Proof of Innocence

by Patricia McLinn

  One of her bigger mistakes was Teddie Barrett.

  Hit and run accident. Though how they can call it an accident when somebody’s so evil he doesn’t stop to help, especially a soul as harmless as Teddie Barrett.

  She thought of Teddie’s face as he’d giggled at her calling him Mr. Barrett. And she thought of his mother.

  Maggie sat on the window seat, staring out. Other than the reflection of the bedside lamp, it showed only dark, yet the dark seemed to move with the wind in the trees on the opposite bank.

  She had tried to get the trial’s lunch break timed immediately after Teddie’s statement that he’d recognized Pan’s and Carson’s voices, letting it sink in with the jury.

  But she’d gone through his testimony too fast. That let Dallas get started. During the break, jurors chewed over Teddie saying he’d been told his memory came from the day of the murder.

  Chewed it over and swallowed it.

  After lunch it went from bad to worse.

  That damned video. She fought it. But Judge Blankenship allowed it. It had been recorded only two days before Pan’s murder as part of a commercial series on waterfalls of the South. A company spokesman testified nothing on it was altered.

  Still, she should have fought harder. She should have kept it out. Somehow.

  * * * *

  9:56 p.m.

  Charlotte scratched “crab puffs” from her menu for the memorial gathering that would have to suffice until authorities released the body.

  Allarene insisted on too much garlic in her crab puffs. Last thing needed, with the hugging and cheek-kissing, was everyone’s breath reeking.

  The mini spinach tarts would do. Laurel hated them, but then, she wouldn’t be there.

  Soon enough she’d be buried deep in the earth of Bedhurst Cemetery. Odd to think of Laurel lying still beside Mama, solitary in the silk-lined coffin Charlotte was almost certain would be her selection.

  Odd to think of Laurel lying solitary anywhere.

  That was what those people had been getting at — Laurel was a slut. That’s what they’d wanted her to say.

  She would have. She had no trouble speaking the truth about her sister. But she’d looked ahead and seen where it might lead — like the crab puffs and garlic breath. She’d refused to be drawn into a discussion of Laurel’s indiscretions.

  Indiscretions? As if she’d ever had discretion.

  Not since she’d been thirteen years old and Charlotte had seen her with that delivery man in the back of the old garage.

  Charlotte, nearly seventeen, hadn’t been kissed, and there was her little sister fucking the help.

  “Honey? Aren’t you coming to bed?”

  She did wish her husband wouldn’t say honey. It was common. Sweetheart or darling or — her mouth pursed — babe were no better. That was why she did not ask him to drop honey. He would have if she asked, but the danger was he would fall into worse.

  “I have a number of things to do still.”

  “You’re running yourself ragged, honey. You don’t have to do it all. Tell me and I’ll do whatever you need.”

  Of course, she had to do it. No one else could be relied on to handle things correctly.

  “I’m fine, Edward.”

  “Okay. Uh. I, uh, I thought I’d go to the office tomorrow. Unless, of course, you need me here.”

  “No, that will be fine.”

  His office and, by extension, the courtroom defined him. It was what had brought Edward Smith to her notice.

  Besides, she had a full slate of appointments tomorrow about arrangements for the memorial and eventual funeral. Edward would be underfoot.

  It occurred to her that if he didn’t die beforehand, she would need a detailed plan for his retirement.

  He patted her hand, the motion slightly awkward, despite three years of marriage, then kissed her on the cheek. From the corner of her eye, she caught sight of his attire, and her gaze followed as he straightened.

  Why he insisted on these pale blue cotton pajamas instead of the burgundy silk she’d bought…

  “Good night, honey. Don’t work too hard.”

  Not even a robe.

  * * * *

  Dallas sipped his wine, staring at Ruth’s silver candlesticks on the mantelpiece.

  Every time Evelyn dusted and left them angled, with the silver bowl slightly in front, he returned them to side by side, in line with the bowl, the way Ruth liked.

  That and refusing to marry him were Evelyn’s only flaws.

  The day Ruth hired Evelyn, she said Evelyn had a lot of good qualities. All he’d cared about was the quality of her fried chicken, and that Ruth was pleased.

  They’d been friendly, but it was until a year and more after Ruth passed they’d started their talks.

  A case came where he was sure old Sheriff Hague coerced a confession. The defendant denied it.

  He’d been in his chair, reading files. Evelyn came in with her coat on, surely to say good night. “Trouble, Mr. M?”

  “Yes.”

  She’d unbuttoned her coat, sat on the couch, and waited.

  He’d talked.

  Two days later, when her leaving time came, she’d brought in two glasses of Madeira, sat in the same spot, and he’d talked more.

  Then she pointed out his defendant was alone since his elderly mother died and the sheriff was feeding him three squares a day, making him the closest thing to a friend the man had.

  Eventually, he realized she’d been his best friend for years. Only looking back did he realize that at the moment he’d recognized friendship, he’d already loved her.

  Sometimes he wondered what Ruth would say.

  She’d treated every soul with kindness and dignity. And she held Evelyn in high regard. But she hadn’t been much of one for folks pairing up outside their race, class, or church. She liked things neat that way.

  Like candlesticks side by side.

  Evelyn liked angles, unsymmetrical yet balanced. Over the years, he’d encouraged her to arrange things how she liked. To look out from his chair at all her touches made him feel as if she were here even when she wasn’t.

  Except the candlesticks. Those remained Ruth’s way.

  Commonwealth v. J.D. Carson

  Witness Theodore Barrett (prosecution)

  Cross-Examination by Mr. Monroe

  Q. Teddie, is that what the falls sounded like the day you say you heard those voices arguing?

  A. Sure, that’s what they sound like every day.

  Mr. Monroe: No further questions.

  Ms. Frye: Redirect, Your Honor?

  THE COURT: Go ahead, Ms. Frye.

  Ms. Frye: Did you hear voices at Bedhurst Falls about 6 p.m. August 12th?

  A. Like I told you—

  Q: You need to answer yes or no, Mr. — Teddie.

  A. But—

  Q: Did you hear voices at Bedhurst Falls, yes or no?

  A. Sure. Like I said, I—

  Q. Are you convinced that the day you heard them was August 12th, the day Mrs. Wade was killed there, yes or no?

  A. Yes. And—

  Q. Are you convinced those voices belonged to Mrs. Wade and the defendant.

  A. Pan and J.D., yeah.

  * * * *

  9:58 p.m.

  That damned video.

  The narrator’s voice had shouted to be heard over the rush of the falls. People in the background appeared to yell, yet no sound came through.

  All was drowned by the rush and roar of the falls.

  Teddie had been unperturbed, clearly not recognizing Monroe had wiped out his credibility, along with his testimony.

  That was the only night of the Carson trial she hadn’t gone directly from the courtroom to the office to prep for the next day.

  She’d ditched Ed, almost incoherent with apologizing for not seeing the flaw in Teddie’s testimony. “I’m more local. I should have known,” he’d said over and over.

  She’d driven to the crime scene, and seen ho
w she’d screwed up.

  From where Pan Wade was murdered, you couldn’t hear the falls. On the map, they were close. But as she’d followed the path, she’d realized it dropped sharply to where the falls sat in a sort of natural amphitheater, concentrating their sound, while blocking out sounds from beyond.

  Standing there, Teddie couldn’t have heard dynamite explode on the service road, much less voices arguing.

  Either Teddie hadn’t been where he’d said he was, or he hadn’t heard those voices. He had no reason to make up the story. So, most likely, he had heard them, and he’d confused which path he’d been on.

  It made no difference to the trial, because his testimony had been shredded into confetti.

  And she’d let it happen. She should have prepared better. She should not have allowed herself to be lulled by Teddie’s earnestness.

  She’d vowed to never again be caught like that.

  The phone rang.

  Not her phone, but a clunky, black old-fashioned twin for the living room phone. This one hunched on the small nightstand on the far side of the bed.

  “Frye,” she answered.

  Nothing.

  “Frye,” she repeated, less patiently.

  Still nothing.

  “Hello.” No static, no clicking, no feeling of dead air.

  She disconnected with her thumb, her thoughts returning to their earlier track.

  She’d let Dallas lead her around too much today.

  She was the prosecutor. Setting out the case, calling the moves.

  Let them react to her.

  Instead of looking at the victims for a connection, what if the connection — if there was one — was the murderer. Who had reason to kill both Pan and Laurel? A lover, spurned or otherwise, of course. Who el—

  The phone on the bedside table rang again.

  She pulled her briefcase to her with one hand while picking up the heavy receiver with the other. Said hello.

  As it registered that once more no one was responding, she flipped open her briefcase.

  She sucked in a breath and didn’t let it go.

  The plastic envelope, the one always kept in the pocket of the lid, instead sat atop the files in the bottom of the briefcase. Not the way she’d left it.

  Through the clear covering, a photo that had never been in that envelope. An autopsy photo of Pan Wade’s dead face.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Without knocking at the back door, without catching her breath, Maggie burst through the kitchen and into a scene of domestic tranquility in the old-fashioned living room — Dallas, Evelyn, and Carson sat before a small fire, Mozart playing softly in the background.

  Carson came out of his seat from one end of the couch, book in hand. He dropped it behind him. “What’s wrong?”

  She demanded of the other two people in the room. “How long has he been here?”

  “What?” Dallas blinked slowly from an easy chair angled toward the fire.

  “Since you left after supper,” Evelyn said from the other end of the couch, her hands suspended, one extended with needle and thread apparently just drawn through a shirt button pinned in place with her opposite thumb.

  “What’s wrong?” Carson repeated.

  “Someone’s been in the guesthouse. In my things.”

  “I’ll call 9-1-1,” Evelyn said.

  “Already did.”

  Carson scowled. “What things?”

  “My briefcase for starters.”

  “Somethin’ taken?” Dallas asked.

  “Not that I can tell. But — Where are you going?”

  Carson didn’t slow. “To see.”

  She hurried to keep up, not knowing if Dallas or Evelyn followed. At the path, Carson broke into a jog, and any doubt she’d harbored about whether he’d let her follow him up the hillside at the crime scene yesterday was put to rest — he could leave her behind whenever he wanted.

  “Hey!” she shouted. “What if I don’t want you in there?”

  “You already believe I messed with your things. What’s a second time?” he asked over his shoulder.

  She caught up at the guesthouse’s back door, only because he’d stopped.

  “Did you leave the door open?” He voice was barely a breath.

  “No. Wh—?”

  The door was wide open.

  “Stay here.”

  She didn’t. She followed him in. She stayed behind him, but watched every move.

  Not difficult because he didn’t make many.

  He eased into the kitchen so slowly her muscles screamed in protest as she mimicked his motions. Finally inside, she reached to push the door closed, but his gesture stopped her.

  For what seemed a good ten minutes they simply stood. Then he moved toward the living room. The slow motion journey ended in another interlude of stillness.

  He relaxed.

  She couldn’t identify a motion or expression that told her, but she was sure.

  Then she heard an approaching car.

  “Sheriff.” He didn’t move, but his voice was normal.

  She stepped toward the front door. He shifted his weight, blocking her. “Out the way we came in. Less we disturb the better.”

  Stung more by her failure to remember that basic rule than by his reminding her, she pivoted quickly. Too quickly. Her balance wavered. Carson grasped her elbow, the grip not as tight but its solidity as effective as when he’d kept her from falling down the hillside.

  Her back still to him, she steadied herself and walked out of his hold and through the kitchen.

  Dallas, breathing heavily, was at the base of the back steps. He looked his question past her, at Carson.

  “Nobody’s there.” Carson moved ahead, leading the way to the front of the guesthouse. From his slowness and movements of his head, she gathered he was searching for marks on the path.

  Double-checking if he’d left any?

  No. Carson wouldn’t have left anything behind unless he’d meant to.

  Still, it could be for show.

  Near the front door, he stepped off the path, crossing spotty grass to the hard surface where a deputy was getting out of his car, parked behind Maggie’s Honda.

  “Got a call you had a break-in, Dallas.” The deputy looked at Carson.

  She stepped past Carson. “I called. The break-in was here. The guesthouse where I’m staying. And my—”

  She broke off because another car had arrived. This one emblazoned Sheriff.

  Gardner emerged slowly. “I heard the call. What’s the status, Abner?”

  “Just got here myself. Evelyn called in a break-in. Ms. Frye was starting to tell me.”

  The sheriff nodded at her. She started over and told her story, only saying items in her briefcase were rearranged.

  “…When I got to the main house, Carson was there with Dallas and Evelyn. He said he’d been there since before supper, but—”

  “Evelyn said it,” Carson interjected.

  She met his gaze. “Evelyn said he’d been there since before supper.” Not looking away, she added, “But I was out of the guesthouse before the briefing. Carson had left my car this afternoon, approximately four blocks from here.”

  “Anyone could have gotten in while you and J.D. and I were together,” Monroe said. “A number of people have keys.”

  “Half the town,” murmured the sheriff.

  “Half the county.” His deputy looked down when the sheriff gave him a level gaze.

  Carson addressed the sheriff. “No one’s inside. We entered through the kitchen, went to the edge of the rug in the living room. Straight line in, straight line out.”

  Gardner looked over his shoulder from a contemplation of the building. “We?”

  “I told her to stay outside. She didn’t. Followed me in. Loud enough to scare off anybody who might have stuck around.” Maggie made a sound. “Not likely anybody there by then. They had an easy target when she came to the house — noisy, no weapon, alone. Back door was op
en when I got to it. She says she closed it.”

  The sheriff shifted his bleary gaze to her.

  “I pulled it closed,” she said. “I didn’t wait to see if it latched. May I have a word with you in private?”

  He jerked his head toward his car. Aware of the others all watching them, she took the passenger seat.

  “I have some photos. From cases. They were removed from the pocket in the lid of my briefcase and put in the main part so I would see it as soon as I opened the briefcase. Also, the order of the photos was changed,” she told him.

  After a couple breaths, he asked, “Anything taken? Anything else moved?”

  “Not that I’m aware of and I believe I would be. Another thing. He won’t have left fingerprints.”

  “He?”

  She shrugged. “Whoever. This was not some idiot breaking in for drug money. They got what they came for as soon as I opened my briefcase.”

  “You’re saying you don’t want your belongings fingerprinted?”

  “I don’t think there’s a chance in hell you’d find anything and with all that’s going on… But I’ll leave that to your professional judgment.”

  After a moment, he gave a quick nod and they climbed out.

  “Maggie,” Gardner ordered, “go back to the house with Dallas. J.D., you go with Abner while he looks around out here. I’m going inside.”

  “But I could lo—”

  He cut off her protest. “Now.”

  Dallas took her arm, a gentlemanly gesture that allowed him to steer her. “Come. We’re not wanted.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Dallas watched Maggie pace from the fireplace to the door and back.

  Let him.

  Her mind was running four times faster than her feet. She’d barely acknowledged Evelyn’s departure as soon as they returned to the house.

  Would Carson have had time this afternoon to get to the guesthouse between leaving her car and being at the office? Maybe not, but he’d had enough time while she’d been talking to Theresa Addington after the briefing.

  What could he have hoped to gain? What could anyone have hoped to gain?

  A message to keep Pan’s murder uppermost in her mind?

  That might point to Rick Wade. Or Pan’s parents.