“Are you in trouble, Griff?”

He knew she was asking if he was involved in something illegal again. “No. I swear it.”

“I believe you. So go to the authorities and tell them about this person who’s hounding you and-”

“I can’t, Ellie.”

“Why not?”

“Because he’s not acting strictly on his own.”

“You mean-”

“ Vista. The same men Coach called slippery, and he didn’t know the half of it.”

“Then you certainly need to talk to the authorities.”

He shook his head, thinking back to what he’d resolved yesterday as he left Marcia’s penthouse. “I’ve been up to my eyebrows in the ‘authorities’ for the past five years. I don’t want anything to do with the authorities.”

He couldn’t report Rodarte’s crime without bringing a lot of shit down on himself and Marcia. The hell of it was, their silence gave Rodarte protection and room to maneuver. Rodarte could make a real menace of himself, and Griff was hamstrung.

“But the police or the FBI need to know if-”

“I no longer trust the system, Ellie. I’m doing what I’m supposed to do. I’ve formed a good relationship with my probation officer. I think he’s on my side. I want to stay under the radar, do nothing that would call attention to me.”

“And to that murder.”

“And to that murder,” he admitted.

“They never caught the person who killed that Bandy character, did they?”

“No, they never did.”

The silence became dense, stretched out. She didn’t come right out and ask. She didn’t want to insult him by asking. Or maybe she didn’t want to hear the answer. She took a sip of tea, returning the glass to the table with more care than necessary.

“You can’t live your life dodging the bad guys, Griff. You’ll just have to ignore them.”

“I’ve tried. It’s not that easy. In fact, it’s impossible. Ignoring them only makes them more determined to get my attention. And they’ll use other people to do it, to bend me to their way of thinking. I won’t play with them, Ellie. I won’t break the law again. But I don’t want other people getting hurt.”

Specifically, the Speakmans. If Rodarte found out about Griff’s deal with them, he could ruin it, and it was the only thing Griff had going. Beyond that, Rodarte could do irreparable damage to the couple’s reputation. Speakman might be as crazy as a loon, but he seemed like a decent enough guy. He was respected for his community service and for giving away barrels of money to charity.

And it made Griff queasy to think of Laura Speakman being subjected to Rodarte’s violence as Marcia had been. Given half a chance, Rodarte would hurt her and not think twice about it. He’d already noticed her, spoken of her in terms that enraged Griff.

Noticing Ellie’s look of concern, Griff relaxed his stance and smiled. “I didn’t come here to worry you. I just needed a sounding board, and you’ve always been a good one.”

She got up and took his hand again. “More than anything, I want you to be happy, Griff.”

“Happy?” He repeated the word as though it was of another language. Happy seemed an unattainable goal.

“Have you got a job yet?”

“I’m looking into some things. One will open up soon.”

“In the meantime, what are you doing for money?”

“My lawyer sold all my stuff. There was a little left after he paid the fines and such. What wasn’t sold he put in a warehouse. I cleared it out a few weeks ago. Sold a few things on eBay. I’m doing okay.”

She pulled her handbag off the peg near the back door and took a fifty-dollar bill from her wallet. “Here.”

He staved her off. “Ellie, I can’t take that.”

“Yes you can. I insist. It’s part of my Hawaii money.”

“ Hawaii money?”

“After years of my pestering him about it, Joe’s finally consented to take me to Hawaii later this summer. I’ve saved some spending money. If you don’t take this, I’ll buy fifty dollars’ worth of tacky souvenirs I don’t need and will never want to look at again. Take it.”

He took it. Not because he wanted to or needed it but because she wanted to give it to him, and she needed him to accept it. “I’ll pay you back.”

They heard the car at the same time. She looked up at him, gave him a very weak smile of reassurance, and turned to face the back door as Coach came in. “Whose car-”

That was as far as he got. Seeing Griff in his kitchen stopped him in his tracks. His sparse hair had gone grayer. He’d put on maybe ten pounds, but he was still as solid as a brick wall, not fat. There were more squint lines extending from the corners of his eyes, showing up white against his perpetually sunburned face. Otherwise he looked much the same as he had the day he’d brought Griff to this house almost twenty years ago.

Griff registered all this within the span of a second, which was only as long as Coach stood still before continuing on his lumbering way through the kitchen, past the living room, and down the hall. The slamming bedroom door echoed loudly through the house.

It was a while before Ellie spoke. “I’m sorry, Griff.”

“I didn’t expect him to be glad to see me.”

“He is. He just can’t show it.”

Griff didn’t have the heart to disabuse her. “I’ve gotta go.”

She didn’t argue. At the door, she looked at him with concern. “Take care of yourself.”

“I will.”

“You promise?”

“I promise.”

“I never got an opportunity to tell you this, but when all that happened five years ago, I hurt for you. What you did was wrong, Griff. Very wrong, and you have no excuse for doing it. But I couldn’t have hurt more for you if you’d been my own flesh and blood.”

“I know that.” His voice was dangerously rough.

“Don’t get discouraged.” She patted the back of his hand. “The best for you is yet to be. I’m certain of it.”

He didn’t disabuse her of that, either.

“Need help with that, ma’am?”

Laura turned, ready to accept the kind offer of assistance. But when she saw Griff Burkett, her smile froze in place as her eyes filled with alarm. “What are you doing here?”

He lifted the large box she was carrying out of her arms, which seemed to have gone boneless at the sight of him. “Where were you taking this?”

She continued to gape at him.

“You keep looking at me like that, you’re going to attract attention,” he said. “Where were you taking the box?”

“To my car.” She nodded in the direction of the reserved spaces in the executive parking lot, not too far from the employee entrance from which she had emerged. She glanced around nervously. Rows of cars baked beneath the blazing sun, but there was no one else around, which was why she’d been carrying the box in the first place.

The building that housed the corporate offices of SunSouth Airlines was one of Dallas ’s famed contemporary structures, built basically of glass held together by a framework of steel. So anyone looking out from this side of the building had an unrestricted view of the parking lot and could see her with him, possibly even recognize him.

However, if he hadn’t been this close, she probably couldn’t have identified him herself. He’d altered his appearance with a baseball cap and sunglasses. He had on a faded T-shirt that was nearly thread-bare, knee-length shorts with a ragged hem, and sneakers instead of cowboy boots. But his height and the width of his shoulders were impossible to disguise, although he attempted to by walking in a slouch.

“What are you doing here?” she repeated.

“I know it’s against the rules.”

“Foster would-”

“Go apeshit, I know. But it was important that I see you.”

“You could have called.”

“Would you have taken the call?”

Probably not, she thought. “Okay, you’re here. What’s so urgent? Are you backing out?”

He stopped, turned to her. “Do you want me to?”

“You left saying you didn’t need this shit, remember?”