Let It Be (Butler, Vermont #6) - Marie Force Page 0,5

Dad. I’m so sorry. That’s unbelievable.”

“It was a long time ago,” Linc said with a sigh.

“And it was just as unbelievable then as it is now,” Molly added.

“What are you going to do?” Hunter asked.

“I haven’t decided yet.”

“We need a family meeting,” Hunter said. “Isn’t that how we always make the big decisions?”

“Yes, but…” Lincoln hesitated at the idea of sharing the ugly story with the whole family.

“Let us help you the way you’ve always helped us, Dad.”

“I think it’s a good idea,” Molly said. “And Hunter’s right. It’s what we do when there’re decisions to be made.”

Though he hesitated to burden his children with his concerns, Lincoln had to acknowledge they were right about how the family addressed big decisions, and now that the proverbial cat was out of the bag, there was no putting it back in. “Okay.”

“I’ll call the others,” Hunter said, rising to use the phone.

“It’s the right thing to tell them,” Molly said when they were alone.

“Are you sure about that?” Linc asked with a small smile.

“They’re the wisest people I know, other than you and my father. They’ll know what to do.”

“You should have Elmer come, too. It’s not a family meeting without him.”

“Hunter,” Molly said. “Call Gramps, too.”

“Will do.”

Molly stood. “I suppose I ought to see about some food for this meeting.”

“Hey, Mol?”

“Yes?”

“Thanks, you know, for having my back.”

“Always have, always will. No matter what you decide to do, you have us. We won’t let anyone, even your own father, hurt you.” She kissed his forehead and then went to see about food for the troops. There was never a time when their children couldn’t eat, but the thought of food with this decision weighing on him turned Linc’s stomach.

His thoughts were all over the place, but he kept coming back to the moment that changed his life in ways he couldn’t have imagined, the first time he’d laid eyes on young Molly Stillman, fresh off a thirty-hour bus ride from Vermont to Mississippi to spend a summer building homes for those who’d lost theirs in a devastating hurricane the year before.

She’d been a recent graduate of Middlebury College, wanting to see more of the country and volunteer to help others before she went to work for the family business in Vermont. Back then, she’d had long honey-colored hair, freckles on her nose and an inquisitive nature that had immediately intrigued him. He saw young Molly in all three of their daughters—in Hannah’s curiosity, in Ella’s kindness, in Charley’s determination.

Fresh out of grad school at Yale, Linc was volunteering on the housing project before spending a post-graduate year at Oxford. As a lifelong Anglophile, he’d dreamed of living in the UK and retracing the steps of The Beatles, his favorite band of all time. The two months in Mississippi were supposed to have been a brief interlude before he got on with the rest of his life.

Little had he known then that those two months would change everything.

The first thing Linc had noticed when he arrived in Gulfport, Mississippi (population 39,600 at the time), was the heat. He’d been told it would be hot, but nothing could’ve properly prepared him for the thick blanket of humidity that made it almost hurt to breathe. Thankfully, Gulfport benefited from the sea breezes off the Gulf of Mexico, which provided a bit of relief.

He’d been met at the bus depot by Joseph Tolman, a tall, muscular Black man with a big smile and a crushing handshake. “Thanks so much for coming.” He gestured for Linc to follow him to his pickup truck. “We need all the help we can get to finish this project in time to receive the second half of our federal funding.”

In the wake of Hurricane Frederic the year before, Tolman and several local contractors had committed to building a hundred and fifty affordable housing units by September 1 and had advertised nationally for volunteers willing to spend a summer learning on the job. Linc had been immediately intrigued by the opportunity to acquire practical skills while also helping people before he left for Oxford.

Since they’d lost his older brother Hunter three years earlier, nothing had been the same. Linc had grappled with his own grief after the staggering loss and had found it harder to be home, where pervasive sadness hung over their family. Spending the summer in Philadelphia hadn’t been an option he’d been willing to entertain. When he’d heard about the project in Mississippi, he’d jumped at the chance to