“It is,” Brynne said. For the first time since her return, she felt truly at home.
She belonged right here, in this place, with these people, and knowing that for certain was a powerful blessing. Now she could plant her feet, square her shoulders and go forward into all that awaited her.
There would be joy, and sorrow.
Wins and losses.
All the polarities that make up a human life, fully lived.
And she was ready.
Or, at least, she thought she was.
After speaking with Clay, she put through a call to Davey and Maddie, told them the visit was very much on. Mentally, she bedecked every limb of every maple and oak tree along Main Street in bright yellow ribbons, just for them.
Sara received a text. I’m okay. Honestly. We’ll get together soon.
By then, she’d dealt with everyone in her text list except Eli.
And she didn’t know quite what to say to him.
She couldn’t help wondering if he’d been projecting when he’d told her she wasn’t ready for a relationship. Maybe he wasn’t ready, and hadn’t realized it yet.
Furthermore, as sheriff of Wild Horse County, with two recent deaths on the books, technically unresolved, he was understandably distracted.
On the other hand, he had apologized, and she didn’t want to leave him hanging, if only because she’d been wrong, as well. She’d seen Clay sitting at a table in her restaurant, gone from zero to a hundred in about two seconds and behaved like a hormonal teenager.
So she opened Eli’s text and replied. I’m sorry, too. Let’s step back for a few days—at least until after the Lansing funeral—and then take another run at acting like grown-ups.
Immediately, the small, flickering dots appeared, indicating an imminent response.
Brynne waited.
A smile curved her mouth when his answer came through.
I’m all for acting like grown-ups. Together. But I’ll settle for a fighting chance to get back in your good graces. Text me when I can grovel properly.
Her reply was a single emoji: thumbs-up.
* * *
ELI AND DAN watched the proceedings from the spacious office Alec and Sam shared with Pete Gilford, the funeral director and, conveniently, only son of the local florist. The surveillance cameras were state-of-the-art, taking in the corridors, lab and autopsy room.
These days, of course, there were cameras everywhere, which was mainly a good thing, in most cases. Here, it fell on the side of creepy.
Too bad there were no lenses trained on that vacant lot behind Russ’s motel, where Tiffany Ulbridge had died brutally and far ahead of her time, or the inside of that abandoned barn, where they’d found Freddie Lansing dangling from a rafter.
The shots Dan had found online of that place were all stills—the backpack, the cot, the chinks of sunlight showing through the plank walls.
Eli sighed, realizing he was about to chase yet another white rabbit down yet another hole, and returned his attention to the monitor, and the separate panel—one of several—showing the chapel.
Doris’s tasteful arrangements occupied every tabletop there and in the viewing room, and covered Freddie’s gleaming fiberglass coffin like a blanket of snow.
Most of the folding chairs were filled, though there was a barrier of empty space beside and behind Fred, Sr., and the Mrs.
Eli studied their grieving faces closely, bothered again, as he had been the night he’d gone out to their place and told them what had happened to their only son.
He’d taken Connie’s advice, tried to quit digging and think of other things, but it hadn’t helped. Whatever he was looking for, it was so subtle as to elude the senses, quite possibly a faint impression or subliminal insight.
The community of Painted Pony Creek had really come through for Fred, Sr., and Gretchen, leaving food on their porch, collecting donations for the coffin and burial plot in the town cemetery, showing up for the service.
He spotted Sara, sitting with Eric, Shallie, Cord and J.P.
Brynne came down the aisle, wearing a soft-looking navy blue dress and a white straw hat with a matching band. Fred, Sr., turned in his seat to glare at her, and she nodded politely, taking a seat beside Eric.
Other locals trailed in—Miranda, a longtime fixture at Bailey’s and in the town in general. Deputy Amos Edwards and his wife, Alec and Sam Wu and Alec’s physician daughter, Marisol.
Ranchers and farmers came, along with a contingent from Sully’s Bar and Grill and even a half dozen of the thugs Freddie had hung out with at the pinnacle of his criminal career, such as it was.
Most of these people were there out of simple kindness, not affection for Freddie, his memory or his parents. At least a few had come for a whole different reason—to see for themselves that young Mr. Lansing was in the box.
Not that the casket was open. Freddie wasn’t looking his best these days; the flowers, in Eli’s opinion, might well be there to hold the lid down.
Once again, he returned his attention to Fred, Sr., and Gretchen.
They looked sad, no doubt about that.
They also looked angry.
Fury buzzed around them, a discernible vibration, nearly audible.
Mr. Lansing’s face was ravaged with grief, wet with tears he probably wasn’t aware of shedding, but he exuded hatred. Gretchen looked even angrier, but her eyes were dry, focused like lasers on her son’s casket.
Maybe she’d already cried all the tears she had inside her.
Whatever state she was in, Eli wouldn’t have been surprised if she leaped to her feet, whirled on the gathering of dutifully sympathetic folks and screeched at them like a banshee. She must have known, after all, that they weren’t there because they missed Freddie; they’d come because it was the right thing, the kind thing, to do.
Given the boy’s track record, it was hard to imagine how Gretchen—or her husband—could expect anything more.
And there he went again, expecting folks like them to be reasonable.
Never gonna happen.
“I’m going to be real glad when this is over,” Dan said, without looking away from the monitor. His eyes moved constantly from one panel to another. “Those are two of the worst people I’ve ever run across—and that, my friend, is saying something—but damned if I don’t feel sorry as hell for them.”
“I know what you mean,” Eli agreed. His gaze had strayed back to Brynne; she was stunningly beautiful, even in the gloomy light of a funeral home chapel, and the sight of her was soothing. Just by being there, she tamed something wild inside him, something reckless and primitive.