monday?”

Wyatt gave him a hard look. “You’re part of the investigation, Adam. You’re not supposed to be talking ’bout it with me.”

“Shoot, Sheriff.” Adam shook his head. “It was a justified shooting. That boy is completely strung out. We’ve known it for a long time now. Why do you have to be so technical with everything?”

“I guess it’s just bred in me.” Wyatt stood up and grabbed his jacket off the coat hanger in the corner. “I’m gonna go home to my wife and enjoy the last of my paid leave.”

“Sounds good.” Adam nodded. “We got it here. Have a good holiday.”

Wyatt put on his jacket, noting the picture on the floor. He walked over and picked it up, finding his father’s face looking back at him. It should’ve felt ominous. Like a warning or a reprimand for the mistakes he’d made.

Instead, he stared at it and felt something very different. This was a man who’d spent most of his life without a partner, pining for the one he’d lost. For so long now Wyatt thought he’d inherited more than his father’s high blood pressure. He’d followed in his footsteps for a lot of years.

Now he had a second chance.

He put the picture back on the bookshelf, letting go of his father’s legacy of loneliness. Life had taught Wyatt nothing if not the value of making sacrifices worth it.

He decided he owed it to Nova to let it all go.

“I guess I’ll wish you Happy Thanksgiving a day early.” Wyatt patted Adam’s shoulder. “Sorry you’re stuck working it this year.”

“You’ve worked it every year for the past six years. I can take a turn.”

“Well, I surely appreciate it.” Wyatt opened his office door once more. “Tell Kesha thank you.”

“Say hi to Jules for us. Tell her we wanna see those babies as soon as she’s up and moving.” Adam walked with him to the front doors of the sheriff’s office. “And say hi to Tabitha too. You know, Sheriff, I reckoned I ain’t ever told you congratulations ’bout that. That was something. Her coming back. All these years I’ve been working here, I didn’t even know you were married.”

Wyatt snorted. “Don’t take it personal. Most folks didn’t.”

“Why’d she leave?” Adam winced as he said it. “If you don’t mind me asking.”

“I made a mistake. I let her go.” Wyatt held up his hands and gave him a sad smile. “Now I reckon I got the rest of our lives to make it up to her. It’s more than other Conners got.”

“You got three more days of paid leave.” Adam gestured to Wyatt’s SUV in the parking lot. “Best get started.”

“Yeah, I think I’ll do that.” Wyatt left Adam standing in the sheriff’s office. “See ya after the holiday.”

“He just left. For no dang reason. Just packed up and left. Good-for-nothing bastard. After all I’ve done for him.”

Tabitha arched her eyebrow as she sat at the kitchen table in the old Conner house and listened to her mother sob. The old Tabitha would’ve felt bad to hear her mother so distraught. The new Tabitha just pointed out, “I doubt you were crying like this when I packed up and left.”

“Yeah, but you weren’t like us,” she growled. “You never understood me like he did.”

“No, Mama, I didn’t,” Tabitha agreed. “Not at all.”

“Now I’m all alone. I got no one.” She let out a sob of misery. “Ain’t ya at least coming over for Thanksgiving?”

“No, I’m not. I’m going to Jules’s house for Thanksgiving.”

“I can’t believe you went and married into that family.” Her mother’s voice was slurred with drunken indignation despite the recent heart surgery Tabitha had paid for. “Those Conners think they’re better than everyone. You think you’re better than everyone too, but I don’t need you or your money. I can be alone. I don’t need anyone.”

“I have to go now.” Tabitha looked up when Wyatt walked in through the back door. “I have things to do.”

“What things?”

“Important things.”

“And I suppose I ain’t important?”

“No, you’re not,” Tabitha said as she looked at Wyatt, who stood in the kitchen pulling off his coat. “I have a life now, Mama, and it doesn’t include you anymore. I’m spending Thanksgiving with my real family.”

Her mother huffed on the other line. “Well, I don’t need you either.”

Tabitha flinched when her mother hung up. She looked at her cell phone until the screen went dark. Then she set it down, surprised at just how little she felt over the entire exchange. Which, she was pretty sure, meant she was getting better.

She knew it wasn’t the last time she was going to talk to her mother.

But it was the last time she was going to let herself be hurt and controlled by her. If her mama died alone, Tabitha supposed that was her own fault, because she wasn’t sacrificing herself for that woman anymore.

“That was awesome, Tab,” Wyatt said with a laugh of disbelief. “I think that just made my life. What was wrong with her, anyhow?”

“Brett left.” Tabitha lifted her head and gave Wyatt a smile. “He just packed up and left town. Left the whole dang state. He told her he was moving to California.”

“That’s—” Wyatt started as he raised his eyebrows. “Not really all that shocking. I’m pretty sure we know who to thank for that.”

“Yeah.” Tabitha smiled as she glanced to her laptop, staring at the book she was working on. “How’d the last of the questioning go?”

Wyatt held up his hands. “Looks like I’m back to work after the holiday.”

Tabitha looked at her phone again, shocked at what this all meant.

“Are we okay?” she asked in awe. “Are we actually gonna be okay?”

“Yeah, I think we actually are.” Wyatt sounded dazed over it too. “I mean, Vaughn is looking at thirty years easy. Shooting at a sheriff. He was over the legal limit, and he had crack cocaine in his system while he was on probation. That boy will die in prison for sure.”

“What did Nova say to him to make that the better option?” Tabitha asked in amazement. “What did he say to my brother? He was living for free in that house. Now he’s gonna go off to California? He might have to get an actual job. I can’t even imagine him doing that.”

“Tab—” Wyatt shook his head. “I don’t think either of us are ever gonna find out what Nova said to them, and maybe it’s better that we don’t.”

“Yeah?” Tabitha was surprised. Wyatt wasn’t one to let things go. “How come?”

“’Cause I think, whatever it is he did, it bought me a happy ending with my girl.” Wyatt smiled. “And I really wanted one.”