Ever since Wade moved in two years earlier, the house had turned into a place where every sound mattered. If Caleb laughed too loud, Wade had a headache. If Caleb ate too much cereal, Wade said groceries cost money. If Caleb stayed in his room, Wade called him lazy. If he came out, Wade found chores he had somehow failed to do before being asked. The punishments weren’t always bruises. Sometimes they were worse. Locked doors. Cold silence. Dinner served without his plate. Long speeches about how boys who weren’t useful became men nobody wanted.
Caleb’s real father had disappeared before he was old enough to remember him. The only man who had ever made him feel safe was his grandfather, Elias Mercer.
But Elias had died when Caleb was nine.
And even now, five years later, old men at the hardware store still lowered their voices when they said his name, as if it belonged to a story instead of a person.
Elias Mercer the carpenter. Elias Mercer the mountain guide. Elias Mercer who could track elk in a blizzard and come back with enough game to feed three families. Elias Mercer who supposedly built a refuge somewhere high in the Bitterroot foothills—some hidden place nobody could find twice, stocked for hard winters and harder times.
