“Uncle Chase!”

“But the older I get, the more inclined I am to think he saw something good in her heart.” He laughed, a rueful sound. “Or maybe it’s just that the older I get, the dumber I get.”

“Why are you telling me this?” She felt desperately unhappy to hear it.

“Because it seems as if all kinds of truths are coming out, and you may as well get them all laid out for you.”

She had to fight back tears. “You’re the mean one.”

She heard him sigh. “Don’t you want to know who she really was?”

Jody didn’t answer. Maybe later she would want to know; at this moment it made her sad. In a kind of revenge, she suddenly said, “What if he really didn’t do it?”

“What if who didn’t do what?”

“Billy Crosby. What if he didn’t kill my dad?”

“Where the hell are you getting this?”

It pleased her to have made him angry, too.

“Do you know that Byron George thinks he didn’t do it?”

“Well, then I guess he doesn’t want this family as his customers anymore.”

“Bailey doesn’t think so, either.”

Chase halted the swing again. She saw him turn to stare at her.

“He told me so today,” she said. “He says Billy was too drunk.”

Jody was about to tell Chase about Red Bosch’s opinion, but thought better of doing that; Red should get to tell the family himself, and not have her tattle on him.

“Is this where that question about the drunk test came from at supper tonight?” Chase asked, and then he snapped at her, “Try to remember you’re the victim here, all right?”

“You didn’t bring me up to feel like a victim.”

“No, we didn’t, but maybe you need to feel that now and then, so you can know the deep wrong this very bad man did and how he doesn’t deserve anybody’s sympathy, least of all yours.”

“I’m not sympathetic to him, Uncle Chase.”

“Good. Don’t ever be. And stop this ridiculous talk.”

They sat in a much less comfortable silence then, until Jody got up from the swing. Faking nonchalance, she stretched up her arms, spreading her fingers until their tips seemed to touch the stars.

“Are you coming in?” she asked, her tone chilly.

“No, I’ll stay out here awhile.”

“Uncle Chase?”

“Yeah?”

“What if he doesn’t leave Rose?”

“He’s not going to stay here.”

“How do you know that?”

“Some things are inevitable.”

“But-”

“Go to bed.”

Something in his tone made Jody walk to the screen door and go inside without questioning him any more.

THE RANCH TELEPHONE rang just as Jody was going into the shower. She delayed long enough to hear Bobby call out to his parents from his old bedroom, “Who called so late?” It was only a little after ten, but it had been an exhausting day and they were all worn down.

Her grandfather opened the door to the master bedroom. Standing in the doorway in his pajamas and a robe, he said, “There’s been trouble in town. Some teenagers outside of the Crosby house were throwing rocks and yelling things.”

“Was that the sheriff who just called?” Bobby asked, appearing in the hallway, still fully dressed in his boots, jeans, and shirt.

His father nodded. “You have to give the man credit for calling to let us know, even after the things we said to him.”

“Oh, come on, Dad. He’s just doing his job, which he should have done in the beginning. What did he do about the kids?”

“Warned them off. Put deputies at either end of the block.”

“That should calm things down.”

Bobby returned to his room and shut the door.

Hugh Senior spotted his granddaughter, who had her head stuck out of the bathroom, listening. “Thank you for coming out here, Jody. Your grandmother and I feel better knowing you’re here with us.”

She decided to say it, rather than let it fester.

“I wish you had let me go with you to the hearing.”

“It wouldn’t have changed anything, honey.”

“But at least I would have known I tried.”

“It doesn’t feel better to have tried,” he said surprising her. “It may even feel worse. I can’t stop thinking of other things we should have said…” He shook his head slowly, with a look of heavy regret on his face. “Be glad you weren’t there. Be glad you don’t have to feel you failed.”

“Oh, Grandpa. You didn’t fail. You never had a chance.”

Feeling sorry she’d said anything at all, she murmured good night and slipped into the bathroom. As she stood under the hot water, her mind took an unexpected turn away from her own family’s woes. Against her will, because she didn’t want to feel any sympathy for the Crosbys, she wondered what it would feel like to have people hurling rocks at you, and cops who didn’t do any more than shoo away your attackers and tell them to be good boys? She wondered if she’d be teaching any of those hooligans in the fall. If they were in her classes, they’d probably assume she approved of their actions, maybe even considered them heroes, and they’d be wrong.

BEFORE JODY could crawl into her bed in her own old bedroom, her grandmother came in to see her. Annabelle’s hair, looking spiky from her own bath, made her appear younger than her years. She had on a pretty mauve bathrobe with a matching nightgown underneath, and brought a familiar creamy scent of soap and lotion into the room with her, which took Jody back to the days when her grandmother got into bed with her and they read together until one or the other of them fell asleep. Annabelle was always gone in the morning, but there had definitely been times when she had been the one to kiss the cheek of a sleeping grandmother instead of the other way around. It must have been hard, she often thought, to have to raise a young child when you had believed those days were over for you.

“May I come in?”

“Of course!” Jody patted the bed beside her. “Come sit with me.”

After Annabelle did that, she said, “Dearest, I want to ask something of you that may be hard for you.” She paused and then said a most unexpected thing: “Please try not to hate Billy Crosby’s son.”

“What?”

“Everyone seems to be so angry at Collin, but really, none of these years have been easy for him, either. All I can think of is that little boy, so diligently doing his homework in the grocery store while his mother worked. He probably loves his father and missed him as much as you love and miss your father.”

Jody remembered what she’d seen and heard outside of Bailey’s.

“I don’t know, Grandma,” she said with some skepticism.

Annabelle, not catching the doubt in her voice, continued, “It’s only natural he’d want to get his father out of prison. I think we can only admire the grit it took for Collin to put himself through college and then law school in order to help his father.”

Her grandmother was a great admirer of grit.

“You’re too good, Grandma.”

“No, I just know that children want to believe in their parents.”

“In that case, I need to ask you something.”

“All right.”

“Just a little while ago, Uncle Chase called my mother spoiled, stuck-up, and mean. Is that true? Was she?”

“Oh, honey.” Annabelle took one of her hands to hold. “I’m sorry Chase said that to you. She was young, that’s all.”

“It’s true then, isn’t it? You haven’t said it wasn’t true.”

Her grandmother sighed. “Laurie may have been a tiny bit selfish, but she took good care of you, and your father loved her very much.”

“Did I?”

“Did you love her? Of course, you did! You adored both of your parents.”

This time it was Jody who let out a big sigh. “Okay. I’m glad.”

Annabelle put an arm around her, hugged her, and kissed her hair. “Do you think you can sleep tonight?”

“I think so, can you?”

“I won’t get a good night’s sleep until that man is out of Rose again.” Annabelle got up from the bed, but then turned around to look down at Jody. “You know, I hardly ever listen to the radio when I’m driving, but today for some reason I turned it on. There was a song I’d never heard before, and I believe the idea of it was that a young mother was singing to her child. I’ve forgotten the words, but they had something to do with keeping her baby safe. When I heard that, I had to pull over to the shoulder because I couldn’t see for crying. I must have cried for half an hour before I could drive again.”