My breath hitched. “It’s not that we didn’t enjoy the same things that hurt. It’s that you wanted me to be someone else. You wanted me to be Violet. Especially after she was gone.”

My dad’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. “You’re right. I never should’ve pushed you like that. Let your mom push you. I’m so sorry if you ever felt alone in our home or somehow unworthy.”

“I wasn’t alone. I had Ford.” As much as I loved my sister, she didn’t understand me either. It was Ford who had always been there, gently encouraging me to follow my own path.

Dad gave me a gentle smile. “I’m so glad you did. Thank you, Ford, for loving both my daughters and treating them so well.”

Ford’s hand spasmed in mine. “You’re welcome, sir.”

My dad sighed. “I’m not sure if sharing what I have to tell you is the right thing or not, but I’ve shared it with Sheriff Raines, so I feel it’s only right to give it to you, as well.”

My stomach pitched, and I gripped Ford’s hand tighter. “Okay…”

“A few weeks before the accident, I was up late catching up on chart notes for the month. Violet came home past her curfew, which was so unlike her. When I stopped her in the hallway, she dissolved into tears. I brought her into the kitchen and made her a cup of tea, told her that whatever it was, we could talk it out, the way we always did.”

Dad was lost in the memory as if he were back there at the kitchen table with Vi. “She said she’d made the worst mistake of her life. I told her that everything was fixable, we just needed to talk it through. That’s when it all came tumbling out. She’d had too much to drink at a party and slept with someone that wasn’t Ford. She slept with Ethan.”

Ford froze. The only movement I could feel in his body was the beat of his heart. No one said a word. With a whoosh of breath, something in Ford eased. He wrapped his other arm around me, even though I knew the pain in his shoulder had to be killing him. “We were so young. Babies, really. We were bound to make mistakes. It would’ve hurt something fierce back then, but now…I just hate that she lived with all that guilt.”

I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. Tipping my head down, I pressed my lips to Ford’s arm. He pulled it tighter around me. “I guess we know what made Ethan fixate on her even more.”