Page 63 of Blood Moon

“He never put the seat down?”

She smiled, then said, “I expected monogamy. He didn’t quite grasp the concept.”

In the faithfulness department, he was no one to judge another man. Then again, his first affair had been in retribution for his ex’s second. At that point, there hadn’t been much of a marriage to salvage. Nevertheless, Roslyn’s betrayal had hurt.

He said, “If the guy knew how important that was to you, and he cheated anyway, you’re better off without him.”

She pointed the tines of her fork at him. “Exactly the conclusion I reached minutes before kicking him out.”

“No one since?”

“No one notable.”

“You’ve got plenty of time.” He paused, then asked, “How old are you, anyway?”

“Thirty-three.”

“Damn.” He lowered his chin to his chest and said under his breath, “I knew it.”

“What?”

He sighed. “You’re too old for me.”

She laughed. He laughed. When it subsided, he decided to venture into territory he thought might be restricted. “I was an only child. You?”

The humor in her expression evolved into desolation. She looked down at the tabletop and followed the wood grain with the tip of her index finger. “I had a sister two years younger.”

He noticed she used the past tense. He waited. If she said no more, he wouldn’t push.

After an audible swallow, she said, “I think Dad must’ve been disappointed that one of us wasn’t a boy. But, unlike me, who was studious, actually somewhat of a bookworm, Adele turned out to be an incredible athlete, which dad could better relate to.”

“What sport?”

“Tennis. By middle school, she was playing at a level well beyond her age. Her potential was evident. She truly was amazing.” She looked across at him as though to make her point. “I was proud of her.”

Then she lowered her head again. This time she tinkered with her unused spoon. “Our family life revolved around her lessons and practices, tournaments and elite training camps. My parents’ focus was on her continuing to excel and eventually go pro.”

“Did she?”

“No. She died of a brain tumor. Only three months after it was discovered. She was sixteen. I was a senior in high school.” She looked up at him again and took a swift breath. “It was a rough year.”

“I’m sorry.”

She gave an obligatory nod. “My parents were shattered, especially my dad, who had put so much stock in her future. When I left home to attend LSU, it was like an escape from the shrine to Adele that our house had become. Paradoxically, their grief was a living thing that consumed them.

“A week before I graduated from university, they were found by a concerned neighbor, dead in their bed, lying side by side. Two gunshots. The pistol was in my father’s hand. They called it a murder-suicide. But I believe they’d made a pact. They had nothing to live for.”

“They had you.”

She gave a rueful shrug. “As I said.” Their eyes held until she suddenly pushed back her chair and carried her plate to the sink. “I have dessert. A pint of ice cream, a pint of sorbet. I barely got them here before—”

She broke off when his computer chimed. He almost knocked his chair to the floor as he got up and rushed over. He didn’t even sit down before accessing his email. “Yes!” He smiled over at Beth. “Roberts and Cougar both came through.”

The next few hours were spent reading through the documents, notes, and interview transcripts that had been sent to him. But plowing through the material had yielded nothing that the detectives hadn’t already told him. His initial excitement had fizzled, then died.

For the past half hour, he’d been slouched in his easy chair, staring into near distance, sullen and incommunicative.He’d declined ice cream when she’d offered to dish it up. When Mutt wandered over to him seeking a pat, John had rubbed him behind the ears, but had paid little attention. Mutt had given up and gone to lie down at Beth’s feet.

She’d been browsing through a boring report filed by the detective in Shreveport when she bravely broke an extended, broody silence. “They really do have precious little.”

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