Phones rang in syncopation as Maggie entered the sheriff’s department.
“The line at the high school should be operating, transfer the Tagner case calls to Abner. You keep things running here and — Yes?” The speaker, a tall, thin man with skin a richer version of his brown sheriff’s department uniform, had caught sight of Maggie.
A gray-haired woman wearing a headset grunted and lowered herself into a battered leather chair. She punched a button, said, “Sheriff’s Department,” and one ring dropped out of the race.
“I’m Maggie Frye, from the Fairlington County Commonwealth’s Attorney’s office. Are you Sheriff Gardner?”
The man nodded and they shook hands. “Come on back to my office.”
He sorted old-fashioned message slips on the way down the short hall and dumped half in the trash can in his office. The rest he slid into a folder. She took the chair he indicated. He sat on the edge of the desk.
“I appreciate your agreeing to help us, Ms. Frye.” He blinked, dark lids covering blood-shot eyes for an extra beat. She recognized the signs. The man hadn’t slept the past two nights.
“Call me Maggie, but I haven’t agreed. How can the man prosecuted for the first murder be involved in the investigation?”
“Prosecuted and found not guilty,” he said.
“Carson has to be a suspect for this murder. The prime suspect.”
“No evidence against him, but I haven’t eliminated anybody.” He narrowed his eyes. “And let me be very clear. I’m leading this investigation.”
“But—”
“That’s not what I need you for. Listen, Dallas has me by the short-hairs and knows it. They recruited me from Richmond to run here. Took office four months ago. I’ve got to know if this murder is connected to the other one, and fast, but what do I have to work with?
“My predecessor has dementia and judging by his reports he wasn’t right for years. The deputy who assisted him on that investigation died of cancer. The judge from that trial is grieving his daughter’s murder. That leaves crap reports and a transcript I don’t have time to read. You’ll help some, but, no offense, you don’t know this county any better than I know Los Angeles.
“Dallas says he’ll help, but only if Carson’s included. What am I going to say? A lot of folks here think Carson never should have been charged — not all, but a lot. And he was acquitted. Now he’s a lawyer in good standing. So, I take the package deal, and ask for you to balance things out.
“Another thing, Ms. Frye — you said Carson was prosecuted for the first murder. That’s jumping to a conclusion that this one’s a sequel. We don’t know that. Yet.” He stood, tucking the folder under his arm, and she also rose. “Look at it this way, if Carson is guilty, he’s where I’ve got two upstanding citizens watching him, including a hot-shot prosecutor from the big city.”
“Monroe? He’s on the other side. Makes it two against one.”
“I’d take those odds with you being the one. Or are you going to quit on me, leave it two against none?”
“I haven’t decided.”
“Decide fast. If you’re staying, we’re meeting at the high school at three-thirty to try to keep this coordinated, not leave gaps, not run over each other.”
“One more thing, Sheriff. I intend to prosecute this case.”
“We have to catch the sonuvabitch before anybody can prosecute. If there’s a conflict between my investigation and you possibly prosecuting later, you do what’s right for the investigation or I’ll throw you out of my county. There’re plenty who can prosecute a case — assuming we get the sonuvabitch — but you’re the only one who can give me the prosecution’s view on the Wade murder.”
He was right.
But another factor might push her toward the decision Gardner wanted her to make.
She’d told herself for more than four years that the jury had spoken in the Carson case and that was all there was to it.
That wasn’t all there was to it.
Either she’d prosecuted the right man and got the wrong verdict or she’d prosecuted the wrong man and got the right verdict.
Either way, a murderer went free and she was responsible.
Again.
* * * *
From the shadowy back corner of Courtroom One, J.D. Carson squinted through hazy afternoon sunlight polishing the wooden benches and floor.
The first time he’d been in this courtroom he hadn’t been old enough to go to school. He’d come to see if it was true his mama was going to jail.
Many times after he’d sat back here, silently watching.
Being on trial for murder he’d been in the same spot Nola Carson had routinely held.
After he’d passed the bar, he’d sat in each seat in the jury box to know what they would see when he stood before them as an attorney. He’d even sat behind the bench, the best seat in the house.
After that, J.D. thought he truly knew this courtroom. But he’d never seen it from where Margaret Ellen Frye stood now, dragging her knuckles across the aged wood of the prosecution table. Right where she’d stood four and a half years ago.
One spot he’d missed.
That was a mistake, and he couldn’t afford mistakes.