As they walked up past the barn, it started to rain again. Winona felt the cool drops hit her face, blur her vision, but they didn’t walk faster. They were local girls, tougher than a little rain.
Inside the cottage, Winona took off her coat and heels and sat down on the sofa in the living room. It had been a long time since they’d been in a room together, she and Vivi Ann. Just the two of them. Since the filing of the petition, probably. Winona understood why: Vivi Ann was too fragile to talk about the proceedings and too invested in the outcome to talk about anything else, so she stayed away from Winona. As she’d done for years, Vivi Ann buried her fear and sorrow and pain in the rich brown arena dirt and kept going.
Vivi Ann stared out the window at the falling rain. The window reflected her face, softening it into a watery smile. The gentle pattering noise on the roof substituted for conversation. Winona could have let it go, said nothing and just listened to this familiar symphony, but she couldn’t stand it.
“I should have taken Dallas’s case in the first place, Vivi,” she said. She’d been waiting for a chance to say it.
“That’s old news, Win.”
“I’m sorry at how much the new petition has upset you, you have to know that.”
“But not sorry you took the case on?”
“How can I be sorry for that?”
Vivi Ann turned at last. “How is it that you’re always so damned certain of yourself? Even when you’re wrong.”
“Me, certain?” Winona laughed. “You must be kidding.”
“You go into the china shop like a bull every time.”
Winona looked at her sister, seeing the vulnerability in her eyes, the pain. “And I break everything. That’s what you’re thinking, isn’t it?”
“No,” Vivi Ann said, but it wasn’t the answer in her eyes.
Before Winona could reply, her cell phone rang. She pulled it out of her coat pocket and saw that it was her office. “This is Winona.”
The cottage door burst open and Noah ran inside, his clothes splattered with rain, his hair wet, his backpack dragging on the floor beside him. “Aunt Winona’s car—”
“Shoes,” Vivi Ann said tiredly.
Noah dropped his backpack and kicked his big shoes off; they flew into the dining room, hit the wall, and thudded to the floor. “Did we hear something?”
Winona held up her hand for silence, listening to Lisa on the phone. “Thanks,” she said finally, and hung up.
“Well?” Noah demanded.
Winona’s heart was beating so fast she felt light-headed. “They granted our motion,” she said, rising in anticipation. “They’re going to test the DNA sample found at the crime scene.”
Noah let out a whoop of joy. “I knew it! You did it, Aunt Win.”
“We did it,” she said, still a little unable to believe it.
“Tell him,” Vivi Ann said in a voice as cold and brittle as a sheet of ice. She was clutching the sofa table tightly.
“Tell him what?” Winona asked, frowning.
“The thousand things that can go wrong from here. Don’t you dare let him go to bed thinking this was easy and dreaming of what he’ll say to Dallas when he’s free.”
Winona wanted to take her wounded sister in her arms and comfort her the way she used to, so long ago. Instead, she gentled her voice. “Let him enjoy his victory.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about. But congratulations,” she said. “Dallas is lucky to have you.” Then she walked past them, went into her bedroom, and slammed the door.
“Ignore her,” Noah said. “Everything either pisses her off or makes her cry these days. It’s pathetic. So if the DNA isn’t Dad’s, they’ll let him come home, right?”
“It’s not certain like that. Just a chance.”
“You mean he could still end up staying in prison for life? Even if it’s not his DNA?”