Lindsay found Max in the stable. He was working hard, sweat soaking the shoulders and armpits of his shirt. He offered her a weak grin as she walked through the open door.

"Hi, Max."

"You haven't been here in a long time."

"Too long," she admitted, watching as each horse buried a velvet-soft nose into the loose hay. Teeth ground, dust swirled, and the familiar scents of horsehide, dung, sweat and dry hay brought back memories of her youth.

"Martina called you."

"Yes."

"She don't like me livin' in Alex's house."

"It's not Alex's house."

"His room." Max shrugged and threw his shoulders into his task, forking hay into the manger.

She reached forward and petted a black horse. The horse snorted and shook his head, dark eyes bright with an inner fire.

"I should be down here. With the horses."

"Would you like that better?"

He nodded, held her gaze a second longer than was comfortable and began working again. She remembered how often she'd found him staring. At her. At Abbi.

"I'm sure Dad would reconsider. He just wants you to be happy." And Martina would be relieved. She'd already bent Lindsay's ear, sounded nearly hysterical at the thought of Max being in the home.

"Alex won't like me in his room. Uh-uh." He worried his lip between his teeth.

"Alex moved out a long time ago. He lives with Kaya and the girls on the other side of the property. He won't bother you."

Max didn't seem convinced, and Lindsay leaned against one of the support beams.

"You found a wallet in the ashes of the fire."

Max bit his lip harder and scooped up the loose strands of hay with a pitchfork.

"Whose wallet was it?"

"I didn't steal it!"

"I know, but it belonged to someone."

Max looked at the floor, but his eyes were restless, his gaze moving quickly over the dusty cement, as if trailing swift little rats scurrying the shadows.

"Whose was it?" she repeated.

"The man's," he said, worrying his lip.

"What man?"

"They call him John."

"The man who died in the fire?"

Nodding, Max turned away from Lindsay and hung the pitchfork on the wall next to the shovel. Horses shifted and chewed, rustling hay, grinding teeth, snorting loudly. The stable was hot and flies buzzed near the windows. Higher up in the rafters, wasps were busy crawling into their paper nests.

Lindsay's heart was pounding so loudly, she was certain Max could hear it. Running the fingers of both hands through his hair, he leaned against the wall and blinked rapidly.

"You know the guy was, don't you?" Lindsay whispered.

Max shook his head so violently, spittle flung from his mouth.

"You do."

"No!"

Slowly, she advanced on him. "Max?"

His jaw worked and his eyes bulged. "It weren't nobody from around here and it weren't Andy. Swear to God, L.K, it weren't Andy."

Despair and certainty touched her heart with cold, cruel fingers. "I didn't ask you if it was Andy," she said, her insides trembling as Max half-ran out of the barn. The sun was intense, heat waves rising from the earth, no breath of a breeze offering any kind of relief.

Max headed through a gate to the curve of Lost Dog Creek to the willow tree where Lindsay had played as a child, where'd she seen Alex making out with a dark-haired girl, where Andy had caught her beneath the leafy swaying branches.

Plopping down on a flat rock, Max stared into the thin stream of water that wandered down an otherwise bone-dry chasm. He didn't look over his shoulder when he sensed her presence.

"It happened here. In this creek," he said suddenly, his voice choked. "That's why I got so stupid."

"You're not--"

"I am! I know what they say. 'Dumb as a door nail . . . doesn't know his ass from a hole in the ground . . . half-brain . . . stupid son of a bitch . . . retard. I know, L.K."

An ache burned deep in her heart. She reached for his shoulder, but he shrugged her off.

"You know I'm your sister."

"I don't see how."

"Our father is the same."

"I'm too stupid to know."

"It's . . . It's like the horses, Max. You know that one stallion can be with a lot of different mares, and--"

"People can't be horses, L.K. I'm not that dumb!"

"It doesn't matter how it works anyway, and don't believe what everyone says. They're the stupid ones."

She knelt beside him and he sniffed loudly, his eyes red and blinking, though he wouldn't cry. He'd learned long ago to keep his emotions inside.

"Tell me about Andy. Why was he here with Ashley?"

Max shook his head. "Don't know."

"But you saw him?"

"I was at the mill." He swallowed hard. "I saw Ashley and a man."

"Andy?"

Rubbing his now furiously, as if the motion might make him concentrate, Max scowled. "It was dark."

"But you saw him."

Max quit moving altogether as he thought.

"What were you doing there?"

"Watchin'."

"For what?"

"Dunno."

Turning to face her, he said, "I always watch. I watch you. I watch Ashley. I watched Abbi,"

Standing, he strode to the trees and pointed upward, past the first split of branches to an old limb. "See here--I seen this, too."

"What?" she asked, squinting against the sun as the drooping branches rustled into the breeze.

Shadows played upon the ground and her eyes adjusted slowly. Then she saw it; a heart carved deep into the bark of the tree. Abbi's name was hewn across the heart and Lindsay remembered sitting here beneath this very tree while Andy, fingering a jackknife, had talked to her. With a tug on her heart, she wondered if he'd chiseled her sister's name into the thick branch.

"Didn't know it was there, did ya?"

"No, I've never noticed it."

"'Cause you ain't been watchin'."

"What else did you see, Max?" she asked and he just stared at her, his green eyes blank.

When he smiled, she felt the wind pick up. "Everything."

He stared at her so long, goosebumps rose on her flesh. She saw shadows race through his eyes. Dark, knowing shadows. Finally, he looked away then turned and stared back to the stable.

"I see everything," he repeated, and his whisper was like the soft smell of doom.

---

The rest of the afternoon, Lindsay worked at the paper. Half the time she'd spent avoiding Bill Laszlo, who had called her several times at home and cornered her twice in the office. Currently, he was hovering again.

"'No comment' won't do," he warned.

"I have nothing more to say."

"Even though our friendly John Doe died?" He leaned a slim hip against the edge of her desk.

"I'm sorry he's dead."

"Your husband didn't say anything."

"He barely talks. His jaw is still wired shut. At least for a few more days."

"Isn't that convenient?"

"Painful is what it is."

"Well, what can you say about Eva Biersack taking a hike right out of the lobby of Northwest General?"

"I was with her and I'm worried about her, and anyone who has seen her should contact me. I assume you'll put that in your piece, won't you? Where to call if she's located?"

He clucked his tongue and looked up at the ceiling. "You're stonewalling me, Lindsay."

"I don't have anymore to give."

He scratched his arm and frowned at the ceiling tiles. "You know, I've been pretty patient with you because we're really on the same team."

"Same team? Save that speech for someone who hasn't heart it a million times, will ya, Bill?"

"Give it a rest, Laszlo." Selma fished into the bottom of her purse and dug out a pack of Virginia Slims. "You know you were a lot more friendly when you smoked. Want to join me on the back porch with the rest of the gang?"

"You're killing yourself."

"I'll quit someday. Maybe I'll take up running, too, and tell everyone else what they should do with their lives."

"I'll come with you," Lindsay said.

"You don't smoke!" Bill was aghast.

"Not yet, but maybe I'll have to take it up so that you'll quit badgering me."

"Badgering you?" A wounded expression converged over his even features. "Hey, you know all about this job."

Selma threw out a hip, and the gauzy fabric of her skirt swung just above her knees. "Look, I need a hit. Are we going to argue or go outside and have a laugh or two?"

Lindsay needed a laugh. Or two. Or six hundred. Ever since the fire, she'd been wound tighter than a watch spring, her nerves so tight she could barely sleep at night. Grabbing her purse, she left the computer humming and Bill muttering under his breath. They stopped at the machine for a couple of sodas, then continued on their mission.

Outside, the sun was still beating down, and a few other employees were enjoying a break. "The Coke and smoke crowd," Selma said as she offered Lindsay a cigarette.

Lindsay shook her head and flipped the top of her Cherry Coke. "I don't think this is the time to take up another vice."

"Didn't know you had any." Selma struck a match and drew on her filter tip.

"Secret vices."

"Don't tell Bill. They'll all be exposed in the next edition."

"And I'll get a sermon."

"Amen," Selma said, laughing.

Other employees joined them and the talk covered the next election, baseball, complaints about married life, jokes about single life and inevitably the fire. By the time they returned to their desks, Bill had given up his vigil and Lindsay finished two articles, one on possible new funding measures for schools, the other on one of the gubernatorial candidates.

She hurried out of the office, glad to be able to go home for the evening. Except she had to face Ashley. At the thought, her stomach churned. How much longer could she keep up the charade? How long before the inevitable, that one of them moved out, occurred? She hoped to hold the marriage together until Ashley was recovered, until the mystery surrounding the fire was solved, until she was certain that there was no chance for them.

Had there ever been one?

Had they ever truly loved each other?

A part of her cried out to be his wife, but then she remembered their last argument, the one that had simmered for days, then sparked on the day of the fire, and she knew that it was only a matter of time until they agree to part company forever. And then what?

She climbed into the Jeep, rolled down the windows and started driving. Her future stretched out before her like an empty road across a desert--endless pavement leading to an unknown destination, the mirage of wedded bliss an illusion, the ribbon of highway desolate and lonely.

"Oh, stop it," she told herself.

This was no way to act. Like a maudlin fool. She needed to find some answers, that was all--to get to the bottom of the fire as well as the last one, and the first person she had to deal with would help her, whether he wanted to or not.

It was time to have it out with her husband.

Notes

Hi!

Yes, as my present to all of my readers, and also an apology for not updating in about two weeks, I published 3 new chapters. I hope and am glad if you're enjoying my story! Thank you!!! <3