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She hadn’t called the Shadow Cove Police for the same reason he and Brooklynn hadn’t. Thank heavens for Jon… He couldn’t even remember the man's last name, but his contact at the state police had shown up just in time.

One more reason for Forbes to thank Brooklynn.

From beside his grandmother, she watched him, her expression filled with concern.

He’d spent his entire life longing for justice, but he’d never thought about what life would look like on the other side. And even if he had, he would never in a million years have imagined this.

His sister and a woman he loved.

It was a better ending than any he could have conjured in his wildest dreams.

* * *

Forbes’s sister was telling him about her family when the door pushed open a second before a knock sounded on it.

“Can I come in?”

Forbes expected a nurse, but it was a woman dressed in a smart pantsuit who paused, waiting for an invitation.

She was vaguely familiar.

At his nod, she advanced, her gaze skimming the crowd before it landed on him. She held out her hand to shake. “Lori Putnam, state police. You were a little distracted last night.”

His right arm was in a sling, so he grabbed her hand awkwardly with his left.

A man followed her. He had gray hair and, like Lori, wore a business suit. He nodded. “Simon Bergstrom, FBI. We need to ask you some questions.” He addressed the others in the room. “You’ll need to step out.”

Forbes didn’t want any of them to leave, but he didn’t argue as Rosie, Brooklynn, and Grandmother made their way toward the door.

Grandmother held her back straight, though she didn’t glance his way. Was she feeling ashamed for having lied to him all those years? Did she fear his anger?

As he watched her disappear, he tried to name how he felt about what she’d done. He’d been angry at first, but that hadn’t lasted. But at the moment, the dominant emotion was gratitude.

He was alive, as was Rosie. They’d both survived that terrible night and everything since then, largely because of his grandmother’s actions. Did he wish he’d known about Rosie? Of course. But maybe, if they’d had contact sooner, Leo Taggart and his cohorts would have found them and killed them.

It seemed to take forever to relate the events of the previous night to the FBI agent and the police detective. The detective took copious notes. The FBI agent just watched.

Forbes went over all the details chronologically, sharing the facts as dispassionately as he could. When he was finished, they bombarded him with questions, which he answered carefully.

Finally, Putnam snapped her notebook closed. “What you’ve said lines up with what Ms. Wright and Mrs. Cartwell told us.”

“Who’s Mrs.—?”

“Your sister,” Bergstrom supplied.

Rosie was married, so of course her name wasn’t Ballentine anymore.

Bizarre that he hadn’t even known her last name. Bizarre that she was still alive.

All this was going to take him a while to process.

“We have some information for you,” Putnam said. “I’d rather tell you all at the same time. Shall I bring them back in?”

“Please.”

Grandmother led the way. He wasn’t sure what the ladies had said or done while he was being questioned, but she met his eyes squarely this time.

He smiled at her, reaching out with his good arm, and a little of the starch went out of her spine as she took his hand.

“I don’t understand everything.” He kept his words low, just for the woman who’d raised him. “But I know everything you did, you did to protect us. I love you for that.”

“Well, of course.” Though her words were strong, tears dripped from her eyes. She dabbed them with a tissue in her regal way.

Rosie stood next to Grandmother, and Brooklynn rounded to the other side of the bed. All of them looked at the two cops who’d summoned them.

Putnam cleared her throat. “Here’s what we know.

As you two suggested”—she nodded to Forbes and Brooklynn—“we’ve pulled video footage from the cameras recording the happenings at the inlet on the Ballentine property.

We’re still putting all the pieces together, but one of the men we arrested last night…

” She flipped back in her notebook. “Owen Stratton. He’s been really chatty about everything going on.

He’d been hired to haul boxes. Though nobody told him what was inside, he peeked once.

Saw bags of pills. Fentanyl, probably. They’ve been pouring into the area, but we didn’t know where they were coming from. ”

“He told you about his grandmother? Maury Stratton?” Forbes asked.

Putnam’s eyes narrowed, and she looked at her notes again. “Not his grandmother. It was?—”

“Lois Whitmore.”

Forbes shot a look at Brooklynn. “Your friend? Your mentor? But…the break-in at her house.”

“Was staged, or made up entirely, I assume.” Brooklynn shrugged as if it didn’t matter.

“She would’ve shot me last night if not for your sister, who shot her first. I’d forgotten until you suggested Stratton could be a married name.

I realized it could be Lois. I didn’t believe it. I didn’t want to believe it.”

“I’ve still got some painkillers running through me,” Forbes said. “Stratton was Maury’s married name, right? I’m confused.”

“Sorry, Whitmore is Lois’s married name. Maury married Lois’s brother, the one who moved them to North Carolina. Before she got married?—”

“Oh. L.S.” It was coming together now. “Lois Stratton .”

Brooklynn nodded, and then Forbes realized what else she’d said. “Is she…? Did she survive?”

“She’s in critical condition.” Brooklynn swiped the sleeve of her sweatshirt beneath her eyes.

Somewhere along the way, she’d changed out of the old-lady jogging suit, though he didn’t know when or how she’d gotten clothes.

“Even if she survives… She was going to shoot me. I’m thinking she’s no longer my mentor.”

He held out his hand for hers, then squeezed it. “I’m sorry.”

“I’m glad I know who she really is.” Brooklynn faced Putnam. “She got her nephew involved. Owen.”

“Owen?” Forbes had heard the name earlier, but now it registered. “Your sister’s boyfriend?”

“I haven’t told Delaney yet.”

“It’s all over the internet.” Rosie looked apologetic when she added, “Sorry to say, but she probably already knows.”

“Right. I hate that. I’ll call her when we’re done here.”

Putnam cleared her throat. “According to Owen, Lois Stratton and Leo Taggart were in charge. Leo pulled Bryce over a few months back and found drugs in his car. Bryce was on probation and looking at jail time. Leo offered him a deal—he’d let him go if Bryce would come work for him.

Bryce didn’t think he could refuse. Not sure how Ned Salcito got involved. ”

Forbes looked from the detective to Brooklynn. “Ned?”

“Niles.”

“Ah. Okay.”

“There were more men last night, most of whom claim they were recruited for this one job. They didn’t know what they were doing at the house. They’re just local thugs who were looking to make some extra money.”

“Do we know how they knew Brooklynn was at the house? Or did they plan to hit the house anyway, and it was just dumb luck?”

“Good question.” Putnam smiled as if at a star student. “The only things left in the truck were Brooklynn’s backpack and a sack of clothes.”

That explained how she’d changed, at least.

“We found a tracker in the backpack.”

“What?” Brooklynn’s eyes popped wide. “How did that happen?”

“Owen admitted he put it there when he saw you in the historical society. He was very chatty. And, honestly”—her lips slipped into a smirk—“filled with regret. He didn’t ask for a lawyer or claim innocence, just told us everything. He swears he had no idea they were trying to kill you.”

“He’s the one who shot Forbes.” Brooklynn bit her lip. “He could’ve shot me, though, and he didn’t. He just ran.”

Putnam made a note. “That’s good to know. He claims he thought they just wanted to get your camera. He said he took the job Bryce offered so he could save money to buy his girlfriend an engagement ring.”

Brooklynn cringed at that last bit. Thank heavens he’d been found out before he’d proposed to Delaney.

“He just happened to have a tracker on him?” Forbes asked.

“He said that Lois had given him one in case he ran into you.”

“That’s probably why he kept offering to help me,” Brooklynn said.

“So you’ve figured out who was involved now, but all the evidence from back then…

” Forbes already knew the answer but asked anyway.

He needed to prove to Grandmother and Rosie—to himself once again—that Dad hadn’t been a criminal.

He’d been a confidential informant. “Any chance it was still in the back of my pickup?”

“Nope.” Putnam didn’t seem at all upset. “We assume it burned with the house.”

So his house was destroyed. He’d known that, of course, but it still hurt to hear it.

Even worse, the evidence was gone.

“He doesn’t know.” Brooklynn spoke to the detective before turning to him. “First, the whole house didn’t burn, just the main part. They were able to save most of the new wing and the garage.”

That was something, at least. So many of the family’s treasures had been moved to the garage, so at least those weren’t lost. But the house his ancestor had built, where his parents had lived, was ruined.

Forbes allowed himself to taste that thought, to examine it. That house had been home to wonderful memories, but all of them were tainted by that last terrible day.

The evidence was all that mattered now.

Brooklynn smiled. “Before we left last night, while you were getting my things, I took photographs of all your dad’s papers and all our notes. I emailed them to Putnam.”

What was she saying? “The evidence was saved?”

Putnam was nodding. “The pictures of it. And we also got the ones Brooklynn took of the men at the inlet last week—which had been sent to the state police lab but were too corrupted to do anything with.”

“Does that mean Nathan?—?”

“He’s in custody. He hasn’t said a word, but he’ll be charged.” Lori stifled a yawn. “Sorry. It’s been a long night. From what I saw, you two took good notes about what was on the cassette tapes.”

Forbes hadn’t taken any notes. That’d been all Brooklynn.

Putnam continued. “That’ll give us a running start to nail down the rest of the people involved with your parents’ murders. We’ll do everything we can to match all those initials and names with people so they answer for what they did.”

“It was Leo who shot them.”

The woman patted the top of his foot, an awkward gesture at best. “We know. Leo and Lois were working together. Leo’s dead, and if Lois survives, she’ll face charges.”

“Are all of those terrible people in custody now?” The question came from Grandmother, who hadn’t spoken before this.

“Everyone we know of, yes ma’am.”

She nodded, then backed up to sit in the chair as if the information was more than she could take.

Forbes understood how she felt.

The FBI agent, who’d been quiet since his introduction, cleared his throat. “I have some information I think will be a comfort to you.”

All eyes turned to him.

“Charles Ballentine was informing for the FBI. That summer, twenty-five years ago, another agent in the Boston field office was diagnosed with a very aggressive form of cancer. He passed less than six months after his diagnosis. I took over all his cases. There was one I never did understand. We think he was working on it off book, maybe something he planned to take to the higher-ups when he’d proved something.

I had a note in the system for years”—he nodded to Brooklynn—“all those initials you wrote down. The information you provided matched what this agent had in the file. The whole thing just slipped through the cracks.”

Forbes absorbed that.

Brooklynn had been right.

Dad hadn’t been a criminal. Forbes had never understood how his good and decent father could’ve done something like be involved in smuggling, but the evidence had seemed concrete.

Only because Forbes hadn’t had all of it.

Rosie squeezed his hand, tears dripping from her eyes. “I didn’t… I didn’t know.”

He sniffed back a fresh wave of emotion. “Me, either, sis. But it makes sense. Dad would never?—”

“But why would he even inform for the FBI?” she snapped. “Why get involved at all?”

“According to the file,” Bergstrom said, “they didn’t give him any choice. They threatened his family if he reported what they were doing. He felt trapped and thought his only chance to get out was to inform.”

Grandmother stood, the motion taking more effort than it ought. “They should have gone in and arrested everyone immediately. They shouldn’t have put my son and his family in danger like that.”

“You’re right.” The agent’s expression was grim. “I agree entirely.”

Gran didn’t seem to know what to say to that, just mumbling a “Hmph.”

Whatever that FBI agent had been thinking, whatever Dad had been thinking, what happened had happened. Their family had been ripped apart that night.

But as Forbes glanced at the people surrounding his hospital bed, he realized God was putting it back together. Not just Rosie and Grandmother, but now there were Rosie’s husband and children, and her husband’s family, and the family that had taken her in, all part of the circle.

And Brooklynn, who smiled at him.

He wasn’t sure what would happen next. He’d spent his entire life hiding his identity, something he no longer needed to do.

Now, he could be himself. Forbes Ballentine. And he had a real family.

He hardly remembered what that felt like, but he was eager to find out.