Page 177 of The Lost and Found Girl

But it was the other story that occupied the front page of thePear Blossom Gazettethat stopped her cold.

Brewer’s Trial Postponed

The trial of Nathan Brewer has been postponed indefinitely. The defense is challenging the charges on the basis that there is not enough evidence, and that Brewer has been held unlawfully. The defense posits that because no body has been found, nor any evidence suggesting violence occurred, Brewer cannot be implicated in the disappearance or possible death of Caitlin Groves.

This is a devastating blow to a community in mourning. It has been more than a year since our town’s greatest tragedy, and we are no closer to justice, or answers. This event has left a deep and lasting scar. If we cannot now trust our own neighbors, as we always have, throughout the history of our town, what will we become? If we cannot root out the bad apples among us with veracity, if we can have no recourse or justice, what will this community become?

It was the strangest thing, to see this story right next to her own.

Hadn’t Dana just made the link between herself and Caitlin yesterday?

The town acted like her appearance canceled out the loss of Caitlin.

She grabbed another newspaper at random, one from the middle of January.

There was nothing about her, or Nathan. There was a piece about smudge pots and their history. But when she grabbed the paper for the week of January 20, there was mention of Nathan again.

Charges Dropped, Brewer to be Released.

She skimmed the article, her eyes landing on the final few paragraphs.

Dana Groves is distraught, her eyes hollow. The single mother has no one else to help to shoulder this burden. She is a woman alone. A wayward teen daughter, who spent nights out with a boyfriend, likely engaging in risky behaviors, likely already causing undue stress, the loss of that child has broken her.

Perhaps it is only residents of this town who can truly grasp the gravity of the situation. Certainly not officials sitting in their ivory towers in Salem. They are unaffected by the tragedy of one teenage girl, potentially murdered by one of the people she trusted the most. For now, for Dana, for the community of Pear Blossom, it feels as if Caitlin has been taken all over again.

“He knows something,” Groves’ mother asserted. “He was the last person to see her. And he’s the only one who knows what happened to her. I just want the truth.”

But the truth is proving to be elusive, subject to the whims of a justice system that is more concerned with keeping the letter of the law than seeing actual justice done. The state of Oregon may forget, the nation most certainly will. But the

town of Pear Blossom will not.

Well, they hadn’t. Ruby knew that for sure. Because there were no villains hated half so much in the town as the Brewer family. And Nathan Brewer was here. Why?

She knew why she was back. To find herself. To be with her family. To connect with this town who loved her so much, almost as much as she loved it in return.

Why would you come back to a town that hated you?

Well, probably because he needed money, and he needed to fix up the house and the land to sell it. That would make the most sense.

Her eyes were prickly, and she was sleepy.

I don’t know what this is going to do for me.

Well, maybe it’s not about what it would do for you.

That was all fine for Dahlia to say, but it was Ruby’s life that was being excavated.

She sighed heavily and got up from the bed, stretching. She surveyed the tidy, small space. The light wood floor was clean and uncluttered, the few open shelves on her wall were filled with books. Her bed was made and ready for her. As ready for her as she was for it.

She pulled the blankets back, crawling beneath the covers. But she kept seeing newsprint behind her eyelids. And in spite of herself, she was trying to read it until she finally lapsed into unconsciousness.

And when she did, there was no rest.

Because she felt like she was awake again, standing there on the backside of Sentinel Bridge. The path behind her looked impossibly long and unfamiliar. The trees overgrown. There were fall leaves on the ground, and the wind was cold. She had a sense of foreboding that stretched all around her, and she didn’t want to go into the bridge. She was afraid of it.

But she had no choice other than to keep walking forward. As if each footstep was compelled by a force more powerful than herself. But the passage through the bridge was dark. And still, she kept walking forward. She wanted to tell herself to stop. But she couldn’t. It was like the body wasn’t hers.

She took her first step into the bridge. Then another.