LITMIR.BIZ

      Hands damp on the wheel, Becca turned her Jetta off the two-lane road that wound through shaggy fields of brush and headed toward the gravel drive that led first through a copse of trees, then split a tended field, and ended at the gray two-story farmhouse with various and sundry outbuildings behind it.

      Lights were on and the front porch was lit from inside lamps. Becca parked her car to one side, took a deep breath, and stripping the keys from the ignition, told herself it was now or never. Out of the Jetta, she walked across a patch of gravel and up three wide wooden steps to the porch. Memories assailed her, though she found the old swing where she’d sat with Hudson was missing. She glanced toward the fields and the solitary willow tree with its drooping branches.

      She felt an ache in her heart, a shifting deep inside. How many times had they made love there? Ten? Twenty? More? She remembered kissing Hudson, his lips hot, his hands, pressed against her spine, strong and large.

      “Oh, Lord,” she whispered, shaking the image.

      The front door was inset with a rectangle of beveled glass, and she could see right down the hall. She rang the bell, which tolled somberly inside the house.

      Hudson came into view, striding toward the door, his long legs eating up the length of oak planks that led from the rear. In a moment he was opening the door to her.

      “You made it.”

      “Like riding a bike.”

      “Doesn’t seem that long, does it?”

      “Nope,” she admitted as he stepped out of the way, and she crossed the old threshold, looking around. Some changes she noticed right away: the aroma of Hudson’s father’s beloved cigars was gone. But his mother’s furniture remained in all its floral glory.

      Becca found herself smiling.

      “What?” he asked.

      “Just remembering,” she said with a gesture around the room as she shrugged out of her coat.

      He hung it over a curved arm of the hall tree that stood at the base of the stairs, then glanced around, seeing the room through her eyes before leading her to the kitchen where the wood stove and television shouted that this was clearly the heart of the home. “One of these days I’ll change things,” he said.

      “Why?”

      He laughed. “Oh, I dunno. Maybe it’s time to jettison out of the seventies. Would you like some wine?” he asked, heading toward the kitchen while Becca cruised slowly behind him, taking in the house.

      “How about one of those,” she said, hitching her chin toward the empty bottle resting near the sink.

      “Huh.” A girl after his own heart. Always…

      He reached into the refrigerator, popped open a longneck for each of them, then returned to the table, turning the chair around to straddle it backward. Becca smiled to herself. Just like he had in his teens. It was as if sixteen years slipped away as their conversation drifted into small talk. He asked her about her job and she told him a bit about the kind of work she did, then inquired about the ranch. He mentioned that he’d just hired a new foreman and that he’d given up what sounded like a successful real estate career to enjoy the fruits of his labor on these sprawling acres located near the foothills of the Coast Range.

      When there was a lull, Hudson rolled his nearly empty bottle between his palms, then looked up and said, “Okay, now that that’s out of the way, tell me what you’re really thinking.”

      “About?” Becca asked cautiously.

      “Jessie. The bones. The meeting with our longtime…friends…”

      “Do I have to?”

      He shot her an indulgent look, then she watched the amusement fall from his face. “I think she died right there. In the maze. And I think someone killed her. It’s not like whoever it was had a heart attack, happened to fall into a hole at St. Lizzie’s, then was somehow inexplicably buried.”

      “But it doesn’t have to be Jessie.”

      “Seems the most likely answer.”

      “I don’t know…”

      “You think she’s alive.”

      Becca took a swallow from her Budweiser. “No. I guess I’m assuming she’s dead like everyone else, except Tamara, though she might be waffling a bit. I guess I just don’t really want it to be, though I can’t think of another explanation why Jessie would leave her parents wondering what happened to her, worrying about her, if she were still alive. Twenty years is a long time to be missing. Renee definitely believes those are Jessie’s bones.”

      Hudson’s eyebrows slammed together. “You talked to Renee?”

      “We had a drink together.”

      “Really?” Obviously this was out of left field for him. “Because you’re such good buds?”

      “Because of Jessie and this mess.”

      “She tell you about Tim? The separation.”

      “A little. Mostly we talked about Jessie and our feelings about her.”

      “Huh.” Hudson finished his beer and set it down on the table. “She didn’t try to convert you to the Tarot?” he asked dryly.

      “She tried. I resisted.”

      Hudson gazed into Becca’s eyes and a smile teased his lips. “I’ve…missed you,” he said slowly.

      Becca felt the backs of her eyes burn and she had to look down at her beer. She was not going to embarrass herself. Not. “So, you think Jessie was murdered and left in that grave?”

      “I think she ran into—trouble—and she died because of it. She’s never contacted me,” he added. “Maybe I’m giving myself too much credit, but I always thought she would, if she were alive.”

      “You never thought she ran away?”

      “Oh, sure. At first. I didn’t want to believe she was totally gone, and I sure as hell didn’t want to believe any of McNally’s theories. And I didn’t want any of us to be involved,” he added as an afterthought.

      “But now…?” she asked, a sense of dread crawling up her spine. “Do you think one of the kids who went to St. Lizzie’s is involved?”

      “I hope not.”

      But he sounded like he were trying to convince himself. “So, what if it’s not Jessie?” Becca asked. “I mean…what if it really is someone else?”

      “Then who is it? And where the hell is Jessie? What’s she been doing? What kind of life did she make for herself? Can you see her married? Having children? Living a normal life?”

      “That would be a leap.”

      “Was she as different as I remember?” Hudson suddenly asked,

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