I stayed silent for a moment, a burst of pain blooming in my chest like a sharp-edged star, so gutted I didn’t even know where to begin. I’d had no idea Linden felt this way.

Or maybe it was more that I’d thought she and I were on the same page, when it came to slowly letting each other go.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered finally. “Lin, really, I . . .”

“You know, I honestly didn’t think you were ever coming back,” she cut me off, tears thick in her voice. “That’s why the thing with Gareth even stood a chance. I’d never have looked at him twice, otherwise, but I thought you were over Thistle Grove for good. Done with this place, done with . . . with me. And that blows, Emmy. It . . . it truly fucking blows, on top of everything else, to feel like my best friend in the world had disappeared on me.”

At that, she started crying in earnest, fat tears sliding in hitching trails down her face.

I’d heard Linden curse with her whole chest like that maybe two other times in my life, and only when driven to the most emotional extremes. Hearing it, and seeing those terrible tears, made me feel like my heart was cracking open like a geode. Breaking down a hidden fault line into two hunks of saw-toothed stone. It made me feel not just ashamed, but like I was even worse than Gareth, somehow, in my own special, garbage way.

While I spun in place like a broken compass needle, Jasper whined, nosing Linden’s knee. She set a palm on his head, hiding her face behind her other hand as she cried.

My standard schnauzer was apparently a better person than me, a dismal truth that just about summed up this entire mess I’d made.

“Lin,” I started, helplessly. She shook her head, her spine tense as a drawn bow and shoulders quivering as she cried into her palm.

So I did the only thing I knew to do, the only thing I’d ever done when something threatened to drive a wedge between us. Even though this time, the wedge was me.

I reached for her.

For a moment, she held herself apart like I’d been afraid she would, and I felt a yawning fear at the possibility that I’d lost her, like standing at the edge of a precipice with miles of empty air gaping below my toes. It had been so foolish of me, so short-sighted and selfish and borderline cruel, to think that just because I’d excised this town from my heart, I could live without her, too. How could I have thought that, when Linden Thorn was such an essential part of me, the two of us braided into each other like trees grafted together when they were only saplings?

How could I ever have considered cutting myself away from her?

After what felt like an eternity, she finally relaxed enough to hug me back. Still tentative and wary, but with a quavering sigh that sounded like coming home after a long and draining day.