She's good for him. I wish she knew that, but there's no real way to tell her. She probably wouldn't believe anything I said, and I can't blame her.

Jerry's a good kid, but I was getting kind of worried about him. Bellewood men aren't happy unless they're mated. Hasn't been a Bellewood to stay single in the last six generations, as far as I'm aware.

Scribe's having a hard time accepting her position. She's still thinking of herself as a captive, and I guess that is the literal truth. Jerry took her, he's keeping her. But she is--she can be so much more. I think that boy would crawl over broken glass for that woman, and I'm pretty sure she still hasn't bedded him willingly. When she does, he's going to be downright besotted.

I'm not saying if about that, I'm saying when. I don't think she'll hold out forever. Yeah, I know that sounds kinda piggish, but hell, Jerry's a fine young man. The boy's been able to pretty much dip his wick anywhere he wanted since he was fifteen. Besides the looks, I know that he really likes women, as people besides as something soft and warm to hump, and he really, really likes this particular woman.

Puts me in mind of something my grandma used to talk about. She called it The Thunderbolt, sort of love at first sight. Claimed that Bellewood men were particularly susceptible to it. A Bellewood would meet the woman he was meant for and bang, that was it. Silly, huh?

But when you look back at family history, you have to wonder. Daddy asked my mama to marry him during their second dance the first time they met. I asked Lally to marry me on our third date. I'd made up my mind before that. If this is true, I guess Jerry must hold the family record. We weren't in that bank more than fifteen, twenty minutes, and he couldn't have spent more than ten of those picking over the available females.

I was pretty sure he'd made a good choice right off the bat. For one thing, he went for substance instead of flash. Lots of those flat land women, you don't know what's there till you scrub off the paint. She has a good heart. He told me how she protected her niece. She must've thought she was going to her death when she went with us, but she did it for her family. She's a brave, feisty little cuss. Laid a few stripes on Benji in the van. Would've thrown herself out if we hadn't been quick enough.

And she's a lady. I swear, you could have knocked me over when we found out she was a virgin. I mean, I know in this day and age it's nothing for a woman to take lovers before she's married. I don't condemn them. But I can't help it, I was raised with just a little more respect for a woman who preserved the purity of her body for one man. Scribe didn't know she was doing that for Jerry, but that's how it worked out.

Thinking about how inexperienced she was when she came here, I guess I'm not really surprised that James is sniffing around her. He wouldn't be James if he didn't. James can smell vulnerability like most people smell smoke. That's how he latched onto Justine. I would've warned her, but it happened so fast.

He hasn't done anything overt, nothing you can call him on. It's in the way he watches her. Makes me understand that term the women use, undressing them with his eyes. He makes her nervous. She's a smart girl. I hope she's smart enough to manage to stay out of his way. I know for a fact that Jerry will kill him if he messes with her too much. I can't blame him, but it would hurt Justine. Though Lord knows, I think her and the kids would be better off without him in their lives.

Jerry's trusting her more. I don't think he ever used those ankle bracelets on her. They were left over from when his ma first came to the mountain. Dad kept them on her till she was quick with Jerry. I think she's as much responsible for his stubbornness as Dad was. She never did tell Dad that she loved him, and he was content to have it that way. Mom had been his first and only true love.

Things might have changed after Jerry was born. Sometimes a child will draw people together. We never had the chance to find out. She'd seemed like such a healthy, sturdy woman, but something went wrong. She lived a while longer, but she never was the same again. Never was really strong. She's buried not too far from where we laid Albert to rest, Dad between her and Mom.

I wonder how much it will be like that with Scribe and Jerry. Not much, I hope. I love my brother, I want him to be happy. I think she can make him happy, if she will. I believe she can learn to love him, almost as much as he loves her. It has to be love for Jerry. It won't be enough for her to just not hate him. Hell, she doesn't hate him now. I think the girl has a hard time hating anybody, even when she feels like she should.

What's hurting her is missing her family. It would have been one thing if they'd met and married in a conventional manner. I'm sure then that moving up here to Colorado, into our isolated area, wouldn't have bothered her that much. But she didn't get a chance to say good-bye to her people, let them know where she'd be. They don't know what's happened to her, and she knows that they're worried.

She doesn't know how worried they are. Or the authorities with them.

I've been following the news since that last job. We have satellite, and they keep the papers for us in town till we come collect them. It's been all over the place. Turns out it was one of the biggest single heists in the south of the past thirty years. Everyone is interested. Here itss been over three weeks, and it still pops up now and then. Mention on the news has tapered off a bit, except when some fool calls in a tip claiming to have spotted Scribe. Last time they claimed she was being dragged through a mall in Encino. Just confirms my opinion of folks in California. We even made Americass Most Wanted.

Interesting recreation. They were pretty accurate in the details. No wonder they're worried about Scribe. The guy they had playing Jerry came off as pretty damn menacing, though I honestly don't believe he popped her that hard when she tried to get away on the way to the door.

They couldn't offer any sketches of us, since we'd been careful to keep masked the whole time. The security video was pretty useless. You could tell it was four men, that's all. The picture they had of Scribe wasn't all that good, either. No one who’d be willing to talk to the man had gotten a close look at her after we got her in the van. We should be all right.

We didn't tell her about this. We don't let her watch the news shows, and we remove articles about her from the paper. Jerry insists on this, and I agree with him. No sense in agitating the girl. The less she thinks about it, the easier it will be for her to settle in.