The following spring brought a quieter, gentler kind of change to Ashford Hollow — Ana taking her first wobbling steps across the compound's gravel yard to the delighted cheers of nearly two dozen club members, Dutch teaching her to fish at Coldwater Creek with the same patient care he'd once shown Cruz decades earlier, Birdie and Preacher welcoming their own first child, a son they named Ray Ezra, honoring both his father and the man who'd become, over the years, something like a father figure to Preacher himself.
Wren's illustration career had flourished steadily, her children's book series expanding into a genuine, beloved franchise that let her work from home while Ana napped, occasionally traveling for book signings that Cruz insisted on accompanying whenever his club responsibilitie
