by Lisa Harris
“Garrett, you don’t have to do this. This wasn’t your fault.”
“This has nothing to do with guilt. Trust me.” He pushed a loose curl back behind her ear. “When you moved to Quantico all those years ago, I should have run after you. I don’t want to make the same mistake today. I’m not a rookie cop anymore, trying to prove something to myself. What’s happened to these families has taught me what’s really important in life and how quickly it can all be taken away. I just can’t believe that it’s taken me this long to figure it out.”
“What are you saying?”
“What I’m saying is that my biggest regret is letting you go. I fell in love with you the first time I saw you. You were so beautiful and funny and smart. I don’t think I’ve ever stopped loving you. You don’t have to answer right now, but the bottom line is . . . I want to marry you, Jordan.”
“Wait a minute.” Her eyes widened. “Is this a proposal?”
He glanced up at the monitor beeping quietly above her bed and grinned. “I guess this isn’t exactly the most romantic place for a proposal, and I don’t even have a ring, but yeah . . . I want to marry you, Jordan. I can work in Memphis just as well as I can here. As long as I’m with you, that’s all I really care about.”
He felt his heart rate speed up as he waited for her to respond. Maybe he should have waited until he had a ring and the perfect proposal planned, but he felt he couldn’t wait even one minute longer.
“Yes,” she said.
He studied her face and caught a hint of amusement. “You just said yes?”
“I did.” Jordan laughed, then touched her side at the pain. “You sound surprised. What were you expecting me to say?”
“I don’t know.” He really had no idea what he’d expected. Only that he had no plans to walk out the door until he knew exactly how she felt. “At best, I thought you’d need time to think about it.”
“I already have. Because you’re not the only one questioning our past and wondering how we managed to keep sidestepping a relationship all these years,” she said, rubbing her thumb across the back of his hand. “I feel the same way. You’ve always been my one regret, Garrett. The one person I never should have walked away from.”
“There are going to be a lot of details to work out—”
“I’m not worried about any of that,” she said. “In fact, there’s only one thing I really am worried about.”
“And what’s that?” he asked.
“Promise me that I’m not going to wake up tomorrow and discover I dreamed all of this. I’m pretty pumped up with pain meds.”
Garrett laughed. “As long as you promise me you won’t wake up tomorrow and regret anything you’ve just told me.”
“Never.”
“Then I can think of a way to absolve your fears by making it as clear as possible how I feel.”
“How do you feel, Mr. Addison?”
He smiled as he leaned forward, stopping briefly to brush aside one of her curls before brushing his lips against hers. Then he cupped the back of her head and slowly kissed her again. She pressed her hand against his chest as she responded to his touch, sending a current of electricity running through him.
“Does that clarify things a bit?” he asked, moving back and catching her gaze.
“Oh yeah,” she said, reaching up to touch his unshaven jawline. “Though you don’t mind if I suggest a very short engagement, do you?”
“Are you kidding me?” He leaned over and kissed her again. “I agree completely.”
Epilogue
December 20
3:48 p.m.
Bridgewood Cemetery
“We are gathered here together to celebrate the life of Sarah Marie Boyd. As we grieve, we acknowledge our human loss and pray that God will grant us grace and peace. We pray that in our pain and hurt, we might find a measure of comfort and hope in our sorrow, knowing that our lives don’t end with death.”
Garrett stood beside Jordan and Sam at the back of the crowd while the minister spoke at the graveside memorial. Dozens of white markers decorated with flowers and crosses were spread out across the green lawns. He’d seen firsthand how death was as much a part of life as birth, but its reality still came coupled with a profound loss. And that loss, whether expected or unexpected, always left behind scars.
The pastor said his closing remarks as the sun began to set, then ended with a prayer to which everyone responded with a heartfelt amen.
Garrett looked down at Jordan and laced their fingers together. “It feels surreal that all of this is finally over.”
“I’m just relieved that they can’t hurt anyone else.”
“How are you feeling?” he asked. She’d insisted on coming to Abram Michaels’s funeral this morning as well as Sarah’s funeral this afternoon, even though the doctor had only released her from the hospital twenty-four hours ago.
“I’m okay, just tired.”
“We need to get you home.” Garrett turned to Sam. “Would you mind walking Jordan to my car? I’ll catch up in a minute, but I’d like to speak to Nikki first.” He turned back to Jordan. “If that’s okay?”
Jordan squeezed his hand, then took Sam’s arm. “Go on. I’ll be fine.”
Garrett walked across the lawn to where Nikki and her husband stood a few yards away from Sarah’s grave. He hoped he wasn’t intruding. A thick row of clouds hovered along the horizon, but the sun had partially broken through the cloudy cover. Somehow the bright rays from heaven seemed fitting. Like a reminder that God was truly a part of today’s proceedings.
“Garrett.” She gave him a hug, then took a step back. “I appreciate you and the team being here. I don’t believe you’ve met my husband. This is Tyler Grant. Tyler, this is Garrett Addison. I’ve told you about him.”
Garrett shook Tyler’s hand. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“It’s nice to meet you as well. I’m grateful for all you did to help bring closure to Nikki and her family. I know it’s been a hard-fought battle for all of you.”
Garrett nodded at the acknowledgment. Because while his struggle could never compare to the Boyd family’s, they weren’t the only ones needing closure. His grief might have manifested differently, but it was a grief all the same. A grief that had made him realize that saying “I love you” should never wait until tomorrow. And that love—no matter how brief—was worth it.
Tyler squeezed his wife’s hand. “I’ll let the two of you talk while I go find Liam and check on your parents.”
“Tyler lost his first wife a couple years ago,” Nikki said, as her husband walked away. “Liam’s his son. It’s been an adjustment for the three of us, but absolutely wonderful at the same time.”
“I’m glad to hear that.”
Nikki turned back to him. “Thank you for coming today. It means a lot to my family.”
“How are your parents doing?”
“They’re strong. They’ve learned to rely on each other. And I think, in a way, knowing Sarah hasn’t been suffering all these years has actually helped. Having the chance to give Sarah a proper burial helps as well. Not that this is how I wanted it to end, but maybe now my family will have some closure.”
“Your sister’s disappearance changed your life.”
“If you would have told me a decade ago that I’d end up working on a TBI task force, I probably would have laughed at you. I was pretty happy being a schoolteacher.”
“I heard rumors you had some good news in the middle of all of this?” he asked, hoping he wasn’t asking too personal a question.
Her broadening smile assured him that it wasn’t a taboo topic. “I’m still trying convince myself it’s real, but yes, we’re expecting.”
“When’s the baby due?”
“May.”
“Congratulations!”
“Thanks.” Nikki smiled and laid her hand across her stomach. “The baby was a bit of a surprise, but a good surprise. Though I heard you have your own good news.”
“I asked Jordan to marry me, and she actually said yes.”
Nikki laughed. “Somehow I’m not surprised at all.”
“Let’s just say it’s been a long time in coming.” He put his hands in his pockets. “Listen, I won’t keep you any longer, but I thought you might want to know that Sam and I went to visit Kelsey Jacobi.”
“How is she?”
“Physically she’s okay. It’s going to take her time to heal emotionally, but I think she’ll get through this.”
“I can’t tell you how glad I am to hear that. Even though my heart breaks for the families of the other girls who never came home, knowing Kelsey is back with her family takes away some of the sting of today.”
“I agree. Sarah’s disappearance was the one case that almost derailed me. The case that forced me to look at life differently.”
“I owe you a lot for helping my family find resolution. I guess, in a way, I always knew she was gone, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t still hurt. But at least we finally got the closure we needed.”
A minute later, Garrett headed back across the grass to his car where Jordan waited for him.
“Thanks, Sam,” he said.
“No problem. I’ll see the two of you later.”
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” she said, taking in the splash of color across the sky in the sunset as Sam walked to his car.
“Very,” Garrett said.
“How is Nikki?” she asked.
“It’s been hard for her and her family, but at least they finally have the closure they’ve needed for so long. Maybe now they can begin to heal.”
Garrett stared a few moments longer at the sunset before turning back to Jordan.
“This might not be the most romantic setting, but I thought it might be time to make things official between us.” He shot her a smile. “That is, unless you’ve changed your mind about marrying me now that the pain medicine’s wearing off.”
She let out a soft laugh. “Never.”
“Good.” He pulled out a single diamond ring with a vintage ornate silver band. “This was my grandmother’s. She left it to me when she died.”
“Garrett . . . It’s beautiful.”
“We can look for something together when you’re feeling better—”
“No.” She smiled up at him. “This is perfect. You are perfect for me.”
1
Northeast Tennessee near the Obed River
The initial step off the sheer face of a three-hundred-plus-foot drop was always the most terrifying. Nikki Boyd leaned back into her harness as far as she could, locked her knees, then peered over the edge of the sandstone cliff that dropped into the ravine below. The terror faded, followed by a shot of pure adrenaline as she kicked off and plunged over the edge.
Legs horizontal to the rock face, Nikki shimmied down the side of the cliff, kicking loose a few rocks along the way. The stress of the past few weeks began to dissipate into the crisp morning air. A day climbing and rappelling with Tyler Grant had definitely been the right thing to do. They’d come, not to dismiss memories of Katie’s death, but to celebrate her life. Which was exactly what they were doing.
Halfway down, Nikki glanced up, then slowed to a stop. The rope had shifted and now ran over a sharp edge of the cliff wall. She caught her toes against a narrow ledge and fought to catch her balance. While perhaps not common, it was possible to sever a weighted rope on a descent.
“You okay?” Tyler hollered down at her.
“The rope moved and it’s running over a sharp edge.”
She’d been told by more than one experienced climber that they hated rappelling because it was the most dangerous part of the day. And this was why. No matter how much training and preparation, no matter how many times she checked her equipment, things could still go wrong. And it just took one mistake. But all she needed to do was unweight the rope and move it to a safer place.
“Can you move it?” Tyler asked.
“I’m trying.”
“You’re going to have to take some of your weight off the rope.”
“Like I said, I’m trying.”
Her gloved fingers held on to a crack in the rock face while she searched for another crack for her feet. Her fingers cramped. A trail of blood dripped down her arm. She didn’t even remember scraping it. Her feet finally found a narrow crevice, alleviating her weight on the rope enough to give it some slack. All she needed to do now was redirect the rope’s path.
Simple.
But she couldn’t get enough leverage to unweight the rope.
“Nikki?”
“Just a minute . . .” Sweat beaded across her forehead as she stood on her tiptoes, her fingertips pressed back into the crack, heart pounding against her chest.
She’d heard plenty of stories about things like this happening. Freak accidents against the side of a sheer cliff. Climbers plunging to their deaths.
You know this isn’t how I want to die, Jesus . . .
And certainly not today. Not on the anniversary of Katie’s death. She glanced at the ground below, then felt her breath catch. If she couldn’t move the rope to a safer spot, it could snap above her.
“Nikki?” Tyler shouted from the top of the cliff. “What’s happening?”
She drew in another breath. “I’m okay, but I’m having trouble moving the rope.”
She hung balanced on the ledge, trying to figure out what to do. Accidents like this weren’t all that common, but as with any sport, there were always variables you couldn’t count on. She shifted her gaze to the ground. Two months ago, a college student had plunged to his death near here. The steep, rocky terrain made it a popular spot for risk takers.
She pushed the thought aside. What she needed to do was focus on solving the problem. Theoretically she knew what to do, but she was going to need both hands. Which was a problem. Currently, with her right hand holding the rope behind her to keep her from sliding down, she’d need to run the end around her legs a few times in order to secure it. But that was a move even an experienced rappeller would hesitate performing. Unless—
“Stay put, Nikki, I’m coming to you.”
“I can figure this out.”
“Stay put,” he ordered. “I’m coming down.”
“Okay, just be careful.”
A handful of small rocks bounced off her helmet as Tyler descended toward her on a separate rope.
“How was your date last night with Ryan?” he called down to her.
Her date? Was he serious?
She never should have told Tyler about Ryan. Now he was simply trying to distract her. Trying to get her to focus her thoughts away from the fear and panic. Panic because she was stuck on a narrow ledge a hundred-plus feet off the ground with the potential of a severed rope. And with it the reminder of how quickly life could spiral out of control.
“The date went fine,” she finally answered.
She could hear him making his way down the sheer cliff above her. His feet scattered another volley of pebbles.
“Fine doesn’t tell me anything,” he countered. “Give me some details. Last night was your third date with Mr. Perfect. You’ve got to have something interesting to share.”
Details? He really wanted details while she was hanging off the side of a cliff praying she wasn’t about to plunge to her death?
A cramp gripped her calf as her fingers dug deeper into the rock crevice above her. She tried to wiggle her leg without losing her footing on the ledge. There honestly wasn’t much to tell. Ryan was six foot three and looked like a model straight off a Banana Republic ad. On top of that, he made a great living, owned his own house, and was completely debt free.
None of those things, though, was the real reason she’d agreed to a second and third date. She’d half expected him to be a snob, but surprisingly, he wasn’t. At all. Instead, he was down-to-earth, complimented her without making her feel he wanted something in return, and treated her like she was the only one in the room when the
y were together. She’d never met another guy quite like him—except perhaps Tyler.
Which was why Tyler had dubbed him “Mr. Perfect” the first time she’d told him she’d gone out with a guy set up by one of her mother’s friends at church. Making it to the third date was something of a record for her—as of late anyway. But despite Ryan’s “perfection,” she still wasn’t completely convinced he was perfect for her. Everyone—including her mother—had already made the decision she’d finally found Mr. Right in Mr. Perfect. But making that decision for herself felt a lot like taking that first step off the cliff. A shot of terror along with a huge rush of adrenaline.
A sharp pain jetted through her head, and Nikki realized she was clenching her jaw. She took in a deep breath and forced herself to relax. “He’s not perfect, and there’s nothing new I want to share with you.”
Tyler laughed as he dropped next to where she hung and stopped. “The guy owns his own company, runs half marathons for fun, and supports orphans in Africa.”
“So he’s a good guy. That doesn’t mean I’m planning on—I don’t know—marrying him.”
“Yet.”
Nikki frowned. No, those were her mother’s plans. Besides, talking with Tyler about her date was . . . well . . . awkward.
“One of us needs a bit of a boost in the romance department, and since I’m not going there, that leaves you,” he said.
She caught a flicker of pain in his voice. How did you start dating again after losing the love of your life? She wasn’t even going to ask that question.
“There’s a slightly deeper ledge six inches to your right for your feet. It will give you some extra support, but I think the simplest solution at this point is to transfer you to my rope.”
Nikki drew in a deep breath as she felt for the ledge, then managed to shove her toes into the crack.
“What did the two of you do?” he asked.