A Bend in the Road - By Nicholas Sparks Page 0,109
felt the fear constrict his chest, making it difficult to breathe. He sat up and held his hands in a defensive posture before he realized he’d been mistaken.
What he’d thought was Miles was nothing but his jacket on the coat rack, mingling with the shadows, playing tricks with his mind.
Miles.
He’d let him go. After the accident, Miles had let him go, and he hadn’t come back.
Brian rolled over, curling into a ball.
But he would.
Sarah heard the knock a little before midnight and glanced through the window on the way to the door, knowing who had come. When she opened it, Miles neither smiled nor frowned, nor did he move. His eyes were red, swollen with fatigue. He stood in the doorway, looking as if he didn’t want to be here.
“When did you know about Brian?” he asked abruptly.
Sarah’s eyes never left his. “Yesterday,” she answered. “He told me yesterday. And I was as horrified as you were.”
His lips, dry and cracked, came together. “Okay,” he said.
With that, he turned to leave, and Sarah reached out to stop him, taking hold of his arm. “Wait... please.”
He turned.
“It was an accident, Miles,” she said. “A terrible, terrible accident. It shouldn’t have happened, and it wasn’t fair that it happened to Missy. I know that and I feel so sorry for you....”
She trailed off, wondering if she was reaching him. His expression was glazed, unreadable.
“But?” he said. There was no emotion in the question.
“No buts. I just want you to keep that in mind. There’s no excuse for him running, but it was an accident.”
She waited for his response. When there was none, she let go of his arm. He made no move to leave.
“What are you going to do?” she finally asked.
Miles glanced away. “He killed my wife, Sarah. He broke the law.”
She nodded. “I know.”
He shook his head without responding, then started down the hall. A minute later, outside the window, she watched as he got into his car and drove off.
She went to the couch again. The phone was on the end table and she waited, knowing it would ring soon.
Chapter 35
Where, Miles wondered, was he supposed to go? What should he do, now that he knew the truth? With Otis, the answer had been simple. There was nothing to consider, nothing to debate. It didn’t matter whether all the facts had fit or that everything had an easy explanation. He’d learned enough to know that Otis hated Miles enough to kill Missy; that was enough for Miles. Otis deserved whatever punishment the law could fashion, except for one thing.
That’s not the way it happened.
The investigation had unearthed nothing. The file he’d painstakingly assembled over two years had meant nothing. Sims and Earl and Otis meant nothing. Nothing had provided the answer, but suddenly and without warning, it had arrived at his doorstep, dressed in a windbreaker and ready to cry.
This was what he wanted to know:
Did it matter?
He’d spent two years of his life thinking that it did. He’d cried at night, he’d stayed up late, he’d taken up smoking, and he’d struggled, certain that the answer would change all of that. It had become the mirage on the horizon that was always just out of reach. And now, at this moment, he held it in his hand. With a single call, he could be avenged.
He could do that. But what if, on closer inspection, the answer wasn’t what he had imagined it would be? What if the killer wasn’t a drunk, wasn’t an enemy; what if it wasn’t an act of reckless behavior? What if it was a boy with pimples and baggy pants and dark brown hair, and he was afraid and sorry for what happened and swore it was an accident that couldn’t have been avoided?
Did it matter then?
How should a person answer that? Was he supposed to take the memory of his wife and the misery of the last two years, then simply add his responsibility as a husband and a father and his duty to the law to come up with a quantifiable answer? Or did he take that total and subtract a boy’s age and fear and obvious sorrow along with his love for Sarah, thus bringing the number back to zero?
He didn’t know. What he did know was that whispering Brian’s name aloud left a bitter taste in his mouth. Yes, he thought, it mattered. He knew with certainty that it would always matter, and he had to do something about it.