had called and it sounded bad. she said there was an accident and you need to come home right away. it was courtney who eventually broke the news to ashton and their mother, their father s wife of close to 30 years, was dead. but neither courtney nor chris waited at the house to tell the sisters what happened or to comfort them. nor did they linger ore the body at the hospital. they because father and daughter were escorted to separate squad cars and driven to the police station to talk about the accident. what was that ride like? quiet. i just remember crying the whole time. i couldn t comfort my father he couldn t comfort me. we got to the station and they said that my dad would be a few more minutes. chris, so frenzied at the scene, had calmed down by then. he was a cop among cops, after all, and he understaood, he said, what was necessary to sort out what happened.