“Your mother told me once, ‘You’re free to make your own choices, but you’re not free from the consequences of that choice.’” His lips curved slightly before falling again. “Sullivan made his choice. Xander did, too. We all do. Every day. You’re no different. You have to love your choices, Camden, no matter what they are, because you have the freedom to choose.” He looked me in the eye. “Don’t waste them, either, because you never know when it’s the last one you’ll get to make. It goes faster than you think.”

He turned and headed down the hill.

“Dad!” I called out. “One thing has been bugging me.”

“What is that?” He paused but didn’t turn.

“The door in the mine. What was it there for?”

He shrugged. “Who knows. Your great-grandfather wasn’t exactly all there in the head.”

I huffed a small laugh and watched him walk away. We might not be a sitcom family, but at least he wasn’t shooting at me anymore.

My phone buzzed as I headed toward my Jeep, and I checked it with a grin.

Willow: Finishing up a design and then headed to your place.

Cam: Sounds perfect. I just need to run an errand. I’ll meet you there.

Willow: Love you.

I grinned. That right there was what my choices—the good and the bad—had earned me.

Cam: Love you.

I slipped my phone back into my pocket and climbed into the Jeep. There was one more choice to be made today, and it was Xander’s.

Ten minutes later, I rang the doorbell at my brother’s house. It was one of the newest buildings in Alba, go figure, all sparkling new, and the setting sun bounced off the gleaming windows, picture-perfect.

“Cam.” He answered the door, looking like nothing had changed. Like he wasn’t out on bail or facing ten years in prison if he didn’t plead it down. “Come here to gloat? I just saw the follow-up on Rose’s rescue on CNN if you want to revel in your glory.”

“You still don’t get it.” The manila envelope crinkled in my hands, and I was glad I’d only brought copies.

“What do you want?”

“About Dad—” I shifted my weight, at a loss on how to broach the topic.

“I’m still his guardian unless you want to take me to court again. Then again, now that this has happened to me, maybe you’ll get guardianship this time.”

I didn’t state the obvious—that he’d done it to himself.

“Dad doesn’t want to die. You know that, right? He just wants the choice. To him, that’s what makes life worth the living. Choice.”