“Dad,” Jase spat out, remembering how stupid he’d been, how scared, how young. “He swore he’d buried the body under a tree on the farm, and I believed him. It was a mistake and a lie, but that’s what he told me. The tree?” he glanced at her, “It’s still there, kind of a reminder, I guess. And now Prescott, my brother, he wants me to buy the place. Tree and all.”

“Your brother was part of it?”

Jase’s jaw grew rock hard. “Seems as if.”

Jase stole a look at her, saw the revulsion on her face, the same revulsion he felt. “So now Ed says I didn’t kill the guy?” Jase couldn’t believe it. “What kind of man would let his son think he was a murderer?”

“The same kind that wouldn’t let his kid go to the cops and plead self-defense,” she said, her voice cold as ice. “What happened to my sister?” Brianna asked, staring at him as if he were Satan incarnate.

“I went back to Arianna, once things were settled with Dad and Pres. I pleaded with her to go to the hospital, or the police. Or both, but she was frantic, insisted that no one, not even you know.”

Brianna let out a soft moan.

“Trust me, I tried to talk her into it, but she wouldn’t hear of it, wanted to pretend it didn’t happen, made me swear I wouldn’t say anything and I didn’t. Ever again.”

“Except to your father and brother,” Brianna said in an accusatory whisper.

“Right.” His insides churned at the memory and he finally forced out his final confession, “I kept my silence. Even after she drowned three days later.”

Brianna seemed to wilt into herself. “She never said anything,” she whispered. “Arianna, oh, dear God, she was my twin. We shared everything and she thought she had to hide the fact that she’d been raped from me?” she said.

“I don’t know why she didn’t tell you,” he said as he drove past the city and into the countryside beyond. If he’d expected to feel release at unburdening himself, he’d been wrong. All he felt now was guilt. Deep, burrowing guilt. But hadn’t it been with him all along? How many nights had he dreamed of Arianna’s death? A hundred? A thousand? Each version was a little different, none the truth, but all the while he swam in a river of guilt and he never could save her. In all the scenarios in the dreams as in reality, she died. He felt sick inside. Had Arianna taken her own life? Had her drowning been an accident? He doubted anyone would ever know the truth.

Brianna’s reaction only made it—his guilt—burn hotter.