Blindsighted

Chapter Seven

SARA leaned over the kitchen sink in her parents' house, using her father's wrench to loosen the faucet. She had spent most of the evening in the morgue performing Sibyl Adams's autopsy. Going back to a dark house, sleeping alone, had not been something she wanted to do. Add to that Jeffrey's last threat on her answering ma chine to come by her house, and Sara did not really have a choice as to where she slept last night. Except for sneaking in to pick up the dogs, she had not even bothered to change out of her scrubs.

She wiped sweat from her forehead, glancing at the clock on the coffeemaker. It was six-thirty in the morning and she had slept all of two hours. Every time she closed her eyes, she thought of Sibyl Adams sitting on the toilet, blind to what was happening to her, feeling everything her attacker was doing.

On the plus side, short of some type of family catastrophe, there was no way in hell today could possibly be as bad as yesterday.

Cathy Linton walked into the kitchen, opened a cabinet, and took down a coffee cup before she noticed her oldest daughter standing beside her. "What are you doing?"

Sara slid a new washer over the threaded bolt. "The faucet was leaking."

"Two plumbers in the family," Cathy complained, pouring herself a cup of coffee, "and my daughter the doctor ends up fixing the leaky faucet."

Sara smiled, putting her shoulder behind the wrench. The Lintons were a plumbing family, and Sara had spent most of her summers during school working alongside her father, snaking drains and welding pipe. Sometimes she thought the only reason she had finished high school a year early and worked through summers getting her undergrad degree was so she would not have to poke around spider-infested crawl spaces with her father. Not that she didn't love her father, but, unlike Tessa, Sara's fear of spiders could not be overcome.

Cathy slid onto the kitchen stool. "Did you sleep here last night?"

"Yeah," Sara answered, washing her hands. She turned off the faucet, smiling when it didn't leak. The sense of accomplishment lifted some of the weight off her shoulders.

Cathy smiled her approval. "If that medical thing doesn't work out, at least you'll have plumbing to fall back on."

"You know, that's what Daddy told me when he drove me to college the first day."

"I know," Cathy said. "I could have killed him." She took a sip of coffee, eyeing Sara over the rim of the cup. "Why didn't you go home?"

"I worked late and I just wanted to come here. Is that okay?"

"Of course it's okay," Cathy said, tossing Sara a towel. "Don't be ridiculous."

Sara dried her hands. "I hope I didn't wake you up when I came in."

"Not me," Cathy answered. "Why didn't you sleep with Tess?"

Sara made herself busy straightening the towel on the rack. Tessa lived in a two-bedroom apartment over the garage. In the last few years, there had been nights when Sara had not wanted to sleep alone in her own house. She generally stayed with her sister rather than risk waking her father, who invariably wanted to discuss at great length what was troubling her.

Sara answered, "I didn't want to bother her."

"Oh, bullshit." Cathy laughed. "Good Lord, Sara, nearly a quarter of a million dollars to that college and they didn't teach you to lie better than that?"

Sara took down her favorite mug and poured herself some coffee. "Maybe you should've sent me to law school instead."

Cathy crossed her legs, frowning. She was a small woman who kept herself trim by doing yoga. Her blond hair and blue eyes had skipped over Sara and been passed on to Tessa. Except for their matching temperaments, anyone would be hard-pressed to tell that Cathy and Sara were mother and daughter.

"Well?" Cathy prompted.

Sara couldn't keep the smile off of her lips. "Let's just say Tess was a little busy when I walked in and leave it at that."

"Busy by herself?"

"No." Sara barked an uncomfortable laugh, feeling her cheeks turn red. "God, Mother."

After a few moments, Cathy lowered her voice, asking, "Was it Devon Lockwood?"

"Devon?" Sara was surprised by the name. She hadn't been able to see exactly who Tessa was wrangling around with in bed, but Devon Lockwood, the new plumber's helper Eddie Linton had hired two weeks ago, was the last name she was expecting to come up.

Cathy shushed her. "Your father will hear."

"Hear what?" Eddie asked, shuffling into the kitchen. His eyes lit up when he saw Sara. "There's my baby," he said, kissing her cheek with a loud smack. "Was that you I heard coming in this morning?"

"That was me," Sara confessed.

"I got some paint chips in the garage," he offered. "Maybe we can go look at them after we eat, pick a pretty color for your room."

Sara sipped her coffee. "I'm not moving back in, Dad."

He jabbed a finger at the cup. "That'll stunt your growth."

"I should be so lucky," Sara grumbled. Since the ninth grade, she had been the tallest member of her immediate family, just inching past her father by a hair.

Sara slid onto the stool her mother vacated. She watched her parents as they went through their morning routine, her father walking around the kitchen, getting in her mother's way until Cathy pushed him into a chair. Her father smoothed his hair back as he leaned over the morning paper. His salt-and-pepper hair stuck out in three different directions, much like his eyebrows. The T-shirt he was wearing was so old and worn holes were breaking through over his shoulder blades. The pattern on his pajama pants had faded out over five years ago, and his bedroom slippers were falling apart at the heels. That she had inherited her mother's cynicism and her fathers sense of dress was something Sara would never forgive them for.

Eddie said, "I see the Observer's milking this thing for every penny."

Sara glanced at the headline of Grant's local paper. It read: "College Professor Slain in Grisly Attack."

"What's it say?" Sara asked before she could stop herself.

He traced his finger down the page as he read. " 'Sibyl Adams, a professor at GIT, was savagely beaten to death yesterday at the Grant Filling Station. Local police are baffled. Police Chief Jeffrey Tolliver' "-Eddie stopped, muttering, "the bastard" under his breath-" 'reports they are exploring every possible lead in order to bring the young professor's murderer to justice.'"

"She wasn't beaten to death," Sara said, knowing that the punch to Sibyl Adams's face had not killed her. Sara gave an involuntary shudder as she recalled the physical findings during the autopsy.

Eddie seemed to notice her reaction. He said, "Was anything else done to her?"

Sara was surprised her father had asked this. Normally, her family went out of their way not to ask questions about that side of Sara's life. She had felt from the beginning that they were all more than a little uncomfortable with her part-time job.

Sara asked, "Like what?" before she got her father's meaning. Cathy looked up from mixing the pancake batter, a look of trepidation on her face.

Tessa burst into the kitchen, popping the swinging door on its hinge, obviously, expecting to find Sara alone. Her mouth opened in a perfect 0.

Cathy, standing at the stove making pancakes, tossed over her shoulder, "Good morning, sunshine."

Tessa kept her head down, making a beeline for the coffee.

"Sleep well?" Eddie asked.

"Like a baby," Tessa returned, kissing the top of his head.

Cathy waved her spatula in Sara's direction. "You could learn from your sister."

Tessa had the common sense to ignore this comment. She opened the French door leading to the deck and jerked her head outside, indicating Sara should follow.

Sara did as she was told, holding her breath until the door was closed firmly behind her. She whispered, "Devon Lockwood?"

"I still haven't told them about your date with Jeb," Tessa countered.

Sara pressed her lips together, silently agreeing to the truce.

Tessa tucked one of her legs underneath her as she sat on the porch swing. "What were you doing out so late?"

"I was at the morgue," Sara answered, sitting beside her sister. She rubbed her arms, fighting the early morning chill. Sara was still in her scrubs and a thin white T-shirt, hardly enough for the temperature. "I needed to check some things. Lena-" She stopped herself, not sure she could tell Tessa what had happened with Lena Adams in the morgue last night. The accusations still stung, even though Sara knew it was Lena's grief talking.

She said, "I wanted to get it over with, you know?"

All mirth had left Tessa's features. "Did you find anything?"

"I faxed a report to Jeffrey. I think it's going to help him get some solid leads." She stopped, making sure she had Tessa's attention. "Listen, Tessie. Be careful, okay? I mean, keep the doors locked. Don't go out alone. That kind of thing."

"Yeah." Tessa squeezed her hand. "Okay. Sure."

"I mean-" Sara stopped, not wanting to terrify her sister, but not wanting to put her in danger either. "You're both the same age. You and Sibyl. Do you see what I'm getting at?"

"Yeah," Tessa answered, but it was obvious she did not want to talk about it. Sara couldn't blame her sister. Knowing in intimate detail what had happened to Sibyl Adams, Sara was finding it hard to get through the day.

"I put the postcard-" Tessa began, but Sara stopped her.

"I found it in my briefcase," she said. "Thanks."

"Yeah," Tessa said, a stillness to her voice.

Sara stared out at the lake, not thinking about the postcard, not thinking about Sibyl Adams or Jeffrey or anything. There was something so peaceful about the water that for the first time in weeks, Sara felt herself relax. If she squinted her eyes, she could see the dock at the back of her own house. It had a covered boathouse, a small floating barnlike structure, like most of the docks on the lake.

She imagined herself sitting in one of the deck chairs, sipping a margarita, reading a trashy novel. Why she pictured herself doing this, Sara did not know. She seldom had time to sit lately, she did not like the taste of alcohol, and at the end of the day she was nearly cross-eyed from reading patient charts, pediatric journals, and forensic field manuals.

Tessa interrupted her thoughts. "I guess you didn't get much sleep last night?"

Sara shook her head as she leaned against her sisters shoulder. "How was it being around Jeffrey yesterday?"

"I wish I could take a pill and forget all about him." Tessa raised her arm, putting it around Sara's shoulders. "Is that why you couldn't sleep?"

Sara sighed, closing her eyes. "I don't know. I was just thinking about Sibyl. About Jeffrey."

"Two years is a long time to carry a torch for somebody," Tessa said. "If you really want to get over him, then you need to start dating." She stopped Sara's protest. "I mean real dates, where you don't drop the guy as soon as he gets close."

Sara sat up, pulling her knees to her chest. She knew what her sister was suggesting. "I'm not like you. I can't just sleep around." Tessa didn't take offense at this. Sara had not expected her to. That Tessa Linton enjoyed an active sex life was pretty much known to everyone in town but their father.

"I was just sixteen when Steve and I got together," Sara began, referring to her first serious boyfriend. "Then, well, you know what happened in Atlanta." Tessa nodded. "Jeffrey made me like sex. I mean, for the first time in my life, I felt like a complete person." She clenched her fists, as if she could hold on to that feeling. "You have no idea what that meant to me, to be suddenly awake after all those years of focusing on school and work and not seeing anybody or having any kind of life." Tessa was quiet, letting Sara talk.

"I remember our first date," she continued. "He was driving me back to the house in the rain and he stopped the car all of a sudden. I thought it was a joke, because we'd both been talking about how much we liked to walk in the rain just a few minutes earlier. But he left the lights on and he got out of the car." Sara closed her eyes, seeing Jeffrey standing in the rain, his coat collar turned up to the cold. "There was a cat in the road. It had been hit, and it was obviously dead."

Tessa was silent, waiting. "And?" she prompted.

"And he picked it up and moved it out of the road so that no one else would hit it."

Tessa couldn't hide her shock. "He picked it up?"

"Yeah." Sara smiled fondly at the memory. "He didn't want anyone else to hit it."

"He touched a dead cat?"

Sara laughed at her reaction. "I never told you that before?"

"I think I'd remember."

Sara sat back in the swing, using her foot to keep it steady. "The thing was, at dinner he told me how much he hates cats. And here he was, stopping in the middle of the road in the dark, in the rain, to move the cat out of the road so that no one else would hit it."

Tessa could not mask her distaste. "Then he got back in the car with dead-cat hands?"

"I drove, because he didn't want to touch anything."

Tessa wrinkled her nose. "Is this the part where it gets romantic, because I'm feeling slightly sick to my stomach."

Sara gave her a sideways glance. "I drove him back to the house, and of course he had to come in to wash his hands." Sara laughed. "His hair was all wet from the rain and he kept his hands up like he was a surgeon who didn't want to mess up his scrub." Sara held her arms in the air, palms facing back, to illustrate.

"And?"

"And I took him into the kitchen to wash his hands because that's where the antibacterial soap is, and he couldn't squeeze the bottle without contaminating it, so I squeezed it for him." She sighed heavily. "And he was leaning over the sink washing his hands, then I was lathering up his hands for him, and they felt so strong and warm and he's always so goddamn sure of himself that he just looked up and kissed me right on the lips, without any hesitation, like he knew all along that while I was touching his hands all I could think about was how it would feel to have his hands on me, touching me."

Tessa waited until she was finished, then said, "Except for the dead cat part, that's the most romantic story I've ever heard."

"Well." Sara stood, walking over to the deck railing. "I'm sure he makes all his girlfriends feel special. That's one thing he's very good at, I guess."

"Sara, you'll never understand that sex is different for some people. Sometimes it's just fucking." She paused. "Sometimes it's just a way to get some attention."

"He certainly got my attention."

"He still loves you."

Sara turned, sitting on the railing. "He only wants me back because he lost me."

"If you were really serious about getting him out of your life," Tessa began, "then you would quit your job with the county."

Sara opened her mouth to respond, but she could not think of how to tell her sister that some days her county work was the only thing that kept her sane. There were only so many sore throats and earaches Sara could take before her mind started to go numb. To give up her job as coroner would be giving up a part of her life that she really enjoyed, despite the macabre aspects.

Knowing Tessa could never understand this, Sara said, "I don't know what I'm going to do."

There was no response. Tessa was looking back at the house. Sara followed her gaze through the kitchen window. Jeffrey Tolliver was standing by the stove, talking to her mother.

The Linton home was a split level that had been constantly renovated throughout its forty-year life. When Cathy took an interest in painting, a studio with a half bath was added on to the back. When Sara became obsessed with school, a study with a half bath was built into the attic. When Tessa became interested in boys, the basement was renovated in such a way that Eddie could get from anywhere in the house to the basement in three seconds flat. A stairway was at either end of the room and the closest bathroom was one floor up.

The basement had not changed much since Tessa moved away for college. The carpet was avocado green and the sectional sofa a dark rust. A combination Ping-Pong/pool table dominated the center of the room.

Sara had broken her hand once, diving for a Ping-Pong ball and slamming into the console television instead.

Sara's two dogs, Billy and Bob, were on the couch when Sara and Jeffrey walked down the stairs. She clapped her hands, trying to get them to move. The greyhounds did not budge until Jeffrey gave a low whistle. Their tails wagged as he walked over to pet them.

Jeffrey didn't mince words as he scratched Bob's belly. "I tried to call you all night. Where were you?"

Sara didn't feel he was entitled to that kind of information. She asked, "Did you get anything on Sibyl yet?"

He shook his head. "According to Lena, she wasn't seeing anybody. That rules out an angry boyfriend."

"Anybody in her past?"

"Nobody," he answered. "I guess I'll ask her roommate some questions today. She was living with Nan Thomas. You know, the librarian?"

"Yeah," Sara said, feeling things starting to click in her head. "Did you get my report yet?"

He shook his head, not understanding. "What?"

"That's where I was last night, doing the autopsy."

"What?" he repeated. "You can't do an autopsy without someone present."

"I know that, Jeffrey," Sara snapped back, crossing her arms. One person questioning her competency in the last twelve hours was quite enough. She said, "That's why I called Brad Stephens."

"Brad Stephens?" He turned his back to her, muttering something under his breath as he stroked underneath Billy's chin.

"What did you say?"

"I said you're acting strange lately." He turned, facing her. "You performed the autopsy in the middle of the night?"

"I'm sorry you find that strange, but I have two jobs to do, not just what I do for you." He tried to stop her but she continued. "In case you've forgotten, I have a full patient load at the clinic in addition to what I do at the morgue. Patients, by the way"-she checked her watch, not really noting the time-"that I have to start seeing in a few minutes." She tucked her hands into her hips. "Was there a reason you came by?"

"To check on you," he said. "Obviously you're all right. I guess that should come as no surprise to me. You're always all right."

"That's right."

"Sara Linton, stronger than steel."

Sara gave what she hoped was a condescending look. They had played out this scene so many times around the time of their divorce that she could recite both sides of the argument by heart. Sara was too independent. Jeffrey was too demanding.

She said, "I have to go."

"Wait a minute," he said. "The report?"

"I faxed it to you."

It was his turn to put his hands on his hips. "Yeah, I got that. You think you found something?"

"Yes," she answered, then, "No." She crossed her arms defensively. She hated when he downshifted from an argument into something to do with work. It was a cheap trick, and it always caught her off guard. She recovered somewhat, saying, "I need to hear back on the blood this morning. Nick Shelton is supposed to call me at nine, then I can tell you something." She added, "I wrote this on the cover page for my report."

"Why did you rush the blood?" he asked.

"Gut feeling," Sara answered. That was all she was prepared to give him at this moment. Sara did not like to go on half pieces of information. She was a doctor, not a fortune-teller. Jeffrey knew this.

"Take me through it," he said.

Sara folded her arms, not wanting to do this. She glanced back up the stairs to make sure no one was listening. "You read the report," she said.

"Please," he said. "I want to hear it from you."

Sara leaned against the wall. She closed her eyes for a brief second, not to help her recall the facts, but to give herself some distance from what she knew.

She began, "She was attacked on the toilet. She was probably easily subdued because of her blindness and the surprise element. I think he cut her early on, lifting her shirt, making the cross with his knife. The cut to her belly came early. It's not deep enough for full penetration. I think he inserted his penis more to defile her than anything else. He then raped her vaginally, which would explain the excrement I found there. I'm not sure if he climaxed. I don't imagine climax would be the issue for him."

"You think it's more about defiling her?"

She shrugged. Many rapists had some sort of sexual dysfunction. She didn't see why it would be any different with this one. The gut rape practically pointed it out.

She said, "Maybe it's the thrill of doing it in a semipublic place. Even though the lunch rush was over, someone could have come in and caught him."

He scratched his chin, obviously letting himself absorb this.

"Anything else?"

"Can you clear some time to come by?" he asked. "I can set up a briefing at nine-thirty."

"A full briefing?"

He shook his head. "I don't want anybody to know about that," he ordered, and for the first time in a long while, she was in complete agreement with him.

She said, "That's fine."

"Can you come in around nine-thirty?" he repeated.

Sara ran through her morning. Jimmy Powell's parents would be in her office at eight. Going from one horrible meeting to another would probably make her day easier. What's more, she knew that the sooner she briefed the detectives on Sibyl Adams's autopsy results, the sooner they could go out and find the man who had killed her.

"Yeah," she said, walking toward the stairs. "I'll be there."

"Wait a minute," he said. "Lena's going to be there, too."

Sara turned around, shaking her head. "No way. I'm not going to give a blow-by-blow of Sibyl's death in front of her sister."

"She has to be there, Sara. Trust me on this." He must have gathered her thoughts from the look she gave him. He said, "She wants the details. It's how she deals with things. She's a cop."

"It's not going to be good for her."

"She's made her decision," he repeated. "She'll get the facts one way or another, Sara. It's better she gets the truth from us than read whatever lies they put in the paper." He paused, probably seeing he still had not changed her mind. "If it was Tessa, you would want to know what happened."

"Jeffrey," Sara said, feeling herself relent despite her better judgment. "She doesn't need to remember her sister this way."

He shrugged. "Maybe she does."

At a quarter till eight in the morning, Grant County was just waking up. A sudden overnight rain had washed the pollen out of the streets, and though it was still cool out, Sara drove her BMW Z3 with the top down. The car had been purchased during a postdivorce crisis when Sara had needed something to make herself feel better. It had worked for about two weeks, then the stares and the comments about the flashy car had made her feel a bit ridiculous. This was not the kind of car to drive in a small town, especially since Sara was a doctor, and not just a doctor but a pediatrician. Had she not been born and raised in Grant, Sara suspected she would have been forced to sell the car or lose half her patients at the clinic. As it was, she had to put up with the constant comments from her mother about how ridiculous it was for a person who barely managed to coordinate her wardrobe to drive a flashy sports car.

Sara tossed a wave to Steve Mann, the owner of the hardware store, as she drove toward the clinic. He waved back, a surprised smile on his face. Steve was married with three kids now, but Sara knew he still had a crush on her in that way that first loves tend to hold on. As her first real boyfriend, Sara had a fondness for him, but nothing more than that. She remembered those awkward moments she spent as a teenager, being groped in the back of Steve's car. How she was too embarrassed to look him in the eye the day after they had first had sex.

Steve was the kind of guy who was happy to set his roots down in Grant, who cheerfully went from being the star quarterback at Robert E. Lee High School to working with his father in the hardware store. At that age, Sara had wanted nothing more than to get out of Grant, to go to Atlanta and live a life that was more exciting, more challenging, than what her home town could offer. How she ended up back here was as much a mystery to Sara as anyone else.

She kept her eyes straight ahead as she passed the diner, not wanting to be reminded of yesterday afternoon. She was so intent on avoiding that side of the street that she nearly ran into Jeb McGuire as he walked in front of the pharmacy.

Sara pulled alongside him, apologizing, "I'm sorry."

Jeb laughed good-naturedly as he jogged over to her car. "Trying to get out of our date tomorrow?"

"Of course not," Sara managed, forcing a smile onto her face. With all that had happened yesterday, she had completely forgotten about agreeing to go out with him. She had dated Jeb off and on when he first moved to Grant eleven years ago and bought the town's pharmacy. Nothing serious had ever developed between them, and things had pretty much cooled between them by the time Jeffrey came along. Why she had agreed to start dating him again after all this time, Sara could not say.

Jeb pushed his hair back off his forehead. He was a lanky man with a runner's build. Tessa had once compared his body to Sara's greyhounds. He was good-looking, though, and certainly did not have to look far to find a woman who would go out with him.

He leaned on Sara's car, asking, "Have you thought about what you want for dinner?"

Sara gave a shrug. "I can't decide," she lied. "Surprise me."

Jeb raised an eyebrow. Cathy Linton was right. She was a horrible liar.

"I know you got caught up in all that yesterday," he began, waving toward the diner. "I totally understand if you want to cancel."

Sara felt her heart flip at the offer. Jeb McGuire was a nice man. As the town's pharmacist, he engendered a certain amount of trust and respect from the people he served. On top of that, he was pretty good-looking. The only problem was he was too nice, too agreeable. They had never argued because he was too laid back to care. If anything, this made Sara think of him more as she would a brother rather than a potential lover.

"I don't want to cancel," she said, and oddly enough, she didn't. Maybe it would be good for her to get out more. Maybe Tessa was right. Maybe it was time.

Jeb's face lit up. "If it's not too cool, I can bring my boat and take you out on the lake."

She gave him a teasing look. "I thought you weren't going to get one until next year?"

"Patience has never been a strong suit," he answered, though the fact that he was talking to Sara proved that point to the contrary. He jabbed his thumb toward the pharmacy, indicating he needed to go. "I'll see you around six, okay?"

"Six," Sara confirmed, feeling some of his excitement rub off on her. She put the car in gear as he trotted over to the pharmacy. Marty Ringo, the woman who did checkout at the pharmacy, was standing at the entrance, and he put his arm around her shoulder as he unlocked the door.

Sara coasted into the clinics parking lot. The Heartsdale Children's Clinic was rectangular in shape with an octagonal room made of glass brick swelling out at the front. This was the waiting area for patients. Fortunately, Dr. Barney, who had designed the building himself, was a better doctor than he was an architect. The front room had a southern exposure, and the glass bricks turned the place into an oven in the summer and a freezer in the winter. Patients had been known to have their fevers break while waiting to see a doctor.

The waiting room was cool and empty when Sara opened the door. She looked around the dark room, thinking not for the first time that she should redecorate. Chairs that could hardly be called anything but utilitarian were set out for patients and their parents. Sara and Tessa had spent many a day sitting in those chairs, Cathy beside them, waiting for their names to be called. In the corner was a play area with three tables so children who felt like it could draw or read while they waited. Issues of Highlights sat beside People magazine and House amp; Garden. Crayons were stacked neatly in their trays, paper beside them.

Looking back, Sara wondered if she had decided in this room to become a doctor. Unlike Tessa, the prospect of going to Dr. Barney never frightened Sara, probably because Sara was rarely sick as a child. She liked the part when they were called back and got to go into the places that only the doctors were allowed to go. In seventh grade, when Sara had shown an interest in science, Eddie had found a biology professor at the college who needed his main water line replaced. The professor tutored Sara in exchange for the work. Two years later, a chemistry professor needed his whole house replumbed, and Sara was performing experiments alongside college students.

The lights came on and Sara blinked to adjust her eyes. Nelly opened the door separating the exam rooms from the waiting room.

"Good morning, Dr. Linton," Nelly said, handing Sara a stack of pink messages, taking Sara's briefcase. "I got your message this morning about the meeting at the station. I've already moved around your appointments. You don't mind working a little late?"

Sara shook her head, going through the messages.

"The Powells will be here in about five minutes, and there's a fax on your desk."

Sara looked up to thank her, but she was already off, probably running down Elliot Felteau's schedule. Sara had hired Elliot straight out of his residency at Augusta Hospital. He was eager to learn what he could and eventually buy a partnership in the practice. While Sara wasn't sure how she felt about having a partner, she also knew Elliot was at least ten years away from being in a position to make an offer.

Molly Stoddard, Sara's nurse, met her in the hallway. "Ninety-five percent blast on the Powell kid," she said, citing the lab results.

Sara nodded. "They'll be here any minute."

Molly offered Sara a smile that said she did not envy Sara the task ahead of her. The Powells were good people. They had divorced a couple of years ago but shown surprising solidarity where their children were concerned.

Sara said, "Can you pull a phone number for me? I want to send them to a man I know at Emory. He's doing some interesting trials with early-stage AML."

Sara gave the name as she slid open her office door. Nelly had put Sara's briefcase by her chair and a cup of coffee on her desk. Beside this was the fax she had mentioned. It was the GBI report on Sibyl Adams's blood work. Nick had scribbled an apology at the top, saying he would be in meetings most of the day and knew Sara would want to know the results as soon as possible. Sara read the report twice, feeling a cold ache in her stomach as she digested it.

She sat back in her chair, looking around her office. Her first month on the job had been hectic, but nothing like Grady. Maybe three months passed before Sara got used to the slower pace. Earaches and sore throats were plentiful, but not many kids came in with critical cases. Those went to the hospital over in Augusta.

Darryl Harp's mother was the first parent to give Sara a picture of her child. More parents followed suit, and pretty soon she started taping them to the walls of her office. Twelve years had passed since that first picture, and photographs of lads wallpapered her office wall and spilled into the bathroom. She could glance at any one of them and remember the kid's name and most of the time his or her medical history. Already she was seeing them come back to the clinic as young adults, telling them at nineteen years old they should probably consider seeing a general practitioner. Some of them actually cried. Sara had gotten choked up on a couple of occasions. Since she wasn't able to have children, she often found she developed strong attachments to her patients.

Sara opened her briefcase to find a chart, stopping at the sight of the postcard she had gotten in the mail. She stared at the photograph of Emory University's entrance gates. Sara remembered the day the acceptance letter had come from Emory. She had been offered scholarships to schools up north with more recognizable names, but Emory had always been a dream of hers. Real medicine took place there, and Sara could not imagine herself living anywhere else but the South.

She flipped the card over, tracing her finger along the neatly typed address. Every year since Sara had left Atlanta, around the middle of April, she got a postcard like this one. Last year's had been from The World of Coke, the message stating, "He's got the whole world in His hands."

She started when Nelly's voice came through the speaker on the phone.

"Dr. Linton?" Nelly said. "The Powells are here."

Sara let her finger rest just above the red reply button. She dropped the card back in her briefcase, saying, "I'll be right out to get them."

Chapter Eight

WHEN Sibyl and Lena were in the seventh grade, an older boy named Boyd Little thought it was funny to sneak up on Sibyl and snap his fingers in her ear. Lena followed him off the school bus one day and jumped on his back. Lena was small and quick, but Boyd was one year older and about fifty pounds heavier. He beat her to a pulp before the bus driver could break them up.

Keeping this episode in mind, Lena Adams could honestly say that she had never felt so physically ravaged as she did the morning after her sister's death. She finally understood why they called it "hung over" because her entire body felt hung over her bones, and it took a good half hour under a hot shower before she could stand up straight. Her head felt ready to crack open from the stress in her brain. No amount of toothpaste could take the horrendous taste out of her mouth, and her stomach felt as if someone had wrapped it tightly into a ball and tied a couple of strings of dental floss around it.

She sat at the back of the briefing room of the station house, willing herself not to throw up again. Not that there was much left she could vomit. Her insides felt so vacant that her stomach was actually concave.

Jeffrey walked over to her, offering a cup of coffee. "Drink some of this," he ordered.

She didn't argue. At the house this morning, Hank had told her the same thing. She had been too embarrassed to take anything from him, let alone advice, so she had suggested a different place for him to put the coffee.

As soon as she put the cup down, Jeffrey said, "It's not too late, Lena."

"I want to be here," she countered. "I have to know."

He held her gaze for what seemed like an eternity. Despite the fact that any source of light was like needles in her eyes, she was not the first to break contact. Lena waited until he had left the room to sit back in her chair. She leaned the bottom of the cup on her knee as she closed her eyes.

Lena did not remember how she got home last night. The thirty-minute trip from Reece was still a blur. She did know that Hank had driven her car, because when she got into it this morning to drive to the station, the seat was pushed all the way back and the mirror was adjusted at an odd angle. The last thing Lena remembered was looking at her reflection in the plate glass window of the Stop 'n' Save. The next memory was the blaring ring of the telephone when Jeffrey had called to tell her about the briefing, practically begging her not to come. Everything else was lost to her.

Getting dressed this morning had been the hardest part. After the long shower, Lena wanted nothing more than to crawl back into bed, tucked into a ball. She would have been perfectly happy doing this for the rest of the day, but she couldn't give in to that weakness. Last night had been a mistake, but a necessary one. Obviously, she had needed to let herself go, to grieve as much as she could without falling apart.

This morning was a different story. Lena had forced herself to put on slacks and a nice jacket, the kind of outfit she wore every day on the job. Strapping on her holster, checking her gun, Lena had felt herself slipping back into being a cop instead of the victim's sister. Still, her head ached and her thoughts seemed to be stuck like glue on the inside of her brain. With an unprecedented sympathy, she understood how alcoholics got started. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she couldn't help thinking that a stiff drink would do her a world of good.

The door to the briefing room squeaked open, and Lena looked up in time to see Sara Linton standing in the hallway, her back to Lena. Sara was saying something to Jeffrey, and it did not look polite. Lena felt a pang of guilt for the way she treated Sara the night before. Despite what Lena had said, she knew that Sara was a good doctor. From all accounts, Linton had given up a very promising career in Atlanta to come back to Grant. She was owed an apology, something Lena did not even want to think about at this point in time. If records had been kept on the matter, Lena 's outburst-to-apology ratio would be heavily weighted in the outburst department.

" Lena," Sara said. "Come on back with me."

Lena blinked, wondering when Sara had crossed the room. She was standing at the door to the supply closet.

Lena scooted up in her chair to stand, forgetting about the coffee. Some of it spilled on her pants, but she didn't care. She set the cup on the floor and followed Sara's orders. The supply closet was large enough to be called a room, but the sign on the door had given it this designation years ago, and nobody had bothered to make a clarification. Among other things stored here were evidence, dummies for the CPR classes the police gave in the fall, and the emergency supply kit.

"Here," Sara said, pulling up a chair. "Sit."

Again, Lena did as she was told. She watched as Sara rolled out a tank of oxygen.

Sara hooked up a mask to the tank, saying, "Your head is hurting because the alcohol depletes oxygen in your blood." She flexed the rubber band around the mask, holding it out to Lena. "Take slow, deep breaths and it should start to feel better."

Lena took the mask, not actually trusting Sara, but at this point she would have sucked the ass end of a skunk if someone had told her it would make her head stop pounding.

After a few more breaths, Sara asked, "Better?"

Lena nodded, because it was better. She wasn't feeling up to her usual self, but at least she could open her eyes all the way.

" Lena," Sara said, taking the mask back. "I wanted to ask you about something I found."

"Yeah?" Lena said, feeling put on her guard. She was expecting Sara to try to talk her out of being here during the briefing, so when the other woman spoke, Lena was surprised.

"When I was examining Sibyl," Sara began, storing the tank back against the wall, "I found some physical evidence that I wasn't exactly expecting."

"Like what?" Lena asked, her mind starting to work again.

"I don't think it has a bearing on the case, but I have to tell Jeffrey what I found. It's not up to me to make that kind of decision."

Despite the fact that Sara had helped her headache, Lena did not have patience for her games. "What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about the fact that your sister's hymen was intact up until the rape."

Lena felt her stomach drop. She should have thought of this, but too much had happened in the last twenty-four hours for Lena to come to logical conclusions. Now the whole world would know her sister was gay.

"I don't care, Lena," Sara said. "Really. However she wanted to live her life is fine with me."

"What the hell does that mean?"

"It means what it means," Sara answered, obviously thinking that was enough. When Lena did not respond, she added, " Lena, I know about Nan Thomas. I put two and two together."

Lena leaned her head back against the wall, closing her eyes. "I guess you're giving me a heads up, huh? For telling everybody else my sister was gay?"

Sara was quiet, then, "I hadn't planned on putting that in my briefing."

"I'll tell him," Lena decided, opening her eyes. "Can you give me a minute?"

"Sure."

Lena waited until Sara had left the room, then put her head into her hands. She wanted to cry, but no tears would come. Her body was so dehydrated she was amazed she still had spit in her mouth. She took a deep breath to brace herself and stood.

Frank Wallace and Matt Hogan were in the briefing room when she came out of the supply closet. Frank gave her a nod, but Matt made himself busy putting cream in his coffee. Both detectives were in their fifties, both from a very different time than the one Lena had grown up in. Like the rest of the detectives on the senior squad, they operated by the old rules of the police fraternity, where justice at any cost was right. The force was their family, and anything that happened to one of their officers affected them as it would a brother. If Grant was a close-knit community, the detectives were even closer. As a matter of fact, Lena knew that every one of her fellow detectives were members at the local lodge. Except for the simple matter of her not having a penis, she imagined she would have been invited to join a long time ago, if not out of respect, then obligation.

She wondered what these two old men would think knowing they were working a case to find out who had raped a lesbian. Once, a long time ago, Lena had actually heard Matt start a sentence with the words, "Back when the Klan was doing some good…" Would they be as vigilant if they knew about Sibyl, or would their anger dissipate? Lena did not want to find out the hard way.

Jeffrey was reading a report when she knocked on his open office door.

"Sara get you straightened out?" he asked.

She did not like the way he phrased his question, but Lena said yes anyway as she closed the door.

Jeffrey was obviously surprised to see her close the door. He set aside the report and waited for her to sit down before asking, "What's up?"

Lena felt the best thing to do was blurt it out. "My sister was a lesbian."

Her words hung in the air over their heads like cartoons. Lena fought the urge to give a nervous laugh. She had never spoken them out loud before. Sibyl's sexuality was something Lena was not comfortable talking about, even with her sister. When Sibyl moved in with Nan Thomas a short year after moving to Grant, Lena had not pushed for details. She honestly had not wanted to know them.

"Well," Jeffrey said, his voice indicating surprise, "thank you for telling me that."

"Do you think it impacts the investigation?" Lena asked, wondering if this was all for nothing.

"I don't know," he answered, and she felt he was telling the truth. "Has anyone been sending her threatening mail? Making disparaging remarks?"

Lena wondered about this, too. Nan had said nothing new had happened in the last few weeks, but she also knew Lena was not open to discussing anything that might bring up the fact that Nan was fucking her sister. "I guess you should talk to Nan."

"Nan Thomas?"

"Yeah," Lena said. "They lived together. The address is on Cooper. Maybe we could go after the briefing?"

"Later today," he said. "Around four?"

Lena nodded her agreement. She couldn't stop herself from asking, "Are you going to tell the guys?"

He seemed surprised by her question. After giving her a long look, he said, "I don't think it's necessary at this stage. We'll talk to Nan tonight and go from there."

Lena felt an inordinate amount of relief.

Jeffrey glanced at his watch. "We'd better get to the briefing."

Chapter Nine

JEFFREY stood at the front of the briefing room, waiting for Lena to come out of the bathroom. After their discussion, she had asked for a few minutes. He hoped she took the time to get herself together. Despite her temper, Lena Adams was a smart woman and a good cop. He hated to see her going through this alone. Jeffrey also knew that she would not have it any other way.

Sara sat in the front row, her legs crossed. She was wearing an olive-colored linen dress that fell to just above her ankles. Two slits came up either side of her legs, stopping just below her knees. Her red hair was pulled up into a ponytail behind her neck, like she had worn it to church on Sunday. Jeffrey remembered the expression on her face when she had noticed him sitting in the pew behind her and wondered if there would ever be a time in his life again when Sara was actually pleased to see him. He had stared at his hands the entire service, biding his time until he could slip out without causing too much commotion.

Sara Linton was what Jeffrey's father liked to call a tall drink of water. Jeffrey had been attracted to Sara because of her strong will, her fierce independence. He liked her aloofness and the way she talked down to his football buddies. He liked the way her mind worked and the fact that he could talk about every aspect of his job and know she would understand. He liked that she couldn't cook and that she could sleep through a hurricane. He liked that she was a horrible house cleaner and that her feet were so big she could wear his shoes. What he really liked was that she knew all these things about herself and was actually proud of them.

Of course, her independence had a downside. Even after six years of marriage, he wasn't sure he knew one damn thing about her. Sara was so good at projecting a strong facade that after a while he wondered if she even needed him. Between her family, the clinic, and the morgue, there did not seem to be a whole lot of time left for Jeffrey.

While he knew cheating on Sara was not the best way to go about changing things, he did know that at that point in time, something had to give in their marriage. He wanted to see her hurt. He wanted to see her fight for him and their relationship. That the first would happen and not the latter still kept his mind spinning. At times, Jeffrey was almost angry with Sara that something so meaningless, something so stupid as a mindless sexual indiscretion, had broken up their marriage.

Jeffrey leaned against the podium, his hands clasped in front of him. He pushed Sara from his mind and concentrated on the task at hand. On the card table beside him was a sixteen-page list of names and addresses. All convicted sexual offenders living in or moving to the state of Georgia were required to register their name and address with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation's Crime Information Center. Jeffrey had spent last night and most of the morning compiling this information on the sixty-seven Grant residents who had registered since the law was passed in 1996. Going through their crimes was a daunting task, not least of all because he knew that sexual predators were like cockroaches. For every one you saw, there were twenty more hiding behind the walls.

He did not let his mind dwell on this as he waited to start the meeting. The briefing room was hardly filled to capacity. Frank Wallace, Matt Hogan, and five other detectives were part of the senior squad. Jeffrey and Lena rounded out this number to nine. Of the nine, only Jeffrey and Frank had worked in municipalities larger than Grant. Sibyl Adams 's killer certainly seemed to have better odds.

Brad Stephens, a junior patrolman who despite his youth and lack of rank knew how to keep his mouth shut, stood just beside the door in case anyone tried to come in. Brad was a kind of mascot around the squad, and the fact that he still had most of his baby fat gave him a round, cartoonish appearance. His thin blond hair always looked as if someone had just rubbed a balloon against it. His mother often brought his lunch to the station. He was a good kid, though. Brad had still been in high school when he contacted Jeffrey about being on the force. Like most of his younger cops, he came from Grant; his people were here. He had a vested interest in keeping the streets safe.

Jeffrey cleared his throat for attention as Brad opened the door for Lena. If anyone was surprised to see her there, they didn't say. She took a chair in the back, her arms crossed over her chest, her eyes still red either from her recent binge or from crying or from both.

"Thank you for coming on such short notice," Jeffrey began. He gave Brad a nod, indicating that he should start circulating the five packets Jeffrey had put together earlier.

"Let me preface this by saying anything said in this room today should be treated as highly confidential information. What you hear today is not for general consumption and any leaks could greatly impede our case." He waited as Brad finished his rounds.

"I'm sure all of you know by now that Sibyl Adams was killed yesterday at the Filling Station." Nods came from the men who were not going through the copies. What he said next made them all look up. "She was raped before she was killed."

There seemed to be a rise in the temperature of the room as he let this set in. These men were from different times. Women were as mysterious to them as the origins of the planet. Sibyl's rape would galvanize them into action like nothing else.

Jeffrey held up his copy of the list as Brad passed out the packets according to the names Jeffrey had written on the outside. Jeffrey said, "I pulled this list of offenders off the computer this morning. I've sectioned them off to the usual teams, with the exception of Frank and Lena." He saw her mouth open to complain, but continued. "Brad will be working with you, Lena. Frank is with me."

Lena sat back in a defiant posture. Brad was hardly on her level, and her look said she knew exactly what he was doing. She would also realize as soon as she interviewed the third or fourth man on her list that Jeffrey was keeping her on a tight leash. Rapists tended to attack women in their own ethnic and age group. Lena and Brad would be interviewing every minority over the age of fifty with a sexual assault on his record.

"Dr. Linton will give you the rundown on the specifics." He paused, then, "My first guess would be that the attacker has some kind of religious leaning, maybe a fanatic. I don't want that to be the focus of your questioning, but keep it in the back of your mind." He stacked the papers on the podium. "If somebody comes up that we should look at, I want a call on my radio. I don't want any suspect falling down in custody or accidentally getting his head blown off."

Jeffrey studiously avoided meeting Sara's eyes as he said this last part. Jeffrey was a cop, he knew how things worked in the street. He knew that every man in this room had something to prove where Sibyl Adams was concerned. He also knew how easy it was to slip over that line between legal justice and human justice when you were out in the field, facing down the kind of animal who could rape a blind woman and carve a cross onto her abdomen.

"That clear?" he asked, not expecting an answer and not getting one. "I'll turn this over to Dr. Linton, then."

He walked to the back of the room, standing behind and to the right of Lena as Sara took the podium. She walked over to the chalkboard, reached up, and pulled down the white projection screen. Most of the men in this room had seen her in diapers, and the fact that they all had their notebooks out said volumes about Sara's professional abilities.

She gave Brad Stephens a nod and the room went dark.

The green opaque projector whirred to life, sending a flash of bright light onto the screen. Sara moved a photograph onto the bed and slid it under the glass.

"Sibyl Adams was found by me in the women's bathroom of the Filling Station around two-thirty yesterday afternoon," she said, focusing the projector's lens.

There was movement in the room as a Polaroid of Sibyl Adams lying partially nude on the bathroom floor came into view. Jeffrey found himself staring at the hole in her chest, wondering what kind of man could do the things that had been done to that poor young woman. He did not want to think about Sibyl Adams, blind, sitting on that toilet while her attacker slit her open for his own sick reasons. He did not want to think about what was going through her mind as her abdomen was being raped.

Sara continued. "She was sitting on the toilet when I opened the door. Her arms and legs were splayed open and the cut you see here"-she indicated the screen-"was bleeding profusely."

Jeffrey leaned over slightly, trying to see what Lena 's reaction to this was. She stood stock still, her spine a perfect right angle to the floor. He understood why she needed to do this, but he could not grasp how she was doing it. If someone in his family had gone through this, if Sara had been ravaged like this, Jeffrey knew in his heart that he would not want to know. He could not know.

Sara stood at the front of the room, her arms crossed over her chest. "She started to seize shortly after I established that she had a pulse. We fell to the ground. I tried to control the seizures, but she expired several seconds later."

Sara jerked the projector's drawer out to replace the photo with another. The machine was a dinosaur, borrowed from the high school. It wasn't as if Sara could send the crime photos down to the Jiffy Photo for enlargements.

The next picture that came on-screen was a close up of Sibyl Adams's head and neck. "The bruise under her eye came from a superior position, probably early on in the assault to discourage a struggle. A knife was held at her throat, very sharp, measuring about six inches. I'd say this was a boning knife, probably common to any kitchen. You can see a slight cut here." She traced her finger on the screen, along the middle of Sibyl's neck. "It didn't draw blood, but enough pressure was used to score the skin." She looked up, catching Jeffrey's eye. "I would imagine the knife was used to keep her from calling out while he raped her."

She continued. "There is a small bite mark on her left shoulder." The picture of this came up. "Bite marks are common with rape. This one shows the impression of the upper teeth only. I found nothing distinctive in the pattern, but I've sent the…" Sara paused, probably remembering Lena was in the room. "The impression was sent to the FBI lab for cross matching. If a known offender on file matches the impression, then we could assume that he's the perpetrator in this crime. However," she warned, "as we all know, the FBI won't consider this a high-priority case, so I don't think we can hang out hats on this piece of evidence. A more likely scenario would be to use the impression as validation after the fact. That is to say, find a solid suspect and nail him with the dental impression."

Next, the screen showed a photograph of the inner sides of Sibyl's legs. "You can see scrapes here at the knee where she gripped her legs around the toilet bowl during the assault." Another picture came, this one of Sibyl's bottom. "There are irregular bruises and scrapes on the buttocks, again from friction against the toilet seat.

"Her wrists," Sara said, putting in another photo, "show bruising from the handicap bars on the stall. Two fingernails were broken in the process of gripping the bars, probably to lift herself up and away from her assailant."

Sara slid in the next photograph. "This is a close-up of the incisions to her abdomen," she narrated. "The first cut was made from just below the collarbone all the way to the pelvic bone. The second cut was made from right to left." She paused. "I would guess from the irregular depth of the second cut that this was a backhanded movement by a left-handed assailant. The cut is deeper as it moves to her right side."

The next Polaroid was a close-up of Sibyls chest. Sara was quiet for a few beats, probably thinking the same thing Jeffrey was thinking. Up close, he could see where the puncture wound had been stretched. Not for the first time, he felt his stomach roll at the thought of what was done to this poor woman. He hoped to God she had not been conscious of what was happening to her.

Sara said, "This is the final cut. It's a puncture wound through the sternum. It goes straight through to her spine. I would guess this was the source of most of the blood." Sara turned to Brad. "Lights?"

She walked toward her briefcase, saying, "The symbol on her chest seems to be a cross. The assailant used a condom during the rape, which as we know is pretty common with the advent of DNA testing. Black lighting revealed no sperm or fluids. Blood on the scene appears to be only from the victim." She took a sheet of paper out of her briefcase. "Our friends at the Georgia Bureau of Investigation were nice enough to pull some strings last night. They worked up the blood analysis for me." She put on her copper-rimmed glasses and began reading, "High concentrations of hyoscyamine, atrosin and belladonnine as well as traces of scopolamine were found in her central blood and urine." She looked up. "This would suggest that Sibyl Adams ingested a lethal dose of belladonna, which belongs in the deadly nightshade plant family." Jeffrey glanced at Lena. She remained quiet, her eyes on Sara.

"An overdose of belladonna can mimic a complete shutdown of the parasympathetic nervous system. Sibyl Adams was blind, but her pupils were dilated from the drug. The bronchioles in her lungs were swollen. Her core body temperature was still high, which is what made me wonder about her blood in the first place." She turned to Jeffrey, answering the question he had asked this morning. "During the post, her skin was still warm to the touch. There were no environmental factors that would cause this. I knew it had to be something in the blood."

She continued. "Belladonna can be broken down for medical applications, but its also used as a recreational drug."

"You think the perp gave it to her?" Jeffrey asked. "Or is this the kind of thing she would take on her own?"

Sara seemed to consider this. "Sibyl Adams was a chemist. She certainly wouldn't take such a volatile drug, then run out for lunch. This is a very strong hallucinogen. It affects the heart, breathing, and circulation."

"Nightshade grows all over town," Frank pointed out.

"It's pretty common," Sara agreed, looking back at her notes. "The plant isn't easy to process. Ingestion is going to be the key component here. According to Nick, the easiest and most popular way to take belladonna is to soak the seeds in hot water. Just this morning I found three recipes on the Internet for preparing belladonna as a tea."

Lena offered, "She liked to drink hot tea."

"There you go," Sara said. "The seeds are highly soluble. I imagine within minutes of drinking it she would have started experiencing elevated blood pressure, heart palpitations, dry mouth, and extreme nervousness. I would also guess this led her to the bathroom, where her rapist was waiting for her."

Frank turned to Jeffrey. "We need to talk to Pete Wayne. He served her lunch. He gave her the tea."

"No way," Matt countered. "Pete's lived in town all his life. This isn't the kind of thing he'd do." Then, as if this was the most important thing in Pete's favor, Matt added, "He's in the lodge."

Murmurs came from the other men. Someone, Jeffrey wasn't sure who, said, "What about Frank's colored man?"

Jeffrey felt a trickle of sweat run down his back. He could see where this was going already. He held his hands up for silence. "Frank and I will talk to Pete. You guys have your assignment. I want reports back at the end of the day."

Matt seemed about to say something, but Jeffrey stopped him. "We're not helping Sibyl Adams by sitting in this room pulling theories out of our asses." He paused, then indicated the packets Brad had handed out. "Knock on every goddamn door in town if you have to, but I want an accounting for every man on those lists."

As Jeffrey and Frank walked to the diner, the words "Frank's colored man" sat in the back of Jeffrey's mind like a piece of hot coal. The vernacular was familiar from his childhood, but he had not heard it used in at least thirty years. It amazed Jeffrey to see that such overt racism still existed. It also scared him that he had heard it in his own squad room. Jeffrey had worked in Grant for ten years, but he was still an outsider. Even his southern roots didn't pay his dues into the good old boy club. Coming from Alabama didn't help matters. A typical prayer among southern states was "Thank God for Alabama," meaning, thank God we're not as bad off as they are. This was part of the reason he was keeping Frank Wallace close at hand. Frank was a part of these men. He was in the club.

Frank shucked off his coat, folding it across his arm as he walked. He was tall and thin like a reed with a face rendered unreadable from years of being a cop.

Frank said, "This black guy, Will Harris. I got called in a few years back on a domestic dispute. He popped his wife."

Jeffrey stopped. "Yeah?"

Frank stopped alongside him. "Yeah," he said. "Beat her pretty bad. Busted her lip. When I got there, she was on the floor. She was wearing this cotton bag-looking kind of dress." He shrugged. "Anyway, it was torn."

"You think he raped her?"

Frank shrugged. "She wouldn't press charges."

Jeffrey started walking again. "Anybody else know about this?"

"Matt," Frank said. "He was my partner then."

Jeffrey felt a sense of dread as he opened the door to the diner.

"We're closed," Pete called from the back.

Jeffrey said, "It's Jeffrey, Pete."

He came out of the storeroom, wiping his hands on his apron. "Hey, Jeffrey," he said, nodding. Then, "Frank."

"We should be finished up in here this afternoon, Pete," Jeffrey said. "You'll be able to open tomorrow."

"Closing for the rest of the week," Pete said as he retied his apron strings. "Don't seem right to be open what with Sibyl and all." He indicated the row of stools in front of the bar. "Get y'all some coffee?"

"That'd be great," Jeffrey said, taking the first stool. Frank followed suit, sitting down beside him.

Jeffrey watched Pete walk around the counter and take out three thick ceramic mugs. The coffee steamed as he poured it into the cups.

Pete asked, "You got anything yet?"

Jeffrey took one of the mugs. "Can you run through what happened yesterday? I mean, from the point Sibyl Adams came into the restaurant?"

Pete leaned back against the grill. "I guess she came in about one-thirty," he said. "She always came in after the lunch rush. I guess she didn't want to be poking around with her cane in front of all those people. I mean, we knew she was blind, sure, but she didn't like drawing attention to it. You could see that. She was kind of nervous in crowds."

Jeffrey took out his notebook, though he didn't really need to take notes. What he did know was that Pete seemed to know a lot about Sibyl Adams. "She come in here a lot?"

"Every Monday like clockwork." He squinted his eyes, thinking. "I guess for the last five years or so. She came in sometimes late at night with other teachers or Nan from the library. I think they rented a house over on Cooper."

Jeffrey nodded.

"But that was only occasionally. Mostly it was Mondays, always by herself. She walked here, ordered her lunch, then was out by around two usually." He rubbed his chin, a sad look coming over his face. "She always left a nice tip. I didn't think anything about it when I saw her table empty. I guess I just thought she had gone while I wasn't looking."

Jeffrey asked, "What'd she order?"

"Same thing as always," Pete said. "The number three."

Jeffrey knew this was the waffle platter with eggs, bacon, and a side of grits.

"Only," Pete clarified, "she didn't eat meat, so I always left off the bacon. And she didn't drink coffee, so I gave her some hot tea."

Jeffrey wrote this down. "What kind of tea?"

He rooted around behind the counter and pulled out a box of generic brand tea bags. "I picked it up for her at the grocery store. She didn't drink caffeine." He gave a small laugh. "I liked to make her comfortable, you know? She didn't get out much. She used to say to me that she liked coming here, that she felt comfortable." He fiddled with the box of tea.

"What about the cup she used?" Jeffrey asked.

"I don't know about that. They all look the same." He walked to the end of the counter and pulled out a large metal drawer. Jeffrey leaned over to look inside. The drawer was actually a large dishwasher filled with cups and plates.

Jeffrey asked, "Those from yesterday?"

Pete nodded. "I can't begin to guess which one was hers. I started the washer before she was-" He stopped, looking down at his hands. "My dad, he always told me to take care of the customers and they'd take care of you." He looked up, tears in his eyes. "She was a nice girl, you know? Why would anybody want to hurt her?"

"I don't know, Pete," Jeffrey said. "Mind if we take this?" He pointed to the box of tea.

Pete shrugged. "Sure, nobody else drank it." The laugh came again. "I tried it once just to see. Tasted like brown water."

Frank pulled a tea bag out of the box. Each bag was wrapped and sealed in a paper envelope. He asked, "Was old Will working here yesterday?"

Pete seemed taken aback by the question. "Sure, he's worked lunch every day for the last fifty years. Comes in about eleven, leaves by two or so." He studied Jeffrey. "He does odd jobs for people around town after he leaves here. Mostly yard work, some light carpentry."

"He buses tables here?" Jeffrey asked, though he had eaten enough lunches in the diner to know what Will Harris did.

"Sure," Pete said. "Buses tables, mops the floors, takes people their food." He gave Jeffrey a curious look. "Why?"

"No reason." Jeffrey answered. Leaning over, he shook the man's hand, saying, "Thanks, Pete. We'll let you know if we need anything else."

Chapter Ten

LENA traced her finger along the street map in her lap. "Left here," she told Brad.

He did as he was told, steering the cruiser onto Baker Street. Brad was okay, but he tended to take people at face value, which is why back at the station when Lena said she had to go to the bathroom, then headed the exact opposite direction of the women's room, he hadn't said anything. A joke around the station house was to hide Brad's patrolman's hat from him. At Christmas, they had stuck it on top of one of the reindeer on display in front of city hall. A month ago, Lena had spotted the hat on top of the statue of Robert E. Lee in front of the high school.

Lena knew Jeffrey partnering her with Brad Stephens was his way of keeping her at the periphery of the investigation. If she had to guess, she would say that every man on their list was either dead or too old to stand up without help.

"The next right," she said, folding the map. She had sneaked into Marias office and looked up Will Harris's address in the phone book during her alleged trip to the bathroom. Jeffrey would interview Pete first. Lena wanted a crack at Will Harris before her chief could get to him.

"Right here," Lena said, indicating he could pull over. "You can stay here."

Brad slowed the car, putting his fingers to his mouth. "What's the address?"

"Four-thirty-one," she said, spotting the mailbox. She slipped off her seat belt and opened her door before the car came to a complete stop. She was walking up the driveway by the time Brad caught up with her.

"What are you doing?" he asked, trotting alongside her like a puppy. " Lena?"

She stopped, putting her hand in her pocket. "Listen, Brad, just go back to the car." She was two ranks above him. Technically, Brad was supposed to follow her orders. This thought seemed to cross his mind, but he shook his head no.

He said, "This is Will Harris's place, isn't it?"

Lena turned her back to him, continuing up the driveway.

Will Harris's house was small, probably little more than two rooms and a bath. The clapboard was painted bright white and the lawn was neatly tended. There was a well-tended look to the place that set Lena on edge. She could not think that the person who lived in this house could do such a thing to her sister.

Lena knocked on the screen door. She could hear a television inside, and distant movement. Through the screen mesh, she could see a man struggling to get out of his chair. He was wearing a white undershirt and white pajama pants. A puzzled expression was on his face.

Unlike most people who worked in town, Lena wasn't a regular at the diner. Somewhere in the back of her mind Lena had considered the diner Sibyl's territory and hadn't wanted to intrude. Lena had never really met Will Harris. She had been expecting someone younger. Someone more menacing. Will Harris was an old man.

When he finally reached the door and saw Lena, his lips parted in surprise. Neither spoke for a moment, then Will finally said, "You must be her sister."

Lena stared at the old man. She knew in her gut that Will Harris had not killed her sister, but there was still the possibility that he knew who had.

She said, "Yes, sir. Do you mind if I come in?"

The hinge on the screen door screeched as it opened. He stepped aside, holding the door open for Lena.

"You gotta excuse my appearance," he said, indicating his pajamas. "I wasn't exactly expecting visitors."

"That's okay," Lena offered, glancing around the small room. The living room and kitchen space were blended, a couch delineating the two. There was a square hallway off the left through which Lena could see a bathroom. She guessed the bedroom was on the other side of the wall. Like the outside of the house, everything was neat and tidy, well cared for despite its age. A television dominated the living room. Surrounding the set were wall-to-wall bookcases packed with videos.

"I like to watch a lot of movies," Will said.

Lena smiled. "Obviously."

"Mostly, I like the old black and white ones," the old man started, then turned his head toward the large picture window lining the front of the room. "Lord a'mighty," he mumbled. "I seem to be real popular today."

Lena suppressed a groan as Jeffrey Tolliver walked up the driveway. Either Brad had told on her or Pete Wayne had fingered Will.

"Morning, sir," Will said, opening the screen door for Jeffrey.

Jeffrey gave him a nod, then shot Lena the kind of look that made her palms sweat.

Will seemed to sense the tension in the room. "I can go in the back if you need."

Jeffrey turned to the old man and shook his hand. "No need, Will," he said. "I just need to ask you a few questions."

Will indicated the couch with a sweep of his hand. "Mind if I get me some more coffee?"

"No, sir," Jeffrey answered, walking past Lena toward the couch. He fixed her with the same hard look, but Lena sat beside him anyway.

Will shuffled back to his chair, groaning as he sat. His knees popped and he smiled apologetically, explaining, "Spend most of my days on my knees in the yard."

Jeffrey took out his notebook. Lena could almost feel the anger coming off of him. "Will, I've got to ask you some questions."

"Yes, sir?"

"You know what happened at the diner yesterday?"

Will placed his coffee cup down on a small side table. "That girl never hurt nobody," he said. "What was done to her-" He stopped, looking at Lena. "My heart goes out to you and your family, sweetheart. It really does."

Lena cleared her throat. "Thank you."

Jeffrey had obviously been expecting a different response from her. His look changed, but she couldn't make out what he was thinking. He turned back to Will. "You were at the diner until what time yesterday?"

"Oh, around one-thirty or a little before two, I think. I saw your sister," he told Lena, "just as I was leaving."

Jeffrey waited a few beats, then said, "You're sure about that?"

"Oh, yes, sir," Will returned. "I had to go pick up my auntie at the church. They get out of choir practice at two-fifteen sharp. She don't like to wait."

Lena asked, "Where does she sing?"

"The AME over in Madison," he answered. "You ever been there?"

She shook her head, doing the math in her head. Even if Will Harris had been a viable suspect, there was no way he could have killed Sibyl, then made it to Madison in time to pick up his aunt. A quick phone call would give Will Harris an airtight alibi.

"Will," Jeffrey began, "I hate to ask you about this, but my man Frank says there was some problem a while back."

Will's face dropped. He had been looking at Lena up until this point, but now he stared at the carpet. "Yes, sir, that's right." He looked over Jeffrey's shoulder as he spoke. "My wife, Eileen. I used to go at her something bad. I guess it was before your time we got into a scuffle. Maybe eighteen, nineteen years ago." He shrugged. "She left me after that. I guess I let the drink lead me down the wrong path, but I'm a good Christian man now. I don't go in for all that. I don't see my son much, but I see my daughter often as I can. She lives in Savannah now." His smile came back. "I got two grandbabies."

Jeffrey tapped his pen on the notebook. Lena could see over his shoulder that he had not written anything. He asked, "Did you ever take Sibyl her meals? In the diner, I mean."

If he was surprised by the question, Will didn't let it register. "I guess I did. Most days I help Pete out with things like that. His daddy kept a woman around to wait tables when he was running the place, but Pete," he said, chuckling, "old Pete, he can hold on to a dollar." Will waved his hand, dismissing the trouble. "It don't hurt me none to fetch some ketchup or make sure somebody gets their coffee."

Jeffrey asked, "Did you serve Sibyl tea?"

"Sometimes. Is there a problem?"

Jeffrey closed his notebook. "Not at all," he said. "Did you see anyone suspicious hanging around the diner yesterday?"

"Lord God," Will breathed. "I surely would've told you by now. It was just me and Pete there, and all the regulars for lunch."

"Thank you for your time." Jeffrey stood and Lena followed suit. Will shook first Jeffrey's, then Lena 's hand.

He held on to hers a little longer, saying, "God bless you, girl. You take care now."

"Goddammit, Lena," Jeffrey cursed, slamming his notebook into the dashboard of the car. The pages fluttered out, and Lena held her hands up in front of her to keep from getting whacked in the head. "What the hell were you thinking?"

Lena picked up the notebook off the floor. "I wasn't thinking," she answered.

"No fucking joke," he snapped, grabbing the notebook.

His jaw was a tight line as he backed the car out of Will Harris's driveway. Frank had gone back to the station with Brad while Lena had been practically thrown into Jeffrey's car. He bumped the gear on the steering wheel column and the car jerked into drive.

"Why can't I trust you?" he demanded. "Why can't I trust you to do one thing I tell you to do?" He did not wait for her answer. "I sent you out with Brad to do something, Lena. I gave you a job on this investigation because you asked me, not because I thought you were in any position to do it. And what's my reward for this? I've got Frank and Brad seeing you go behind my back like some teenager sneaking out of the house. Are you a fucking cop or are you a fucking kid?" He slammed on the brakes, and Lena felt her seat belt cutting into her chest. They were stopped in the middle of the road, but Jeffrey did not seem to notice.

"Look at me," he said, turning to her. Lena did as she was told, trying to keep the fear out of her eyes. Jeffrey had been mad at her plenty of times, but never like this. If she had been right about Will Harris, Lena might have a leg to stand on; as it was, she was screwed.

"You have got to get your head on straight. Do you hear me?"

She gave a sharp nod.

"I can't have you going around behind my back. What if he had done something to you?" He let that sink in. "What if Will Harris is the man who killed your sister? What if he opened his door, saw you, and freaked out?" Jeffrey slammed his fist into the steering wheel, hissing another curse. "You have got to do what I say, Lena. Is that clear? From now on." He jabbed his finger in her face. "If I tell you to interview every ant on the playground, you bring me back signed depositions on each one. Is that clear?"

She managed to nod again. "Yeah."

Jeffrey wasn't satisfied. "Is that clear, Detective?"

"Yes, sir," Lena repeated.

Jeffrey put the car back into gear. The tires caught as he accelerated, leaving a good deal of rubber on the road. Both hands gripped the wheel so hard that his knuckles were white. Lena kept quiet, hoping his anger would pass. He had every right to be pissed, but she did not know what to say. An apology seemed as useless as treating a toothache with honey.

Jeffrey rolled his window down, loosening his tie. Suddenly, he said, "I don't think Will did it."

Lena nodded her head up and down, afraid to open her mouth.

"Even if he did have this episode in his past," Jeffrey began, anger coming back into his voice, "Frank failed to mention that this thing with his wife was twenty years ago."

Lena was silent.

"Anyway"-Jeffrey waved this off-"even if he had it in him, he's at least sixty, maybe seventy years old. He couldn't even get into his chair, let alone overpower a healthy thirty-three-year-old woman."

Jeffrey continued, "So that leaves us with Pete in the diner, right?" He didn't wait for her answer; he was obviously just thinking aloud. "Only I called Tessa on the way over here. She got there a little before two o'clock. Will was gone, and Pete was the only one there. She said Pete stayed behind the cash register until she placed her order, then he grilled her burger." Jeffrey shook his head. "He might've slipped into the back, but when? When did he have time? That'd take, what? Ten, fifteen minutes? Plus the planning. How did he know it would work out?"

Again these questions seemed rhetorical. "And we all know Pete. I mean, Jesus, this isn't the kind of thing a first timer would pull."

He was silent, obviously still thinking, and Lena left him alone. She stared out the window, processing what Jeffrey had said about Pete Wayne and Will Harris. An hour ago these two men had looked like good suspects to her. Now there was nobody. Jeffrey was right to be angry at her. She could have been out with Brad, tracking down the men on their list, maybe finding the man who had killed Sibyl.

Lena's eyes focused on the houses they were driving by. At the turn, she checked the street sign, noting that they were on Cooper.

Jeffrey asked, "You think Nan will be home?"

Lena shrugged.

The smile he gave her said he was trying. "You can talk now, you know."

Her lips came up, but she couldn't quite return the smile. "Thanks." Then, "I'm sorry about-"

He held up his hand to stop her. "You're a good cop, Lena. You're a damn good cop." He pulled the car to the curb in front of Nan and Sibyl's house. "You just need to start listening."

"I know."

"No, you don't," he said, but he did not seem angry anymore. "Your whole life has turned upside down and you don't even know it yet."

She started to speak then stopped.

Jeffrey said, "I understand needing to work on this, needing to keep your mind occupied, but you've got to trust me on this, Lena. If you ever cross that line with me again, I will bust you so low you'll be fetching coffee for Brad Stephens. Is that clear?"

She managed to nod her head.

"Okay," he said, opening the car door. "Let's go."

Lena took her time taking off her seat belt. She got out of the car, adjusting her gun and holster as she walked toward the house. By the time she reached the front door, Nan had already let Jeffrey in.

"Hey," Lena offered.

"Hey," Nan returned. She was holding a ball of tissue in her hand, the same as she had been last night. Her eyes were puffy and her nose was bright red.

"Hey," Hank said.

Lena stopped. "What are you doing here?"

Hank shrugged, rubbing his hands together. He was wearing a sleeveless T-shirt, and the needle tracks up his arms were on full display. Lena felt a rush of embarrassment. She had only seen Hank in Reece, where everybody knew about his past. She had seen the scars so many times that she had almost blocked them out. Now she was seeing them through Jeffrey's eyes for the first time, and she wanted to run from the room.

Hank seemed to be waiting for Lena to say something. She stumbled, managing an introduction. "This is Hank Norton, my uncle," she said. "Jeffrey Tolliver, chief of police."

Hank held out his hand, and Lena cringed to see the raised scars on his forearms. Some of them were half an inch long in places where he had jabbed the needle into his skin, looking for a good vein.

Hank said, "How d'you do, sir."

Jeffrey took the offered hand, giving it a firm shake. "I'm sorry we had to meet under these circumstances."

Hank clasped his hands in front of him. "Thank you for that."

They were all silent, then Jeffrey said, "I guess you know why we're here."

"About Sibyl," Nan answered, her voice a few octaves lower, probably from crying all night.

"Right," Jeffrey said, indicating the sofa. He waited for Nan to sit, then took the space beside her. Lena was surprised when he took Nan's hand and said, "I'm so sorry for your loss, Nan."

Tears welled into Nan's eyes. She actually smiled. "Thank you."

"We're doing everything we can to find out who did this," he continued. "I want you to know if there's anything else you need we're here for you."

She whispered another thank-you, looking down, picking at a string on her sweat pants.

Jeffrey asked, "Was anybody angry at you or Sibyl, do you know?"

"No," Nan answered. "I told Lena last night. Everything's been the same as usual lately."

"I know that Sibyl and you chose to live kind of quietly," Jeffrey said.

Lena got his meaning. He was being a lot more subtle than she had been last night.

"Yeah," Nan agreed. "We like it here. We're both small-town people."

Jeffrey asked, "You can't think of anybody who might have figured something out?"

Nan shook her head. She looked down, her lips trembling. There was nothing else she could tell him.

"Okay," he said, standing. He put his hand on Nan's shoulder, indicating she should stay seated. "I'll let myself out." He reached into his pocket and brought out a card. Lena watched as he cupped it in one hand and wrote on the back. "This is my home number," he said. "Call me if you think of anything."

"Thank you," Nan said, taking the card.

Jeffrey turned to Hank. "Do you mind giving Lena a ride home?"

Lena felt dumbstruck. She couldn't stay here.

Hank was obviously taken aback as well. "No," he mumbled. "That's fine."

"Good." He patted Nan on the shoulder, then said to Lena, "You and Nan can take tonight to put together a list of the people Sibyl worked with." Jeffrey gave Lena a knowing smile. "Be at the station at seven tomorrow morning. We'll go over to the college before classes start."

Lena didn't understand. "Am I back with Brad?"

He shook his head. "You're with me."