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sister who, like Beth, had survived the massacre at the family cabin north of the Twin Cities. But instead of commiserating with the man, Justin held onto his anger toward him. Blaming Marcus for not seeing that his father—Justin’s uncle—had been so close to losing his grip on reality. Surely there had been some indication of his instability before he’d gunned down both their families and then turned the weapon on himself. Beth and Marcus’s sister, Meredith, only survived the shooting because they’d been up in the attic, the place they had loved to go to talk. The commotion had brought them downstairs in time to see Edward Black take his own life. That, in and of itself was bad enough, but they’d also come face to face with the carnage he’d left behind.
    Eight dead. Seven at the hand of a suicidal madman. In addition to their parents, he and Beth had lost the siblings that had been between them in age. Michael, their sixteen-year-old brother who had just gotten his driver’s license. Amanda, their eighteen-year-old sister who had been preparing to graduate high school. And Charlotte, their newly engaged twenty-one-year-old sister. Marcus had lost his parents as well as Meredith’s twin brother, Mitchell. And in the aftermath of everything, Marcus’s fiancée had broken off their engagement just two months before the wedding.
    Justin looked over at his sister, pride flooding him at how far she’d come in the decade since that horrible day. Meredith hadn’t fared as well. No doubt in part because she’d lost the twin she had been exceptionally close to and had also seen her father take his own life.
    Realizing he needed to stay in the present, Justin turned his attention back to the conversation going on around the table. He almost checked out again when he realized they were talking about church-related stuff. Since hearing about Genevieve’s diagnosis, he had struggled with how God could allow yet another traumatic event in Beth’s life. Hadn’t losing the majority of her family in a horrific way been enough? Surely she had been entitled to be able to live out the rest of her life without any more heartbreaking trials.
    But she didn’t question any of this. Her faith remained strong. When he’d returned to Minneapolis to take care of Beth, she had insisted on still going to church. After five years in the military, Justin hadn’t exactly been interested in attending at first. He’d gone just for her sake, but soon he was listening to the sermons and eventually, he’d reconnected to the faith his parents had raised them with. But that didn’t mean he didn’t still have some questions for God when stuff like this happened.  Because not understanding was one of the hardest things for Justin, and he definitely didn’t understand why Genevieve had to go through this.
    “Would you be willing to take some sign language lessons, too, Justin?” Beth asked.
    Justin looked from Alana to his sister. What could he say? He didn’t want to. He wanted to believe that he could find a cure for Genevieve. But what if he couldn’t? Sign language would be the only way to communicate with her. His gut clenched at the thought.
    “I’ll think about it,” he said, not wanting to make any promises he couldn’t keep.
    “Alana is a great teacher. And Caden has even been good helping with Genevieve,” Beth told him.
    “I’ll think about it,” he repeated, his voice gruff.
    ~*~*~
    Alana watched the exchange between Beth and her brother. She could see the firm set of Justin’s face as he responded to his sister’s suggestion about learning sign language. As far as she was concerned, she’d be just as happy if Justin didn’t want to learn from her. The less she had to do with the man, the better. And even less contact between him and Caden would be a good thing.
    Still, she couldn’t miss the disappointment on Beth’s face when Justin refused to commit. Alana knew it was important for the relationship