Most of her children had loved her. Faith’s mother’s younger brother Jordan had taken care of Gran uncomplainingly until she’d drawn her last breath. Faith’s mother had been devoted to Gran, although Faith wasn’t sure how much of her devotion had been love. And the jury was out on Jeremy, her grandmother’s only other living child. He was . . . estranged.

Faith’s grandmother had been quietly laid to rest next to her grandfather in a very private service with only her priest and Faith’s uncle Jordan in attendance, in accordance with her grandmother’s wishes. Faith thought it was likely due to the fact that Tobias’s funeral had become a bitter battleground that had shattered the O’Bannion family.

And her own little family as well, she thought as she moved past the next five headstones, all children of Barbara and Tobias who had not survived into adulthood. She stopped at the sixth headstone. Its design was identical to that of her grandparents’, the inscription as weathered as Tobias’s. Not surprising since they’d been bought and carved at the same time.

One side, her father’s, was mercifully blank. The other bore a terrible lie.

MARGARET O’BANNION SULLIVAN

BELOVED WIFE AND MOTHER

“Hello, Mother,” Faith murmured. “It’s been a while.”

A high-pitched scream floated across the air as if in response. Startled, Faith did a three-sixty, looking for the source, but saw nothing. No one had followed her, of that she’d made certain. There was nothing like being stalked to teach a woman to be careful.

No one was here. It was just Faith, the house, and the fifty acres of fallow farmland that was all that remained of the O’Bannion family holdings. She patted the pocket of her jacket, calmed by the presence of her gun. “It was a dog howling,” she said firmly. “That’s all.”

Or it could simply have been her mind playing tricks, echoing the scream from her nightmares. Twelve steps and a basement. Sometimes she woke from the nightmare to find herself screaming for real—which had scared the hell out of her ex-husband, a fact that gave Faith a level of satisfaction that was admittedly immature. Officer Charlie Frye deserved a hell of a lot more than a start in the night for what he’d done.

Her mother had done so much worse to her dad. “Dad deserved a hell of a lot better than what you did to him. So did I. I still do.” She hesitated, then spat the words out. “I have hated you for twenty-three years. I lied for you. I lied to Dad so that he’d never know what you did. So if you meant to hurt him, you failed. If you meant to hurt me, then congratulations. You hit the bull’s-eye.”