Watching as he put down his plate and drink, Joanna was surprised to note that although he was naturally handsome, he was also surprisingly ungainly. While the conversation hummed around the table, Rod attacked his food with a peculiar intensity. When he glanced up and caught Joanna observing him, he blushed furiously, from the top of his collar to the roots of his fine blond hair. For the first time, Joanna wondered if Rod Bascom wasn’t an inveterate head-nodder in class because he was actually painfully shy? The very possibility made him seem less annoying. At twenty-five or -six, Rod
was close to Joanna’s age. In terms of life experience, there seemed to be a world of difference between them.
“Are you enjoying the classes?” Joanna asked, trying to break the ice.
Once again Rod Bascom nodded his head. Joanna had to conceal a smile. Even in private conversation he couldn’t seem to stop doing it.
“There’s a lot to learn,” he said. “I never was very good at taking notes. I’m having a hard time keeping up. I suppose this is all old hat to you.”
“Old hat? Why would you say that?” Joanna returned.
“You’re not like the rest of us,” he said, shrugging uncomfortably. “I mean, you’re already a sheriff. By comparison, the rest of us are just a bunch of rookies.”
Joanna flushed slightly herself. No matter how earnestly she wanted to fit in with the rest of her classmates, it wasn’t really working. She smiled at Rod Bascom then, hoping to put him at ease.
“I’m here for the same reason you are,” she said “Some of this stuff may be boring as hell, but we all need to learn it just the same.”
He nodded, chewing thoughtfully for a moment before he spoke again. “I’m sorry about your husband,” he said. “It took me a while to figure out why your face is so familiar. I finally realized I saw you on TV back when all that was going on. It must have been awful.”
Rod’s kind and totally unexpected words of condolence caught Joanna off guard, touching her in a way that surprised them both. Tears sprang to her eyes, momentarily blurring her vision.
“It’s still awful,” she murmured, impatiently brushing the tears away. “But thanks for mentioning it.”
“You have a little girl, don’t you?” Rod asked. How’s she doing?”
Joanna smiled ruefully. “Jenny’s fine, although she does have her days,” she said. “We both know it’s going to take time.”
“Are you going home for Thanksgiving?”
“No, Jenny and her grandparents are coming up here.”
Rod Bascom nodded. “That’s probably a good idea,” he said. “That first Thanksgiving at home after my father died was awful.”
He got up then and hurried away, as though worried that he had said too much. Touched by his sharing comment and aware that she’d somehow misjudged the man, Joanna watched him go.
What was it Marliss Shackleford had said about people in the big city? She had implied that most of the people Joanna would meet in Phoenix were a savage, uncaring, and untrustworthy lot.
So far during her stay in Phoenix, Joanna had met several people. Four in particular stood out from the rest. Leann Jessup—her red-haired note-writing tablemate; Dave Thompson, her loud-mouthed jerk of an instructor; Butch Dixon, the poetry-quoting bartender from the Roundhouse Bar d Grill; and now Rod Bascom, who despite his propensity for head nodding, gave every indication of being a decent, caring human being.
