Chapter 5: Allies

"Gabriel," Diane said.

She said it pleasantly, in the voice she used for waiters.

"Diane."

"I didn't know you still came to Riverbend."

"I come every shift. I bring the ambulances in."

Carlton took one step back from his half-brother.

He had gone pale, and he looked at the floor and then at his mother.

Gabe took the notice out of my hand and read it once, standing there with a gurney rolling past his elbow.

"Three days," he said. "She's been in that house six years, and she gets three days."

"The law is generous," Diane said.

"It's generous when you write it."

"You always did enjoy a scene."

"Only the ones you write."

He put the paper back in my hand.

"Claire. My truck's downstairs."

My coworkers were still at the elevator, pretending to read their phones.

I looked at Carlton.

He opened his mouth, and I understood that whatever he said would be about how it looked.

"Don't," I said.

I walked out with Gabe through the sliding doors.

It was dusk, and the lot lights were coming on.

He didn't talk until we were on the highway north.

"My place is forty minutes out. It has a guest room and a lock that works. You don't have to say yes."

"I don't have anywhere else."

"That isn't the same as yes."

"Yes," I said.

His farmhouse sat on a gravel road outside Delaware, white with a green door, and behind it a field going silver in the last light.

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