As Jonathan drew even with him, the guy worked a friendly wave into the rhythm of his postdinner power walk. Jonathan waved back as the man flailed past him. Then he checked the mirror—both to see if the man kept going and also just to see it one more time, to know that he wasn’t hallucinating. The exchange belonged in a dream given the murder on his mind.

He forced down a big breath to stretch the tightness in his chest and slid his hands back and forth over the wheel to still the tremors that were threatening to wrench them out of his control. He filed away another huge breath, but the calm it brought faded with the exhale.

He had to preserve his options. That meant absolutely no speeding through the neighborhood. No screeching into the driveway. No running. No yelling. No launching anything—word or deed—that might need to be taken back.

He coasted down his street looking for anyone who was looking at him. No concerned faces appeared at any doors suddenly thrown open. No curtains twitched as he went by. A listless kid at the first house on Jonathan’s block was staring off into a daydream while his arthritic old dog raised its leg at the post of the streetlight.

Roy’s truck came into view at the bend, slanted across Jonathan’s driveway. He’d left his door hanging open, inches from having knocked a ding into the rear quarter panel of Donna’s car.

Jonathan startled at the sight of it. The realization settled down over the pounding in his chest a second later. Of course she hadn’t beaten him home. Not only had he left Donna and Carly sitting at a table at Don Julio’s to wonder where he’d gone, he’d left them there with no way to leave.

That was going to require some creative explaining to smooth over, unless the scene at the table under the sombreros really was the last time he would ever see them. He hoped not. Then he hoped the other way. Then he opted for the middle sort of hope—that he would just get through this. The rest would work itself out. It always did.

The driveway had no space for him to leave his car neatly parked. He didn’t like the optics of two crooked cars in front of his house. It could draw attention. The fewer eyes on this mess, the better. He might be able to keep it to just his own two eyes, if he was careful. And if he was lucky.

Jonathan wasn’t sure how he would answer if anyone asked him if he considered himself lucky.