“I don’t need one,” I assured her, spying Charity standing with her boyfriend. “You already know I don’t care what people think about me.”

Her eyes widened. “You get it.”

“Cam? The ice pack?” I asked.

“First, you have to answer a question.” She pinned me with her stare as people moved around us, heading for the buffet or the display of historical pictures.

“Okay?”

“Your unicorn pin. Who gave it to you? You know, the one you lost in the mine?” She tilted her head toward the Rose Rowan.

“Cam. He bought two at the Mother’s Day shop at school that year. One for me and one for his mom.” Lillian had been buried with hers.

She frowned. “I bet you really miss it.”

“The pin? Well, of course it would be nice to have it, but I made peace with losing it a long time ago.” Seeing how sad that seemed to make her, I pushed forward. “But you know, the mine is opening today! There’s always the chance that someone finds it. Who knows! I don’t remember where I was, but Cam has the 1880 tunnel ready for exploration, so any one of these thousand tourists might stumble onto it.”

“But what if one of them thinks it’s treasure and keeps it?” she demanded.

“I can’t really control that.” I kept my voice soft, trying to soothe her.

“Why didn’t you look for it?”

“I was too scared,” I admitted. “Even now, the mine scares me at times. Reminds me of being trapped and lost and hurt.”

“Still?” she whispered.

“Yep. Sometimes fears don’t die just because you get bigger. They just get bigger, too.” I shrugged.

She nodded, as if mulling something over in her head. “I’m going to go find Mom, okay?”

“Sure thing. She’s right there.” I pointed to the lone grove of aspen trees, and she hugged me before taking off.

I made my rounds, stopping to talk with Dad and John Royal before getting called over to Mom and the Ivy’s crew. They all wanted to know how Cam was after that horrid display Milton Sanders had put on.

None of them mentioned that he’d done so at Xander’s request. In that regard, he’d come out of last month’s hearing squeaky-clean. Sure, it was sad that he wouldn’t give Art the DNR, but if the doctors and the judge said Art didn’t know what he was asking for, then really, he was just a son defending his father’s life.

After about twenty-five minutes of that crap, I made my excuses and snuck out of their gossipy clutches, with Mom mouthing, Run.

I chatted with Julie Hall and flipped off Oscar Hudgens when he walked by, then took Julie and her boys over with Thea and Jacob to see the trains, telling them all about the history of the ore carts.