But before her mind could torture her anymore, Banks wrapped her up in strong, warm arms and just stood rocking her.

“Morris?” she whispered into his chest.

“Dead,” he said quietly.

She lifted her head and her pale silver eyes were tormented. “Dead?”

“He had Jake Blair and me at gunpoint. His men had dug a single grave and he was at the point of killing us. Chet Billings blew him away, not a minute too soon, I might add.”

“God bless Chet Billings,” she said fervently.

He hugged her close again. It had been a tragic day, almost a fatal one. He’d thought about dying many times in his life, but this was truly the closest he’d ever come. The thought of never seeing Clancey again had flashed through his mind while Morris taunted him and Jake Blair. He knew that Jake was thinking about his daughter, Carlie, and his new grandchild that he might never see again. Nothing ever looked as big as the barrel of a gun when it was pointed at you. He could still feel the fear. He hated it, hated his own helplessness against it. At the same time, he mourned for Morris. The boy, with the right parents, might have turned out totally different. It was a damned shame.

“We’d better go tell Tad,” Clancey said, drawing back. “I’m sorry that Morris was the way he was,” she added quietly. “Except for what happened today, Tad and I might be the ones dead.”

“Yes,” Colter replied. His chest rose and fell deeply. He was still in a sort of fog from the standoff. “We found your grandfather,” he added gently. “Morris had buried him under the planks at the altar of the old church.”

Tears stung her eyes. She’d been expecting it for five years, but during that time she’d had hope that maybe her grandfather had just lost his memory, that he’d been carried off somewhere and hadn’t found his way home. They were illogical hopes, but they’d kept her going.

Now she had proof that he was really dead. It was so unfair. He’d been a kind, gentle man. Why? she asked. “Why?” she moaned aloud.

Colter dried her tears with a handkerchief. “Nobody understands why criminals do such horrible things. Hundreds, thousands of books have been written about motivation, DNA, upbringing. But in the end, it’s still mostly a mystery, even to people in the criminal justice system who’ve dealt with them for years.”

“My grandfather was such a good man,” she choked.

He hugged her close in his strong, warm arms and rocked her in the silence of the front porch, broken only by the distant lowing of cows and the snuffling sounds the horses made in the nearby corral.