Cassie nodded. “We talked about it before she left. I asked her about him and she came clean. She said she’d always known that he was struggling with it, but it was easier to let us believe he’d gone missing.”

Easier on who? He ran a hand through his hair. His mouth was sandpaper. An addiction, he could have dealt with. Maybe he could have helped somehow. Keeping this from them was wrong.

“She said she was always hoping he’d get his shit together and come back. Still hoping,” Cassie said softly.

“She should have told us. You should have told me.” That was the hardest thing to swallow. He and Cassie had always had each other’s back. He couldn’t help the feeling of betrayal.

“I know. I’m sorry. I just... He said you’d be disappointed in him the most. He asked for a chance to get better, then come back to you...a better man. Someone you could be proud of again.”

Proud? Of a man who’d just walked out on them? Who’d chosen alcohol over his family? He could barely breathe as he stared at his sister, trying to see her side, trying to make sense of it. Any of it. “Why didn’t you tell me? Did you think I couldn’t handle it?”

“That’s not it at all. I just didn’t want to hurt you.”

Too late. He nodded slowly. “I’m going to go.”

“Reed, please,” Cassie said, reaching for his hand.

“I can’t do this right now, Cass.”

Heading back outside, he took the stairs two at a time and walked down the quiet, deserted Main Street with no destination in mind, just away from the truth.

Chapter Twenty-four

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

TIME WAS FLYING BY in a blink and Erika’s guilt kept rising. She started each day with the best intentions of reaching out to Reed to explain that things would slow down a little once the clinical trials started...and each day came and went with unanswered text messages from him as a million other things took priority.

Now it seemed impossible to reach out. To explain. Pushing thoughts of him aside was the only way she could successfully get through her busy days, but how could she tell him that?

His texts were becoming fewer each day and he hadn’t tried to call the last few nights. Maybe he was slowly accepting that she was busy and he wasn’t prepared to keep reaching out to dead air. While she wanted to beg him to not lose hope, that would be wrong.

She missed him, or at least she missed what they’d had in Wild River. She missed the connection with another person—a man who had made her feel more alive than she’d ever felt. She missed the freedom and the adventure and the excitement. She missed the woman she’d been in Wild River.