“There’s a trust from my father’s estate that I could use to live modestly but comfortably, but I plan to work. I’ve been studying ethics. I’m doing a paper on the ethics of scientific research called ‘The Fear of New Knowledge.’ It could turn into a book.”

“How about the fear of old knowledge?” he asked. And old lovers? “What got you interested in ethics?”

“It’s profoundly interesting, both simple and highly complex,” she said. “What’s your definition of ethics?”

He shrugged. “It isn’t too complicated to me. Honesty, fairness, decency, knowing the difference between right and wrong. Treating people nicely, the way you’d want to be treated.”

She leaned against the seat, looking out over the vast Colorado terrain, dimly lit by the moon. She was beginning to feel safe. She sighed deeply. She wouldn’t bother to tell him that he was right—exactly, absolutely right—and that still she could make a whole profession out of the study. Part of the study would show that the real role models for ethical behavior were people who naturally did the “right thing” without studying the subject. It wasn’t as though ethical people were flawless or never made mistakes; they sought rightness and rectified mistakes when they could. Like John.

Which was why she hadn’t argued for one second when Jess called and said, “I need you to come home.” She was grateful; she had needed a nudge. There were lots of “rights” in there. Of course you came home when your mother, who had been your life raft every time you ever got into trouble, called. And also, Leigh had already been thinking of returning to see if she could tidy things up with John, bury the hatchet and see if there was a way to get along. She’d expected to find him married and had prepared herself to negotiate friendship with him and his wife. And she hadn’t made this decision during her preliminary study of ethics, either. Rather, she had known all along it was the right thing to do. However tough it was for her and John to see eye to eye, she knew he was a good and honest man who would naturally do the right thing—and she needed such a man to be a role model for her sons.

For his sons.

“So,” John said, “what’s next?”

“Do you think it’s possible for us to be friends?”