the feeling that you’re still carrying Miriam around with you.”
That struck him, and his heart ached. It often did at the mention of his late wife’s name.
“At times, I am,” Max whispered. As she had, he fought to find the right words, and the courage to say them. “I’ve always felt responsible for Miriam’s death, for Brooke’s injuries.”
“No!” Clara said, turning toward him, shaking her head.
“That night, when Miriam decided to go home, not stay at her aunt’s house until the morning, I should have driven through the mountains. But I’d had a tough case, and I’d been working long hours all week. I felt sleepy, and she insisted she would drive. I knew Miriam had problems seeing at night, but when I brought that up, she swore she would be fine. I shouldn’t have given in, but I did. I should have at least stayed awake to keep watch. But I nodded off. If I’d been awake to see the truck overturned on the road…”
Max’s eyes filled, and he pulled Clara closer. She used the tips of her fingers to wipe away his tears.
“Oh, Max, I’m so sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to upset—”
“I don’t talk about it,” Max murmured. “I haven’t been able to get to the point yet where it doesn’t rip me apart when I think of it. But I’ve wanted to tell you. I’ve tried to a couple of times.”
For a while, silence. Then she said, “I wonder if either one of us will ever be free of our pasts. Do you think so?”
Max hesitated, but then said, “Our pasts are part of who we are. The pain will always be with us. But maybe we don’t have to let it define the rest of our lives.”
Clara nodded, and then they kissed again, a long, familiar coming together, this time at his urging. When their lips finally parted, he asked, “Clara, you know what you said earlier, what that old man you married said to you?”
“Yes,” she said. “What about it?”
He gazed deep into her dark eyes, and she felt the years fade away, all the hurt, all the pain, all the loneliness she’d endured. Maybe she’d been wrong when she assumed that she would always be alone, and that she’d never find a place to call home. All these years after they’d parted, she still felt as if she belonged in his arms.
His voice husky with emotion, he said, “No matter what, there is something you should never doubt.” She brushed her lips against his cheek, burrowed into his warm, soft neck. He put his hand on her chin and tilted her face up to his, then whispered, “I assure you that you are a highly desirable woman.”
At that, Max smiled at Clara, his eyes reflecting the deep emotions flooding his heart. She reached for him, and he pressed his lips to her hair, her ear and whispered so quietly she could barely hear him: “One more thing: I don’t give a damn about your mother or any of those people carrying their ridiculous signs. They may not realize it, but they need you.”
“They do?” Her lips hovered so close to his that it was as if they shared a breath.
“They do,” he whispered. “They absolutely do.”
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Books by Kathryn Casey
Detective Clara Jefferies Series
The Fallen Girls
Her Final Prayer
The Sarah Armstrong Mystery Series
Singularity
Blood Lines
The Killing Storm
The Buried
True Crime
Evil Beside Her
She Wanted It All
A Warrant to Kill
Die, My Love
Shattered
A Descent Into Hell
Deadly Little Secrets
Murder, I Write
Possessed
Deliver Us
In Plain Sight
AVAILABLE IN AUDIO
The Fallen Girls (Available in the UK and the US)
A Letter from Kathryn
I want to say a huge thank you to you for choosing to read Her Final Prayer. If you enjoyed it and want to keep up to date with coming books in the series, just sign up at the following link. Your email address will never be shared and you can unsubscribe at any time.
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For those of you who haven’t read the first book in the series—The Fallen Girls—it introduces Clara Jefferies and explains her journey, from growing up in the fictional polygamous enclave