Page 58 of The Moonlight Healers

“I healed it,” Louise said, the words tumbling out. “But it still died.” She braced herself. “Is that going to happen to Peter?”

It hurt just to voice the question, as though simply saying the words held the awful power to make them true.

Camille looked down. When she looked back up, her eyes glistened. “No,” she said.

Louise wanted so desperately to believe her, but she had already been lied to enough.

Camille leaned across the island. “You have to trust me.”

Louise shook her head. “You said you were waiting for Mom, to tell me. Why wait, if he’s going to be okay?”

Camille put her hands on Louise’s shoulders. “I was. I am. But it’s not what you think.”

“If you bring someone back, the way I brought Peter back, is it permanent? Does it last?”It won’t endure. Louise took a deep shuddering breath. “Grandma, if you don’t tell me the truth now I will never forgive you. I’m not a child. I don’t need Mom here. You have to tell me.”

Camille released Louise’s shoulders. “No, honey, what you did, on its own, is not… It’s not permanent, it won’t endure…but, Louise, you have to understand something—”

“How much time?” Louise asked, cutting her grandmother off. All she could think of was Peter, the earnest look in his eyes when he told her he maybe loved her, the hurt in his features in the car, when she had run away from him, from the truth. Soon he could be gone, any second. “How much time?” she repeated.

“I don’t know,” Camille said, wringing her hands. “I never did what you did. I was taught it was a violation.”

The wordviolationlanded on Louise with the force of a blow.

“I wanted to,” Camille choked out. “Of course there were times. In nursing school especially. Young people…”

“How much time?” Louise demanded a third time. She didn’t want to hear her grandmother’s stories, listen to her try to relate to Louise. It was irrelevant. All that mattered right now was Peter.

“It’s not exact,” Camille answered. “My mother said it had to do with the moon cycles. Usually at least a few days. Sometimes longer. For Peter, he’s otherwise healthy. But, please, there’s something I can do… I can’t explain it to you without Bobbie. It’s not fair to her, or you.”

She had to get back to Peter, to find him before he died. She had to tell him he was right, about everything, that she had been lying when she didn’t say it back, that she loved him too.

“Louise, it wasn’t supposed to go like this. There are other factors here. Things you have to understand. Peter is going to be okay. I promise. Just give me more time to explain it. Wait until your mom can get here.”

Louise grabbed the key to her grandmother’s truck and walked out onto the porch, ignoring her grandmother’s pleas to come back. She slammed the truck door shut, shoved the key in the ignition, and with a roar of the engine and slosh of mud, she drove off.

As she flew down the driveway, the sky overhead was almost violent with explosions of crimson and purple. The mountains beneath were a dark, glinting gray. The land felt suddenly menacing, all hard edges where before there was softness.

She hit the brakes hard at the farm stand. Peter’s car was still there. He hadn’t left.

She barely saw the road in front of her, her eyes blurred from tears, but she managed to park on the side of the road and sprint toward Peter’s car, mud kicking up from where her feet hit the road.

Peter was out of the car before she could reach it. She threw herself against him as he wrapped his arms around her.

“You didn’t leave,” she choked out. She clung to his body, the solidity of it. She couldn’t believe that he would be gone again, in days, or hours even. It was impossible.

“I couldn’t. I just sat there. I’m such an idiot. I should never have said any of that.”

Louise’s chest heaved with a sob. How could she tell him? How could she ever explain what was about to happen?

“Louise…” Car lights swept over them, and he shielded his eyes from the harsh glare of high beams.

“That must be my mom,” Louise said. She felt an illogical relief, like her mother could fix all of it.

But as she squinted into the bright headlights, a man lumbered out of the car and toward them. At first she didn’t recognize him, still adjusting to the light. But when he was a few feet away, she saw it was Jake Henley.

“You know why I’m here,” Jake said without preamble, his eyes bloodshot.

Every muscle in her body went rigid. She thought of Caroline’s face on the trail after she healed Peter’s knee, and she knew instantly that she must have told him. Of course, she’d told him. “I don’t…”

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