In the Clearing (Tracy Crosswhite, #3)

by Robert Dugoni

He got a sense that the victory wasn’t just about sports, but rather a validation of a way of life,

which somehow equated to small-town living being equal to, if not better than, urban living.

“Because we’ve been trusting you for two hundred years and you just keep ripping us off.” It was the type of generic statement Tracy had heard often as a police officer when someone had no specific or rational answer to one of her questions. Instead, they accused her of being a racist.

Tracy suspected that Coe, like Gallentine, had toed the ledge between living and taking his own life for years, and had only managed to subsist by following a structured routine.

That was the problem with crowing too loudly. You gave away your position and made yourself vulnerable.

“It’s a terrible thing when a child is stripped of his perception that his parents are perfect. Kids want to believe their parents will always be there to take care of them. One of the hardest things about getting older is losing that naïveté that allows us all to believe in myths and fantasies, having it replaced by harsh reality. We don’t want to believe our parents aren’t perfect, some far from it.”