Night Road

“What would have been the point?” she said to him. “I thought we’d be better off if we just forgot each other. And those first two years in prison were … hard. ”

“I used to think about you all the time. ”

Used to. She swallowed hard, shrugged.

He touched her upper arm in a tentative, careful way, as if he were afraid she would either break or scream, or maybe he thought she wouldn’t want him so close. She stood there, staring up at him, realizing with a start that she wanted him to kiss her.

Fool.

She stumbled back from him, needing distance between them. She’d been an idiot to get this close. From the moment they’d met, she’d given him her heart. How could she not have learned anything after all that had happened? “You let me go to prison,” she said to remind herself who he really was.

“I had no choice. ”

“Believe me, Zach, you’ve always had choices. I’m the one who didn’t. ” She took a deep breath and looked up at this boy—man—she’d loved from the first time she saw him, and the pain of their past was overwhelming. “I want Grace,” she said evenly. “I filed the papers today. ”

“I know you hate me,” he said. “But don’t do that to Grace. She won’t understand. I’m all she has. ”

“No,” Lexi said. “That’s not true anymore. ” She heard a car drive up, tires spin on gravel, and she had no doubt about who had arrived.

Jude. Sweeping in to save her son and granddaughter from terrible Lexi.

“Good-bye, Zach,” Lexi said, turning away.

“Lexi, wait. ”

“No, Zach,” she said without looking at him. “I’ve waited long enough. ”

* * *

Jude was shaking as she strapped Grace into her car seat.

“Ow, Nana!”

“Sorry,” Jude mumbled. A headache had spiked behind her eyes, and she could hardly see. She texted Miles to get home ASAP and then climbed into the driver’s seat. But she couldn’t go home. Lexi knew where they lived.

“How come I’m goin’ home early, Nana?” Grace said from the backseat. “Was I bad again?”

Home. That was it.

She drove—too fast—to Zach’s cabin and parked beside his truck. Once there, she took Grace in her arms and hurried inside, slamming the door shut behind her.

The sliding glass door was open. The whole place smelled of the beach at low tide. Zach stood on the deck, looking out at the Sound.

Jude carried Grace into her bedroom and put her down on her bed. Handing her a well-worn copy of Green Eggs and Ham, she said, “Read this for just a minute, okay? I have to tell your daddy something, and I’ll be right back. ”

Jude left the room and closed the door behind her. Then she went out to the deck and approached her son. She could tell by his stance—his shoulders rounded in defeat, his hands plunged deep in his pockets—what had happened. She hadn’t gotten here in time. “Lexi was here,” she said bitterly.

“Yes. ”

“She wants another chance, but we don’t get one. Mia will always be gone. I can’t look at the girl who killed her every day. ”

Zach looked at her. “Grace is her daughter, Mom. ”

The simplicity of that made Jude catch her breath. She felt suddenly as if she were hurtling toward a precipice, as if they all were. It scared her to her bones; in the past years, they’d healed just enough to survive. They couldn’t go through it again.

She’d watched from a distance as her immature, coltish boy had become a man. Grief had shattered him; fatherhood had put him back together.

She flipped open her cell phone and called the friend who had been their lawyer for years. “Bill. Jude Farraday. The girl who killed Mia is out of prison, and she’s filed a petition to get custody of Grace … tomorrow? Great. See you then. ” Jude hung up the phone.