32
GRANDFATHER CLAUSE
With shaking fingers, Emma unclipped the picture of the mother she hadn’t seen in thirteen years and looked at the note underneath it. Her eyes raced over the words, barely believing them.
I recognized your voice on the answering machine immediately. I wish things had gone differently that night in the canyon, but there’s nothing you can tell me about my dad, your grandfather, that I don’t already know. If you have questions, ask him. He’s a good man.
There’s nothing I can give you besides this photo of me from when I was your age, and a piece of advice. Living with your grandparents gives you every opportunity in the world. I never appreciated that myself, but it’s not too late for you. Be smart. Seize those opportunities and don’t make the same horrible, life-changing mistakes I did.
Raven Jannings (Becky Mercer)
Raven was…Becky? And Becky was the Mercers’…daughter? And Grandma Mercer was her and Sutton’s great-grandmother?
Yes, I whispered. Yes, it’s all so f**ked up, but it’s true.
“Oh my God,” Emma whispered. Becky. She couldn’t believe it. Her own mother was related to the Mercers. And she had been here just moments before. Like she had been throughout Emma’s life, Becky was so close, and yet so far. A specter, a memory.
Emma looked at the letter once more. “That night in the canyon,” was the exact same phrase Mr. Mercer had used when he’d cornered her in the school parking lot. Suddenly a crack opened in her mind and pieces started falling into place. Thayer had seen Mr. Mercer with a woman…Becky. But he hadn’t been having an affair with her—he’d been meeting her because she was his daughter. And it sounded like Mr. Mercer and Becky had come clean to Sutton. Had she been so upset to learn the truth that she’d run off, only to die shortly thereafter? Either way, it seemed she’d been wildly wrong about Mr. Mercer. Becky had called him a good man. Maybe his discomfort with Emma, his warning to play along, had been because of what he’d told Sutton.
He didn’t do it, I tried to tell her. I ran away from him. I ran away from the man who could have taken me home safely.
A small knock sounded on the Volvo’s window and Emma jumped. Sutton’s father loomed before her. His dark eyes blinked and his brow furrowed with a distinct combination of sadness, worry, and exhaustion.
Emma stuck the note in her clutch, then fumbled with the levers on the door. A clicking noise sounded as the window began to open. She was no longer afraid of him. She was just tired—and confused. “How did you know I’d be here?”
I studied the man I’d been raised to think of as my adoptive father, observing the contours of the face I knew so well. I wasn’t sure how long it would take to adjust to the idea that he was my biological grandfather, but as I stared hard, I began to see similarities between the two of us—well, counting Emma, the three of us. We had the same sloping nose. The same pointed chin. The same long, thin hands. How could I not have noticed this before?
Mr. Mercer lowered his head and rested his hands against the door of the Volvo. “She…Becky…called me, saying you wanted to meet her at her motel. She wasn’t in the room, but this is her favorite diner.”
Emma nodded. “She left a matchbook in her room with a note that said ‘meet me.’”
Mr. Mercer shook his head. “She always did love scavenger hunts,” he said with a wistful smile.
Emma smiled, too. Becky used to make scavenger hunts for her around the courtyard of their apartment building, leaving a piece of birdseed on the table as a clue to look in the bird feeder in the corner, leaving a scrap of TV Guide in the bird feeder as a clue for Emma to look on top of the TV in the apartment, and so on.
“Was she in the diner?” Mr. Mercer asked, interrupting Emma’s thoughts.
Emma shook her head slowly. “No. She just left a note. And a photo.”
A gust of wind rustled his short hair, making it stand up straight. He glanced through the window of the diner before turning to look Emma in the eye. “Can I sit with you? Just for a minute?” he asked.
Emma nodded. She rolled up her window as Mr. Mercer crossed in front of the car and opened the passenger door.
Mr. Mercer let out a breath and stared at the glove compartment. His hands rested in his lap and he hung his head, making him look like a little boy. “I should have had a real conversation with you after that night,” he said finally. “I shouldn’t have let you run away. Especially after Thayer had left you there all alone.” His eyes darkened at the mention of Thayer.
Emma nodded, saying nothing. His words confirmed what she’d suspected: that he’d explained the Becky situation the night Sutton died—and that Sutton had run off, angry and upset. And if Mr. Mercer thought Thayer had left her in the canyon, then it followed that he hadn’t hit him with Sutton’s car. It also actually explained why he hated Thayer so much: He thought Thayer had ditched his daughter in Sabino Canyon.
“But right after you ran off, I was called into surgery,” Mr. Mercer continued. “I hated leaving you there, but you were just so angry. I thought it would be easier to talk once you had some space. When I got back from the hospital that night, I started to write you a letter. Maybe if I explained things clearly, you’d understand why I didn’t tell you for so long.” He turned to face Emma. “It wasn’t because I was ashamed of you. It was because I wanted to protect you from your mother. I love you more than you can ever know. You are my daughter, and I’ve loved you ever since Becky left you at our house.”