Copyright © 2002 by Michael Malone

Cover design by Chip Kidd

Cover image by William Eggleston/A+C Anthology

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks, Inc.

The characters and events portrayed in First Lady are fictitious. The setting is the state of North Carolina, and certain public institutions and public offices are mentioned, but the characters involved in them are entirely imaginary. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Malone, Michael

First Lady / by Michael Malone.

p. cm.

ISBN 1-57071-971-3 (alk. paper)

Police—North Carolina—Fiction. 2. North Carolina—

Fiction. 3. Serial murders—Fiction. I. Title

PS3563.A43244 F57 2001

813’.54

2001031327