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“That’s one of my episodes,” she explains. “And I just think it’s odd that our only murder is also unsolved.”

“I can understand your thinking, but you’ve got to consider the statistics,” Dad says. “A lot of homicides go unsolved, but that’s not a headline you’ll see in the paper.”

“Not the Hometown Henley Headlines,” Mom murmurs into her wineglass.

“Any paper,” Dad doubles down. “The public likes to believe that justice will always be served. Informing them of how often that doesn’t pan out isn’t in their general interest.”

A cold ball is forming in my stomach, a reminder of Dad’s comment the other night about the gray areas of life, areas people wander into and never find their way back out of.

“How many?” I ask, and Dad pulls out his phone.

“You want a number, or a percentage?”

“A number,” I say.

“From 1980 to 2019, in Ohio, over ten thousand murders went unsolved.”

A high whistle escapes from Bristal, and Mom sits her glass down harder than necessary. “I don’t know if this is really good dinner conver—”

“Dinner’s over,” I say sharply. “What’s the percentage on that?”

“That’s a sixty-seven percent clearance rate,” Dad says, pinching his phone to zoom in on the chart. “That’s actually not too bad.”

“Not too bad?” I demand. “That’s thirty-three percent of murders going unsolved! Randall Boggs is one of those numbers. That is unacceptable.”

“Maybe you should be a cop, then,” Dad tells me. “Go make the world right.”

“Maybe you should stop defending the people that commit crimes,” I snipe back.

“I’m sorry, Bristal,” Mom says, pouring herself another. “I think this was supposed to be a good-natured debate, but it’s turning into a family fight.”

“This is a fight?” Bristal asks. “Nobody’s thrown anything yet.”

“Don’t worry,” Dad says, holding a hand out to Mom in a staying gesture. “I’m not going to take the bait.”

“Sorry,” I say. It’s terse and sounds anything but genuine, yet Dad stills nods his acceptance.

“It’s okay,” he says.

“I really am surprised at those statistics,” I admit.

“I’m not,” Bristal says. “Think about it. Somebody gets killed, who probably did it?”

“The husband,” Dad says.

“Or the wife,” Mom adds, tipping her glass toward him.

“Possibly their daughter,” I tack on, raising my Diet Coke.

“Exactly my point,” Bristal goes on. “Boggs didn’t have any family. No spouse, no kids. Nobody had anything to gain from him dying, so there was nothing for the cops to really go on in terms of motive.”

“You said yourself that no one liked the guy,” I counter.

“Yeah, but I don’t like a lot of people, and I’ve never murdered anyone,” Bristal says.

“Here’s my card, just in case,” Dad says, pretending to dig in his pocket.

“Regardless,” I hop in. “Boggs wasn’t just shot; he was beaten. There was something more complicated going down in that trailer other than a drug deal. It was personal.”