The Virgin of Small Plains (50 page)

“Speaking of whom—” Rex laughed. “You know his diabolical scheme to buy up downtown Small Plains? Turns out all he wanted to do was take it away from our fathers. I guess he had some nasty idea of letting the buildings go to hell, but I doubt he’d ever have been able to do it. Now he’s ready to move back and live here and bring the properties back up to lookin’ good. The mayor is thrilled, as you can imagine.”

He remembered something else he wanted to tell her.

“With Patrick gone, that leaves the ranch in a bind, and I’m thinking maybe I should get out of sherriffing and take over for my folks. I wouldn’t mind doing that. Hell, what am I saying, I’d love to do that. The only reason I didn’t do it earlier was because I didn’t want to have to work for my dad and be arguing with him all the time. But if he could trust Patrick to run it, he can sure as hell trust me.”

He revolved his hat in his hands for a moment, thinking.

“We’ll take care of Jeff for you, Sarah. I’m sorry we haven’t all done a better job of it until now. He’s living with my folks, I guess you know. It’s not the best arrangement. He’s too pigheaded and they’re too old. But it won’t last forever that way. I’m pretty sure Mitch intends to take him in, and once he and Abby get married, which they’re sure to do, then Jeff will finally have a home with people who actually give a damn about him. I don’t know what he thought he was going to do with that gun of his dad’s when he ran out of my folks’ house like that, but I shudder to think what could have happened. He was one hurt, angry kid, I’ll tell you, after what he had heard about Tom and Nadine. And what he had heard about you. I think he was heartbroken on your behalf, Sarah. I think he wanted to kill the son of a bitch who had done that to his mother.”

Rex took a deep breath, feeling upset all over again.

When he could talk calmly, he said, “About Jeff. I’ll try to be more patient. Be like an uncle, or something, although I can’t promise I’ll be any good at it. You don’t go from being the sheriff to being the uncle overnight, you know.”

Rex gazed off into the distance, over the flint-topped hills now turning green with summer ripeness. “Well, I guess that’s about it. I don’t know if you ever actually cured anybody. My mom says you did, but I don’t know. And I don’t know if people will continue to come out to see you, now that you’re not such a mystery anymore. But I’ll tell you one thing—even if nobody else ever really got a miracle, I think I’m cured, Sarah, which should be good news.” He grinned down at her gravestone. “God knows you must be sick of me still hanging around you after all these years.”

Out of a still, clear day, the wind suddenly picked up.

It bowed the grass in his direction, unaccountably lifting his spirits and making him think that maybe she hadn’t minded his devotion, after all.

About the Author

N
ANCY
P
ICKARD
is the creator of the acclaimed Jenny Cain mystery series. She has won the Anthony Award, two Macavity Awards, and two Agatha Awards for her novels. She is a three-time Edgar Award nominee, most recently for her first Marie Lightfoot mystery,
The Whole Truth,
which was a national bestseller. With Lynn Lott, Pickard co-authored
Seven Steps on the Writer’s Path.
She has been a national board member of the Mystery Writers of America, as well as the president of Sisters in Crime. She lives in Prairie Village, Kansas. Visit her website at
www.nancypickardmysteries.com
.

Also by Nancy Pickard

FICTION

The Truth Hurts

Ring of Truth

The Whole Truth

The Secret Ingredient Murders

The Blue Corn Murders

The 27-Ingredient Chili Con Carne Murders

Twilight

Confession

But I Wouldn’t Want to Die There

I.O.U.

Bum Steer

Dead Crazy

Marriage Is Murder

No Body

Say No to Murder

Generous Death

Storm Warnings

NONFICTION

Seven Steps on the Writer’s Path

The Virgin of Small Plains
is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2006 by Nancy Pickard

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

B
ALLANTINE
and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Pickard, Nancy.
The virgin of Small Plains : a novel / Nancy Pickard.—

p. cm.

eISBN-13: 978-0-345-49372-9

eISBN-10: 0-345-49372-9

1. Cold cases (Criminal investigation)—Fiction. I. Title.

PS3566.I274V53 2006
813'.54—dc22
2005055550

www.ballantinebooks.com

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