10 days ago. Dot said. I'd been through the box before, but not all the way through. The folder was at the bottom. Gerald wrote this summary.
Dempsey said. Yes. In his handwriting. Yes. Dempsey sat back.
Gerald Fitch had a college degree in accounting. She said before he married you, he worked for a regional bank for 11 years. Is that right? Yes. Dot said.
This summary. Dempsey looked at it again. This is the work of someone who understood financial documentation, who understood what constituted evidence. Gerald was careful about everything. Dot said.
Dempsey looked at the table for a moment. I need to say something, she said. She said it carefully. Gerald Fitch's accident. I was not sheriff in 2015.
I became sheriff in 2017. I inherited a case file that was closed as accidental. I looked at it when I first took office because it was the kind of case I look at when I take over. Ones that don't sit right, she paused. It didn't sit right, but I didn't have grounds to reopen it.
Not then. Dot was very still. With this box, Dempsey said quietly. And with what we're building today, we may have grounds. The silence at the table was the particular silence of something that had been needed for a long time and had just arrived.
Dot looked at her coffee cup. Ray didn't look at anyone. He looked at the table. He thought about what it meant. This woman had been keeping her husband's records in a box in her garage for 9 years and making breakfast every morning and waiting.
The endurance of that, he thought, "That is a kind of courage that doesn't look like courage. That is the hardest kind. " Coach Burch's folder went on the table next. 11 years of incident reports. Then Dempsey listened to what Mia had told Rey about Garrett. Word for word as Mia had given it to him.
When he was done, Dempsey said, "If Garrett Win voluntarily made a statement to me as an adult without coercion with council present, that would be significant. He's 18. " Ry said, "I know. " Which means he can make that decision himself. Dempsey looked at Ry. I'm not going to pursue him. If he comes to me, I'll hear him.
I won't come to him. Ry nodded. That was the right answer. The meeting lasted 2 and 1/2 hours. When it was over, Dempsey gathered the copies of what she'd been given.