“His heart stopped working,” Shaina said. “Got all kind of medical reasons for Daddy. Doctor’s reports, insurance denials for a preexisting condition, all that mess. But sometimes folks can just get so sad, they hole up in a place in their head and never want to get back out. Daddy blamed himself. Never got over it.”

Her daughter was as slick as a sea lion, hair plastered back to her head, all elbows and knees, with a big, mischievous smile. The hose flooded through their yard and into a cleared lot next door with a single-wide trailer with a FOR RENT sign in the window. Shaina Taylor worked most days at the Dollar General, was off on Sundays.

“You said your parents blamed the sheriff?” Tashi said.

“Yes, ma’am,” Shaina said, not being able to help it. “Daddy used to say Sheriff Beckett was big as an ox and dumb as a brick. Said the man never even questioned what happened to Brandon. As soon as they seen that rifle nearby, laying ten feet away, he decided on it.”

“Hold on,” Tashi said, holding her hand. She scribbled out some more notes and then checked the recording levels to make sure she was getting all this. “Who said ‘ten feet away’?”

“The sheriff told Daddy that,” she said. “Said some animals had moved his body some. But we don’t know if anyone even checked to see if the bullet inside Brandon’s head came from his hunting rifle. You know how it says on the autopsy that it was a .38, not a .308, and they tried to tell us it was a typo? Well, we don’t have no bullet. No ballistics or whatever. And to this day, I don’t even know how or why he’d even do such a thing. If that ain’t Tibbehah County, I don’t know what is. Believe what you’re told. Keep your mouth shut and don’t ask no questions. And let the folks in power let you know what’s best for your family. I’m just glad Daddy lived long enough to see Sheriff Beckett be the one who really took his own life. After years of backstabbin’, corruption, and dirty payoffs, the man just couldn’t live with himself no more.”

“Did he ever speak to you or your family again about Brandon?”

“Came by once after the fifth anniversary,” Shaina said. “Tried to shake my daddy’s hand and give my momma a hug. Daddy told him never to say Brandon’s name again in his presence or he’d punch him right in the damn mouth.”

*   *   *