I stared at her.

Mom stared at her.

Dad stared at her.

“Leon’s my dead husband,” Shirleen explained. “He’s better off dead. He was a mean sonovabitch. Two days after they put him in the ground I redecorated the entire house then went on a cruise. Do you know how much food they serve on those cruises? Food everywhere, al the time.

I even got me a piece of my own personal Isaac, you know, from The Love Boat? He was a cruise ship bartender and Jamaican. Don’t remember his name but he was nice to Shirleen, real nice. I gave him a tip he’l never forget,” then she laughed so hard, her entire body shook with it.

Mom, Dad and I just kept staring at her. Then, Mom shuffled up close to Hank and I. “Are you sure you want to move to Denver?” she whispered.

I looked at Hank.

He ran the tips of his fingers lightly along the edge of my He ran the tips of his fingers lightly along the edge of my dress at the smal of my back.

A shiver went along my skin.

I nodded to Mom. “I’m sure.”

She sighed. I noticed hers wasn’t as happy as mine had been.

“Maybe we should mingle,” Jet suggested, noticing that we had become the center of attention for the entire room.

“That’s a good idea,” Indy agreed.

“Where’s this secret VIP buffet, that’s what I wanna know. I’m starved,” Dad asked loudly, causing some of the other guests’ subtle stares to become a lot less subtle.

“Herb, keep your voice down,” Mom whispered, also loudly.

“I’l show you, Mr. Logan,” Daisy offered, not in the least upset that her secret buffet was outed by my Dad. “Right this way.”

Daisy, Mom and Dad peeled off and Marcus moved close to Hank and I while everyone wandered away. “We need to talk,” Marcus said to Hank.

It was clear by the look on his face and the tensing of Hank’s body that Marcus wasn’t proposing idle, party chitchat.

Hank nodded once, then his hand drifted up my back to between my shoulder blades and he curled me to him, front-to-front. I tilted my head back and his face was as serious as Marcus’s.

“I’l be a minute,” he said.

I nodded.

“Keep Lee, Eddie or Carl in sight. Got me?”

“Keep Lee, Eddie or Carl in sight. Got me?” I nodded again.

His hand went away from my back and he ran a finger down my jaw, then he and Marcus were gone.

“I see you sorted some of your man troubles,” Shirleen noted. She was standing beside me but watching Marcus and Hank move through the big room.

I noticed Lee, Eddie and Carl watching Hank too. After Hank disappeared from sight, Lee’s eyes cut to me, he said something to Indy and they moved away from the couple they were talking to and closer to me.

Indy caught my eye and smiled reassuringly.

I smiled back.

Then I realized something.

And it hit me so hard it had a total body impact.

“I think I’m in love with him,” I said quietly to Shirleen.

“What, child? I couldn’t hear you,” Shirleen replied.

“I barely know him but I think I’m in love with Hank,” I repeated.

She turned ful y to me and her eyes narrowed, mainly because I was beginning to freak out and I was certain it was showing.

“Calm down, girl. This is good. You should be happy.

Hank Nightingale is a good man and he’l treat you right. I think you and I both know ain’t a lot of men in the world like that. You got a shot at one, you hold on tight and you better f**kin’ wel rejoice,” Shirleen advised, her voice serious to the point of being sharp.

“I think I’m in love with al of them,” I said, ignoring her words and beginning to panic.

words and beginning to panic.

“Al of who?” Shirleen asked.

“Them, ” I threw my arm out. “Indy, Lee, Al y, Daisy, Eddie, Jet, Tod, Stevie… al of them,” I answered.

Shirleen nodded.

“Far as I can tel , there’s a lot to love,” her eyes didn’t leave me. “Why you lookin’ like you been sentenced to life in prison?”

“Bil y’s out there, he’s acting crazy. Or, I should say, crazier. There’s no tel ing what he’l do. They might get hurt,” I replied.

I’d felt it days before, when Daisy got shot at when she was with me. But now, it had intensified. It was something different, something more immediate, visceral. Something not to be borne.

“They know ‘bout Bil y?” Shirleen asked, cutting into my thoughts.

I nodded.

“Al of ‘em?” she went on.

I nodded again.

“Then they know what they’re gettin’ into,” Shirleen declared decisively. “Trust Shirleen, child. Lotta folk would stand clear from a girl like you, leave you to go it alone, best as you could. And, I’m tel in’ it to you straight, if this Bil y is as much of a crazy motherfucker as he sounds and even as strong as you are, I’m guessin’ the best you could do would fail. He’d end up hurtin’ you or turnin’ you and neither of those things are good.” I felt my blood turn to ice and I stared at Shirleen. She kept talking. “These folk don’t stand clear. Says a lot. Don’t let it mess with your head.

From what I hear of your people, you’l eventual y have your chance to settle the score.”

I couldn’t say I liked the sound of that.

Shirleen’s eyes had been clear and focused, but something drifted across them and her gaze left me. “I’m not ashamed to tel you, Shirleen has always had a soft spot for that boy,” Shirleen murmured, almost as if I wasn’t there.

She was staring at the place we last saw Hank and I could tel immediately that she’d slipped into another place.

I felt something strange coming from her, something immensely sad, almost to the point of longing.

I stood stock-stil as she continued. “He was a good kid, through and through. Good son to his parents, good brother, good friend to my nephew Darius. Things changed, for me, for Darius. Hank never changed. He tried, harder ‘n’

hel , more even than Lee and Eddie, to pul Darius back, to save him…”

She stopped on a whoosh of air, as if she’d been sucker punched in the gut. I was confused, not knowing what she was talking about but I had no chance to ask and I had the feeling she wouldn’t have told me anyway.

She carried on. “I know where his head’s at, so does Darius. We know where he stands. Even so… even so…” her voice had dropped to a whisper, so low, it was almost like she was chanting. “Even so, I admire it. If I’d had me a boy of my own, I’d want him to be just like Hank.” I felt her words hit me somewhere private, somewhere I didn’t even know existed. Somewhere that was a place that only women like me had. Women like me, which was I suspected, women like Daisy. I was also guessing (correctly, even though I didn’t know it at the time), women like Shirleen. Women who’d experienced bad things at the hands of men they’d opened their hearts to and women who hoped for something good to fol ow.