His thoughts went to the time when he and Annie and Seamus were just little kids, taking their fishing poles to the river. Seamus’s folks had a cotton farm in those days. Annie’s mama and daddy ran a little grocery store. Zed’s daddy was a handyman around the area and his mama was the cook at the school. Then the area got dug out and flooded for the lake, and Annie’s daddy hired Zed’s daddy and mama both to work for him full-time.

Looking back, he knew that he’d fallen in love with Joanna—or Annie, as everyone already called her—when they were too young to even go to school. But in those days a man of color could get himself strung up for even looking at a blonde girl like Annie. So they’d all played together, and when they graduated from high school, she’d married Seamus. And Zed had gone straight into the army.

Seamus Clancy was his friend right up until the day he died. Zed missed him like a limb.

But Zedekiah Williamson had never stopped loving Annie.

CHAPTER EIGHT

The phone rang five times, quit, and then rang five more before Zed finally grabbed it from the wall and grumpily said, “Hello?”

“Hello, Zed. This is Mrs. Johnson from the Frankston School. Could I speak to Dana, please?”

“She’s busy in the store. What can I help you with? Need reservations for Sunday?” Zed asked.

“No, sir. I need to speak to Dana about Brook,” she answered.

“Is she sick?”

“I just need to talk to her mother, please,” Mrs. Johnson said.

“Is she alive?”

“Yes, she is.”

“We’ll be there in ten minutes.” Zed hung up and called Flora in the laundry room. “Go to the store and tell Dana to meet me out front of it in two minutes. We’ve got to go to the school, so I need you to mind the store while we are gone.”

“Will do,” Flora said.

Dana was standing in front of the store when he arrived. The expression on her face said that she was every bit as worried as he was. He’d promised Annie that he’d take care of the sisters as long as he could. That meant every one of them.

“What’s happening? Is Brook all right? Is she hurt? What kind of trouble is she in? She’s never been in trouble at school before in her life,” Dana said as she crawled into his twenty-year-old truck.

“Mrs. Johnson wouldn’t tell me, but I didn’t want you to go alone,” he said.

“Thanks,” Dana whispered.

He made it in eight minutes and would have arrived there sooner if he hadn’t gotten behind a poky old woman who didn’t have anyplace to go and a year to get there. He was grumbling and praying both as he parked his truck.

Zed beat Dana to the door and practically jogged down the hallway to the office. Didn’t even knock on the principal’s door but barged right in and heaved a sigh of relief when he saw Brook sitting in a chair without a mark on her. He put his hands on the desk and looked Mrs. Johnson right in the eye.

“What is this all about?”

Dana stopped and laid an arm around her daughter’s shoulders. “What’s going on, Brook?”

“I do not use, buy, or sell drugs,” Brook said with a stiff upper lip. “But no one will believe me because I’m the new girl and they don’t know me.”

Zed whipped around and nodded seriously. “I believe you, child.” Then just as quick, he was staring down the principal. “Now you’d best tell me what happened.”

“Brook came to us with exemplary records, but when the drug dogs came in for a random check today, they hit on her purse and we found marijuana in it,” the principal said.

“There must be a mistake,” Dana gasped.

Zed backed up and sat in the chair next to Brook. “Want to tell me where you got it?”

“It’s not mine,” she said, reddening to her hair part. “I don’t do drugs. Mama would ground me until I was fifty if she caught me with any kind of drug, even marijuana.”

“Then how did it get in your purse?” Dana asked. “You’ve got to know that—and probably who put it there.”

Brook shrugged.

Zed turned back to the principal. “How much did she have?”

“A bagful, enough to get her expelled from school and likely put in jail.”

Zed laid a hand on her shoulder. “Who are you protecting?”

“I’m not a rat,” she said.

“Well then, I guess you’d better expel her from school and we’ll take her on home. Her mama and aunts can homeschool her. Smart as she is, I expect that she can get her work done in a couple of hours every evening and work through the daytime in the laundry with Flora. We can use the help.” Zed’s hand dropped into his lap.

“No!” Brook squealed.

“Brook Clancy, you had better start tellin’ me right now what you know.” Dana’s tone didn’t leave a bit of wiggle room. “This can ruin your chances for college. It will be a mark on your record for the rest of your life. Start talking.”

There were several awkward moments during which Brook was no doubt weighing the pros and cons. On one hand she would be cut off from the social aspect of school. On the other she wouldn’t have to be branded a drug dealer. Finally she raised her head.