“No. My brother was.” I didn’t elaborate and didn’t intend to.

She was quiet for a minute, taking in that word—was. When I spoke of Brent to someone unfamiliar with his story, which was rare because I didn’t speak of him at all if I could help it, a strained moment always passed during which I hoped they’d heard everything that word implied. People could express sympathies all day long and I would nod and accept them, but I didn’t want to discuss the loss of him.

“My mama was too.”

I glanced at her downturned face and wondered if Silva had known this. Of course he had, that sly bastard.

“I got the tattoo on the third anniversary of 9/11, three months after he was killed in action,” I said. “He had the same one.”

“Did you mean to join up too?”

“No. Brent—” Damn if his name spoken aloud didn’t still lance through me. “Brent was the Marine. I was always the grease monkey.”

She smiled faintly. “That’s what my dad calls me. His grease monkey.”

“You’re a monkey all right. A damned ornery monkey.” I was sure she’d have some comeback at the ready—likely one that proved my point—and we’d leave the grim discussion of dead brothers and mothers behind.

“Dad says he’d rather I be cranky all the time than pretend to be happy when I’m not.”

Not exactly the retort I’d expected. I handed her a wrench and pointed to the bolt she needed to tighten.

As she turned it, she said, “My mama got out when she got pregnant with me. Dad’s never told me if she meant to stay out or go back. I think she meant to go back. But then, you know, me. With all this.” She pounded a fist on the arm of the wheelchair and stared at her lap. “She killed herself when I was three. I don’t remember her. But in every picture we have of her, she’s smiling.”

I didn’t know how the hell to respond to that, so I didn’t. I was at a loss for what Silva was thinking, sending this kid to me. I couldn’t fix her. All I could do was give her a job, though working had been a savior of sorts to me once I allowed it to be.

“Congrats, monkey—you just replaced brake pads all by yourself.”

She rolled her eyes. “It’s not like I’ve never done it before.”

“Ever gotten paid to do it?” I shot back.

She blinked and her mouth quirked a little on one side.

“Don’t waste time being smug. Get to work on the next one.”

• • • • • • • • • •

The mattress delivery was scheduled for Wednesday, so I slapped a coat of paint on the walls of Pearl’s bedroom Tuesday evening while she was at work. That room hadn’t been painted since ever. When she came home, I heard her rummaging for something to eat in the kitchen, washing up in the bathroom, and finally opening the creaky door to that bedroom across the trailer. I’d left a window up for ventilation, but the searing fumes had snuck under the door anyhow.

“You painted the bedroom?” she asked the next morning when I came in from lifting. She hadn’t yet moved from her spot on the sofa. She usually got up about the time I grabbed a final cup of coffee before heading out to the garage. In her little sleep-rumpled T-shirt and shorts—with nothing, I knew now, underneath—she’d stand there folding the sheets and stacking them on the end of the sofa while I fought the urge to cross the room, pull her to my lap and kiss her until she begged me to lay her down.

I stopped halfway to the bathroom, fists clenched tight. “Reckon it needed it.” I’d driven my muscles to fatigue not ten minutes ago, and it had done nothing to stem the want of her. “The mattress should be delivered later today. I forgot to buy sheets, but I have an extra set you can use.”

Just when I was calling myself ten kinds of dumbass for setting her up with a bedroom when I wanted her back in my bed, she said, “Thank you, Boyce.”

“Yep.”

I was a patient man. I’d survived being beat and cussed and outlived the asshole who did his damnedest to make every day of my life a living hell. I’d withstood being branded a troublemaker when all I wanted was to be invisible. I’d done what I had to do and refused to sweat the nuts and bolts or suffer remorse over what couldn’t be changed. My life was simple. I fished a little and drank a little. I worked hard and I fucked hard. I’d outgrown fighting, but if the situation called for it, I could put a boot in someone’s ass they’d never forget.

I was a man who’d loved this girl from the moment she’d come back to life and saw no one but me. Now she was closer than she’d ever been, right when I was on the verge of losing everything I’d spent years building and becoming. It was the cruelest switch life had ever thrown at me.

• • • • • • • • • •

Just after the delivery truck showed up, I got a call from Barney Amos, who didn’t beat around the bush this time. “Boyce, I traced your mama to Amarillo, where she’s been living for the past twelve years. I got ahold of her an hour ago. She asserts that she and your dad never divorced. Will or no will, disputing her claim wouldn’t be something I’d advise, though you’re welcome to seek other legal counsel.” He sighed heavily. “You’d best start setting up a plan B.”

I pointed the delivery guys to the bedroom and waited until they carried the mattress set inside and out of earshot. “Did she already know about Dad? And Brent?”

“She knew about your brother’s passing, but not Bud.”

I walked out onto the stoop, lit a cigarette, and took a long drag. The sky was too bright and blue for my world to crash and burn today. “Did she ask about me?”

“I told her what a fine young man you’ve become. That you’d been running Wynn’s ever since your dad got sick.” He hadn’t answered the question—not directly, at any rate.

“When’ll she be here?”

“I’m not sure what her circumstances are, and it’s near seven hundred miles there to here. At the soonest, it’ll be a couple days. More’n likely three or four.”

My life was set to blow to hell in somewhere between forty-eight and ninety-six hours. I could almost hear the tick tick tick counting down. This whole shitty scenario hadn’t been real before. Now it was.

By the time I lost Brent, I hadn’t expected to ever see her again. I hadn’t presumed her dead. I’d just presumed her gone, as if she’d vanished into thin air the night she left. I’d spent a year or two pining for her to come back, crying myself to sleep face-first in my pillow so Brent wouldn’t hear. When he left for boot camp, I couldn’t handle the double loss. To survive his absence, I let her go.