“I did then. And if Bobby Joe hadn’t popped up from the backseat, I might have tried to interfere. Didn’t matter, did it? We lost our dad and my kid brother ended up hating me. He told the story his way. Some folks believed him.”

Mary Beth could imagine Bobby Joe doing just that, with a few embellishments thrown in for effect.

“For a while, I thought my mother did too.” He clenched his clasped hands until his knuckles turned white. “But she swears not. Let’s just say there were several versions of the truth. It all depended on who people wanted to believe.”

A cloud drifted over the lake, then another. The shadows were fleeting. Mary Beth looked up first. Parr didn’t seem to have noticed.

They were utterly alone. No one could possibly overhear. But it wasn’t like Parr was giving away secrets. He was telling the truth as he’d understood it, even if no one beside the authorities ever wanted to hear it or remember it.

As the only living witness to a murderous crime of passion, he bore a dual burden. Of remembering, because he had to in order to understand as he grew to manhood. And of forgetting, because he had to forget in order to keep going.

Mary Beth moved next to him on the truck’s bench seat. He let her lean against him. She lay a hand over his. He didn’t pull away. But he didn’t embrace her.

His dark eyes stared out at the serene lake and the motionless lilies.

“Mary Beth, what you said last night about me and Bobby Joe—how different we are—that was more truthful than you knew. But there’s more to it. We’re different for the same reason. And now you know what that reason is.”

“I—I appreciate you telling me.”

He drummed on the steering wheel. “But you can’t keep on with him.”

She swallowed hard. “That’s my decision to make.”

Parr frowned and his jaw set in a hard line. “You don’t have to allow him to ruin your life with his philandering and his lies. That’s not going to change and you can’t change him.”

“Well.” She blew out a breath. “If you’ve been doing so much thinking about what I should do with my life, then tell me what I should do.”

“Just let me love you.”

The simple words had a devastating effect. Tears welled in Mary Beth’s eyes. She brushed them away before Parr could see her crying.

“It hit me like a sledgehammer the first time I ever saw you. Standing there crying like a lost angel. And when I found out who’d made you cry, I could hardly control myself.”

“But you did. Really well.” She still didn’t understand how or why he’d done that, if what he was saying now was true.