Alex had done what she could not do. He’d been willing to face the truth and end the pain.
Now Rosalie prayed she could do the same.
She’d already stopped by the Wildemer Company’s office in downtown Sonoma. The office was going to prepare a contract of sale immediately. But before she could force herself to sign it, she knew she had to be brave enough to go to the farm and say goodbye, one last time.
But as she’d come out of the Wildemer offices, pushing her baby in a stroller, she’d passed by a red-haired man coming toward the door.
“Hello, Rosalie.”
Shocked, she gasped, “Cody?”
“I heard you were in town. Is this your baby?” Husky in a flannel shirt and jeans, with a wide, friendly face, Cody Kowalski knelt briefly by the stroller, smiling. “And I heard you were married...”
“What are you doing here?”
He straightened. “The same as you, I guess.” He looked up at Wildemer’s picturesque nineteenth-century office building. “I’m here to pick up the check.” He tilted his head. “We’re done. We sold.”
“You sold your farm?” she cried. “But why?”
“My parents want to retire to Florida.” Cody grinned. “And I hate farming. I always have.”
“What?” she exclaimed.
He shook his head. “For my whole life, I tried to be brave enough to tell my parents I didn’t want to do it.” He looked at her. “All this time I’ve been wishing I could have been brave enough to do what you did, Rosalie.”
“But I never should have left.” She looked down at her baby in the stroller, feeling suddenly near tears. “At least you were here, to help your parents escape the fire...”
“No, Rosalie. It wasn’t me.” He came closer, his freckled face sad. “Your parents did that.”
“My parents?”
“They helped us escape. I was in the basement, playing video games. My parents were in the kitchen, arguing. Your parents came and pounded on the door, and told us to leave. If not for them, we wouldn’t have known. We wouldn’t have made it. They said they were going back to try to save all their animals... They knew about the danger. But they didn’t care.”
“They knew?” Rosalie whispered.
Cody looked down. “I wanted to tell you at the funeral. But I was scared.”
“Why?”
“Because it was my fault,” he said in a low voice, wiping his eyes. “My fault your parents died. If I’d just been honest with my parents that I didn’t want the farm, they would have sold up long before.” He paused. “And your parents would still be alive, because they wouldn’t have wasted time coming to warn us.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“But—”
“It was never your fault, Cody. Never. Just be happy. It’s what they would have wanted. It’s what I want too.” She hugged Cody hard as she whispered, “Thank you for telling me.”
Now, remembering, Rosalie looked out at the land.
All this time, she’d thought of her parents’ deaths with guilt and shame, blaming herself. Now she was able to see they’d died as they’d lived—on their own terms, making the world a better place.
Just as Rosalie could, if she tried. She took a deep breath.
Everything had burned. Nothing was left, except the house’s foundation buried deep in the earth, and even that was covered with ash and scarred by smoke. Looking down at her baby, she said, “This is where I grew up, Oliver. Your grandparents and their grandparents too. I wanted you to see it. Even though it’s gone.”
Rosalie couldn’t run the farm alone. She couldn’t. It was the people she’d loved who’d made the land beautiful to her. Without them, there was nothing. She’d lost them forever. Her parents. Her dreams. And Alex—
Looking down, Rosalie saw tiny green shoots, pushing through the rubble and debris.