The Finish Line （The Ravenhood #3）
Kate Stewart
Note to Reader
Wow. What a journey!
The little bonus epilogue that could has now become my lengthiest novel to date! Most of you who’ve been following the progress of the ‘bonus epilogue’ on social media know this was never supposed to be a trilogy. After finishing this book, I stand firm that this last installment was always there, waiting for me to unearth it. And I’m so glad I did.
In order to properly pen the ending I saw fit, I had to make a few—very few—changes to the previous scripts. Do not let this alarm you in any way. These are minor details, so minor they’re probably undetectable to most. These slight changes were necessary to keep timeline flow and if you’re a stickler for details, please know we’ve corrected them to the absolute best of our ability.
That said, these minimal tweaks should not, in any way, alter your enjoyment of the final book.
It’s been an honor and one of the most memorable highlights of my career to write The Ravenhood.
I so hope you enjoy The Finish Line, and I thank you so much for taking this journey with me.
All my love.
XO
Kate
For Mon Trésor, Ma?wenn
And for my readers for taking this journey with me. Merci.
Age Forty-Three
Saint-Jean-de-Luz, France
“Viens ici, Ezekiel,” Come here, Ezekiel. I walk over to where he stands, his hand lowered, a round, brown seashell with a flat bottom resting in his palm. When I go to take it, he moves it out of reach.
“Qu’est-ce que c’est?” What is it?
“Un clypéastre, un dollar de sable. Lorsque tu en trouveras un, garde-le. Et lorsque tu seras prêt, alors tu le casseras. Mais tu dois le faire bien au milieu pour pouvoir en récupérer son trésor.” A dollar of sand. When you find this, you keep it. And only when you’re ready, do you break it. But you have to do it right down the middle to claim the treasure.
“Quand serai-je prêt?” When will I be ready?
He ruffles my hair. “Tu le sauras.” You’ll know.
Standing on the shoreline, I skip rocks along the foamed waves flooding in at my feet. I never recalled the whole conversation from that day my father brought me here; only the look of the sea, a glimpse of sand, the flash of early sun peaking behind him, and the strange shell in his palm. It was on my last visit to the institution that he recalled our discussion verbatim during one of his rare and lucid moments. He told me the story of his son, Ezekiel, and repeated our exchange that day with surprising clarity just minutes before he asked me to search for him.
Whether it was a sign, or fate, or something else playing a factor, I found a sand dollar on the beach in pristine condition the day I broke ground on the house. Though he didn’t jog my memory until years after, the why of what drew me to keep it when I found it was made clear. Somehow without knowing the details, I knew the significance of it.
It’s ironic and cruel how the mind works, mine especially. Some memories I re-live regularly but would do anything to forget, the details so vivid, so ingrained, it can be torturous. While others, the memories I hold most dear, at times evade me. But it’s my fickle memory that planted a seed that day and instinct that had me hiding that shell—that makes it all the more meaningful. And it wasn’t until I looked up the significance of the ‘treasure’ that I understood his state of mind that day, a state very much like my own mindset now.
We were never close due to my mother fleeing from him because of his temper and mental illness—a diagnosed schizophrenic—but I feel some connection to him now. However, I’ve been fearful since the day I found him decades later, covered in his own shit and rambling frantic French at any stranger who passed him on that street in Paris. Seeing him in that state gave way to trepidation that one day I would suffer the same fate—that everyone who claimed to care for me would eventually abandon me—due to mental illness and lack of control. A fear that crippled me for years and kept me from investing, in believing in people fully.