Emily rarely visited her hometown, and when she did, she conscientiously avoided other people. Yet here she stood, hesitating at the corner of the block where the streets and the sidewalks crisscrossed on the western end of Pine Bluff’s Courthouse Square. The very heart of town. Once she rounded that corner the pedestrian traffic would be heavier and the likelihood of running into someone who recognized her would be much greater. She’d spent her entire senior year in high school as the object of the whole town’s morbid curiosity. Then there was the breakdown she still hadn’t lived down in her parents’ eyes. The painful memories whispered through Emily, reminded her of just how bad it had been. She’d been running away from it ever since.
No more running. She squared her shoulders and strode determinedly around the corner. She intended to talk to someone in the district attorney’s office about the requirements for retrying Clint Austin. They should have done more in the first place and this would not have happened. Phone calls just weren’t getting the job done. From now on, she would be doing this face-to-face.
The sidewalk wasn’t as busy as she’d anticipated, allowing her to relax marginally. She picked up her pace, trying not to linger too long in front of any one particular storefront. Most looked the same other than a little new paint or decorating. Cochran’s Shoes, Half Moon Cafe, she’d loved both places as a kid. And Hodges’s Drugstore. She’d spent a summer working behind the old-fashioned soda fountain counter there. An eternity ago.
As she neared the middle of the block, the crowd of people gathered at the eastern corner caused her to falter. The shouting reminded her of a rally she’d accidentally gotten caught up in back in college. She couldn’t make out the words being chanted. Hand-painted signs that displayed slogans such as “The Wages of Sin Is Death” and “Prison Was Too Good for You” jogged above the sea of faces.
A demonstration against Austin’s return, she realized slowly. But why protest at this particular location? Lee Brady’s law office was there. Surely he wasn’t working with Austin. But why else would this protest be happening outside his office?
Another realization sank in. Austin could be in there.
Her palms started to sweat and her heart began that pointless race against disaster. She should just go back to her SUV and go home. She would come back to the DA’s office tomorrow. They wouldn’t like her showing up and would certainly urge her to let the whole thing go ... but she couldn’t. Not in this lifetime. Heather Baker had died in Emily’s bed—in Emily’s stead—and she had to see that this mockery of justice was righted.
The shouting grew more frantic as the crowd grudgingly parted for someone to pass. Emily’s lungs refused to take in any air.
It washim.
She recognized the way he moved. Long, confident strides that had once made her heart stop, then thump wildly. Fluid grace combined with the bad-boy good looks that had made her pray that this time, just maybe, she would be the girl he was coming to talk to.
He came closer. Her mouth felt as if she’d gone days without water. She couldn’t move. Couldn’t run away. He would walk right past her. Would he recognize her? Would he stop?
She fell back a step, flattened against the brick facade of the nearest shop in a futile attempt to become invisible. She should go back to her car. Slip into a store. Run like hell. Anything to get out of his path.
A dozen or so yards away he abruptly darted across the street before continuing westward—toward her but with the width of the too-narrow street between them. Relief made her knees weak, allowed her to breathe again.
He reached for the door of a car ...hiscar. The red vintage Firebird he’d driven all those years ago. When he would have gotten into the driver’s seat, he stopped as if someone said his name or as if he felt her watching him.
Emily’s heart lurched when his gaze locked with hers. Even from thirty feet away she felt the focused intensity of those gray eyes. She tried to look away but couldn’t master the necessary motion.
Every horrifying detail of that night flashed in vivid color. The blood ... the struggle. The pain of knowing that nothing Emily had done had been enough. Thatshewas the reason her best friend was dead.
Austin broke eye contact first, then got into his car.
Time and place returned with jarring force as he backed out of the parking slot and sped away. Emily had tried to pull Austin away from her friend. She’d banged against him with her fists, screamed at him to stop. All to no avail. It would have been so easy to do what she should have done. No one would have blamed her for actions that certainly would have amounted to self-defense. The knife he’d used on Heather had been lying right there on the floor ... within easy reach.
That was where she had truly failed her friend.
Emily should have killed him when she had the chance.
5
3:25 p.m.
The trouble had already begun, not a block from City Hall. Police Chief Ray Hale had no intention of allowing this first wave of community reaction to trigger a domino effect. It was his job to ensure this kind of thing didn’t happen.
For ten years his town and the people he served had gone on with their lives, allowing old wounds to heal and a painful tragedy to fade into memory. Now the worst of Pine Bluff’s past had been resurrected, and there appeared to be nothing he could do to stop the gathering momentum. He felt the shift in the air like the accumulating charge of an electrical storm.
Ray had thought the weight of responsibility he felt would lessen once Clint Austin was a free man again. But that hadn’t happened. If anything, the reverse was true, considering the reality Ray had faced this morning. The man he’d brought home from prison now wore a hard mask of chilling indifference. Strict regulations had required that Clint keep his black hair shorter than before. The pallor that spoke of little or no exposure to the sunlight had stolen the glow of youth and vigor he’d once radiated. Sometime during his incarceration, a nasty laceration had left a prominent scar just beneath his left cheekbone. His lean, wiry frame had morphed into a more heavily muscled build.But the most telling change was in his eyes. Dull, lifeless gray reflecting an unnerving emptiness.
No, Clint was not the same man Ray had known back in high school, or even in those final days before the trial had ended. For that, he felt deep regret.
Troy Baker and his friends had orchestrated a protest to publicly lodge their complaints regarding Clint’s return. Ray heaved a lungful of frustration. Troy was a good man, under normal circumstances very levelheaded. But this situation was anything but normal. Troy’s sister had been the victim. His family had tried everything to ensure Clint didn’t win that long-in-coming appeal. In the end, Heather’s parents had accepted the decision made by the court. What else could they do? Troy’s intentions, however, had not changed and were as obvious as if he’d thrown down a gauntlet. He would not rest until he ensured Clint paid the price for Heather’s murder. If Ray could talk some sense into Troy, that one step would go a long way in keeping down the trouble. Others would be taking their cues from his actions. The chances were slim to none, but Ray had to try.
To escape the crowd still loitering outside, Deputy Chief Mike Caruthers herded the ringleaders of the disturbance into Lee Brady’s office, giving the whole lot a good chewing out along the way. Mike’s red hair and multitude of freckles gave him the look of a big kid, but he was no pushover. Ray counted on him more than anyone else in the department. They’d been best friends since first grade, had graduated high school together and gone on to the police academy to serve the town they loved. Mike had no patience for this business either. He was just as pissed off at these guys and was making no bones about it.
For the most part, Pine Bluff was a picturesque Southern town filled with law-abiding citizens, where life was generally peaceful and uncomplicated. A place where folks supported one another through the good times as well as the bad. The problem was, Clint Austin’s release didn’t fit neatly into either of those categories. As God-fearing folks, the citizens of Pine Bluff would want to support a man’s bid for a secondchance. But anyone who offered a hand to Austin was, in effect, turning a hand against the Bakers. In their eyes—Troy’s in particular—Clint would always be a killer. Only time would make a difference, and only if folks would let it.
Lee Brady sidled up next to Ray. “I hope this isn’t any indication of what’s to come.”
