or the kids.
The music started in time with her tears. She sank into Ben’s recliner and let them wash over her. And she didn’t even know what she was crying for beyond a general sense of loss, and a feeling of guilt that had dogged her steps since the moment CJ Baxter returned to town. At some point the tears turned into prayers, and a while after that the prayers turned into a peace that was like détente.
When the CD ended after sixty-six minutes, she didn’t notice.
The clouds kept the moon from dispensing all but the most meager light, and most of what might have fallen regardless was caught up in the tree branches, which seemed to soak up the illumination, even though their leaves had draped the cold ground below them.
Graham, though, didn’t need the moon’s help to find this spot.
He was cold, even in the heavy coat he wore, which was one of the ways that age left its mark. Even ten years ago he wouldn’t have felt the weather. Now the wetness of the woods got up into him, made his back ache.
It seemed appropriate, because this was the spot where Eddie had died.
The night was quiet except for a light wind that whistled through the hollow trunk of a tree behind him, and a lone owl that called from what could have been any direction.
Graham’s feet had found the spot, as they always did, until he was like a tree rooted to the earth. Or like a migrant bird that always returned to the same branch when the season changed.
He wasn’t overly sentimental, nor was he prone to harbor guilt for something that was long past—a quarter century past. But he was susceptible to introspection, to weighing how the contents of a single instant could so drastically alter the courses of several lives. And Graham was well aware of how the ripples from that day had reached shores more distant than he could have anticipated.
“I’m sorry you’re dead, Eddie,” Graham said.
The woods took the words and swallowed them up, and if either they or Eddie was inclined to grant any kind of forgiveness, they kept it to themselves.
Chapter 23
Of all the things that should have occupied CJ’s attention, there was only one that wouldn’t leave him alone while he finished his toast. Perhaps it was because, of all the other things he could have pondered, the one he chose to obsess over was also the one that had the least to do with him. The problem, though, was that the man responsible for the puzzle, and who sat next to him chewing on a piece of bacon, remained inscrutable on the subject.
“Oh, honey,” Maggie tsked at him. “I think you’re just going to have to accept the fact that he’s not all there.” She was walking by with a plate of food as she said it and she patted Dennis’s hand affectionately.
Dennis, who didn’t seem at all put out by the comment, took a sip of coffee and said, “She’s p-probably right.”
CJ was starting to suspect that was the only answer that made sense. After all, why would a multimillionaire still live with his parents, drive a beat-up Chevy truck, and bounce between low-paying, labor-intensive jobs? It wasn’t any of CJ’s business, but for some reason the question wouldn’t leave him alone.
He decided that he needed to find a new tactic, something to get Dennis to spill his guts. But before he had a chance to formulate one, the bell on the front door gave an emphatic jingle.
It wasn’t until he heard a few of the regulars snicker that CJ turned and saw Artie. During his short time in Adelia, CJ had pieced together enough to know that Maggie did, indeed, carry some kind of torch for CJ’s boss, and that it had something to do with the senior prom, although the details on the exact nature of the relationship were a bit hazy. What that told CJ was that Artie wasn’t entirely clueless regarding her affections, and that whatever it was that normally kept him out of the eatery had nothing to do with the food.
Artie stood in the doorway, scanning the crowd until he found his employee at the counter. Artie didn’t make it more than a few steps before CJ understood that something was wrong.
“What’s the matter, boss?” CJ asked.
Up close, it was obvious that Artie was agitated. He glanced around the restaurant, his eyes lingering for just a moment on Maggie, who