“Where next?” she calls across the water, making no attempt to cover herself.

“I think it’s time we got back.”

“Home? But the day’s not half over.”

“I need to check on Annie.”

She nods somberly. “I understand.”

I turn and make my way carefully along the slippery log. For any other woman I would wait, but Livy Marston can take care of herself.

As I swing the Fiat back onto Highway 61, I realize with a dull shock that guilt is not among the torrent of emotions rushing through me. A moment’s thought tells me why: my past with Livy predates my life with Sarah. Intimacy with Livy is not a new experience. It’s like walking through a checkpoint to a country I visited long ago and to which I now return, older and—hopefully—wiser.

She doesn’t speak as the Spyder thrums northward in the afternoon sun, but I feel her eyes upon me, trying to penetrate my thoughts. What really brought her back to Natchez? Caitlin’s belief that Livy has returned to persuade me to leave her father alone is not impossible. But Livy would not declare her love for such a cynical reason. That is the one gift she’s reserved through the years, if indeed she has given love to anyone. She certainly must have said the words more than a few times, probably while trying to believe them herself. But why did she want this reprise of a perfect day twenty years past? And why does she think she loves me? Is it some strange analogue of a man wanting to marry the only girl who wouldn’t sleep with him?

As we pass St. Stephens Preparatory School and join the traffic heading into town, Livy touches my knee and says, “After you check on Annie, let’s do something else. We still have our picnic.”

Her voice is calm enough, but I sense anxiety beneath it. She is reluctant to let this day end. Tomorrow things will not be so simple. It’s one thing to pretend for a few hours that we can evade the past, as this town somehow evades the future. But it will be quite another when I insist on asking the questions she didn’t want to hear today. And what will happen after I tell the world that her father ordered the murder of Delano Payton? When I commence my campaign of attrition against him? How will she feel then?

“I think we’ve done a lot to think about already,” I say evenly.

She bites her lower lip and looks away.

The whine of a siren overtakes us from behind, and I glance at the rearview mirror. Traffic is parting on the highway behind us. We’re at the turn for my parents’ neighborhood, so I swing right off the bypass, clearing the way.

“Penn?” Livy says, her voice tinged with fear. “Look.”