“Come on,” the bailiff said, sucking in his stomach. “You’ll have to wait outside.”

  The brother slouched from his place, and the bailiff led him from the courtroom. Trish removed her hand from the gun.

  “Because the defendant entered a plea, there’s no need for the jury to publish its verdict,” the judge continued. “Thank you for your service. Court is adjourned.”

  Judge Lomax struck his gavel and exited through a door next to the witness stand. The jury started to leave the box. Holt stepped over to them. Trish kept her eye on Amanda’s family, who pressed forward against the railing.

  “What were you going to do?” Amanda’s father called out in the direction of the jury.

  “Just a minute,” Holt said, holding up his hand, “and I’ll talk to you.”

  Holt spoke briefly with the juror in the dark suit before directing the rest of the panel to leave via a doorway opposite the one used by the judge. Clare Dixon was putting her papers into a large briefcase on wheels. Holt came over to her and whispered in her ear, and she left through the same door. Trish appreciated Holt’s desire to protect the jurors and Clare from a tense confrontation with Amanda’s irate relatives. He walked over to the family. Trish edged closer so she could listen.

  “The jury found Malcolm not guilty of all the charges. If he had not entered a guilty plea, he would have walked out of the courtroom a free man.”

  The faces of everyone in Amanda’s family registered total shock.

  “How could they do that?” her father asked angrily. “After all he did to my Amanda? Didn’t they listen to what she told ’em?”

  “I didn’t have time to get the details, but the foreman said they thought there was so much fussing and fighting going on it wasn’t right for Malcolm to be prosecuted and not Amanda too.”

  “You ain’t gonna arrest her, are you?” Amanda’s mother asked in a shaky voice.

  “No, no,” Holt replied. “In my opinion, the jury was wrong and got off track, but that’s a risk we take when we bring a case to court.”

  “What’s gonna happen to Malcolm?” Amanda asked.

  “He pleaded guilty to count one of the indictment and will spend five years in prison followed by five years on probation. He’s been in jail for four months waiting for the case to come to trial, so he’ll get credit for time served. There’s the possibility he may get out sooner for good behavior, but the parole board in Atlanta is making more and more criminals guilty of violent crimes serve their full time.”

  “What am I supposed to do when he’s cut loose?” Amanda asked.

  “You’re gonna get a divorce and move back home,” Amanda’s father said. “And this time you’re gonna go through with it!”

  The remaining brother muttered in agreement.

  “I need to talk to Amanda,” Holt said to the group. “Alone.”

  “Why?” her father demanded.

  “Just wait for me outside, Pa,” Amanda said. “I’ll be there in a minute.”

  “Don’t try to talk to any jurors if you see one of them in the parking lot,” Holt said to the departing family.

  Trish turned to leave, too.

  “Officer Carmichael, would you stay, please?” Holt asked.

  Trish realized Holt didn’t want to be alone in the courtroom with Amanda. “Yes, sir.”

  As soon as her family was gone, Holt turned to Amanda. “Have a seat,” he said.

  Amanda sat on the bench with Trish beside her. Holt positioned his chair so he faced them.

  “Do you want to go back to Dahlonega with your family?” he asked.

  “No, a big reason me and Malcolm moved down here was to get away from all the mess up there. But we brought our own mess with us.” Amanda sniffled. “But I ain’t got no choice. I don’t have a place to live. We’re getting kicked out of the trailer at the end of the month, and finding work with two younguns to take care of is impossible.”

  “Katelyn is in first grade, right? And Buddy can go to pre-K in the fall.”

  “Yeah.”

  Holt put his hands together in front of him and leaned forward. “That means you’re going to have to find a job that fits with the school schedule.”

  “They have a program that lets kids stay till five o’clock, but it costs money that I ain’t got unless I can get me a decent job.”

  “Would you be willing to work at the chicken plant? You have to stand up all day, and it’s cold and wet, but they have a day shift that doesn’t begin until after you drop the kids off at school, and you could leave in time to get them by four o’clock.”

  “I tried to get on there, but they told me they weren’t hiring any new hands.”

  “They’re always hiring. I know one of the managers at the plant and could talk to him for you. The problem is you’d have to pay for day care for the kids while school is out for the summer.”

  “I met a woman at Food Lion who keeps kids at her house and doesn’t charge as much as most places,” Amanda said. “She gave me her card.”

  “What’s her name?” Trish asked.

  Amanda dug in a beat-up purse until she found a battered card. “Betty Lou Franklin,” she said. “She lives on Baxter Street.”

  “I know her,” Trish said, glancing at Holt. “She’s legit. If I talk to her, I think she’ll work with Amanda until she gets her first paycheck. My church may be able to help, too. I’ll check as soon as I get back to the office.”

  Amanda’s eyes filled with tears.

  “Do you think it would be a good idea for you to find another place to live?” Holt continued. “That trailer is filled with bad memories for you and the kids.”

  “Yeah, but I don’t know where to look.”

  “There are subsidized apartments not far from the chicken plant,” Holt said. “With Malcolm in jail and two kids to take care of, you may qualify. If you do, it’ll be a lot cheaper than what you’re paying for the trailer.”

  By this point tears were streaming down Amanda’s face. Trish handed her a box of tissues.

  “I’m ashamed of what I done.” Amanda sniffled, blowing her nose. “Hearing it today, I felt like my insides was being ripped out. That juror man was right. I’ve been wrong, too.”

  “Think about what I suggested and let me know,” Holt said in a gentle voice. “I’ll be in my office tomorrow. The phone number is on my card.”

  Amanda wiped her nose. “My pa is gonna want me to pack up the kids and go home with them tonight.”

  “But it’s up to you to decide what’s best for you and your children,” Holt said.

  “My ma knows why I left home.” Amanda nodded. “Sometimes she can talk sense into my pa. I think she’ll side with me.”

  “Either way, let me know if I can help. Okay?”

  “Thank you, Mr. Douglas. If’n you hadn’t talked to me, I never would have stood up to Malcolm. Maybe jail will be good for him.” Amanda glanced at the back door of the courtroom. “I’d better git and catch up to my folks.”

  Amanda left, and Holt began packing up his file. Trish watched as he neatly placed the folders in the oversize briefcase. Her admiration for the lanky lawyer had just gone up several notches.

  Some people in the sheriff’s department didn’t like the young lawyer from north Atlanta and wanted Ralph Granger, the district attorney, to fire Holt and give his job to Sheriff Blackstone’s nephew, who was graduating from law school in a few weeks. Trish wished those who criticized Holt could have witnessed his practical concern for Amanda Callaway.

  “Do you think Amanda will divorce Malcolm?” Trish asked as they walked up the aisle toward the main door of the courtroom.

  “Probably, unless she forgets the past three years and starts fantasizing that he’s somebody he’s not.”

  “People change.”

  Holt glanced sideways at her with a skeptical look on his face as he held the door open for her.

  They walked down the broad steps in front of the courthouse. The early May evening was cool enough to be comfortable. The sun was about to descend below the line of pine trees to the west of the courthouse annex. There was no sign of Amanda or her family. Holt checked his watch.

  “Will you make it home in time to watch Jeopardy?”

  “I’m not sure. This is the night I pick up Chinese food.”

  “My girlfriend likes Chinese,” Holt said. “We usually go to Wong Foo Palace. It’s the only place in town that has decent sushi.”

  “Wong Foo is okay. But my mother likes the spring rolls from Mister Chang’s.”

  At the bottom of the steps, Holt turned toward the courthouse annex. “See you in the morning,” he said.

  “Okay. I’ll have the files in order.”

  “You always do.” Holt smiled.

  Trish watched Holt walk away and sighed. It was nice that he treated her as a colleague, not an underling. But she couldn’t help wishing for more.

  3

  Holt walked across the parking lot to his office located in the courthouse annex. Sitting at his desk, he buried his face in his hands. He’d come way too close to losing the Callaway case. The cause of justice could be an elusive mistress, and if Malcolm hadn’t lost his nerve, she would have slipped out of the courtroom. Holt could only hope that Malcolm’s time behind bars would give Amanda Callaway a chance to create a new life.

  Holt knew about second chances. He’d been living one ever since Calico’s death. He opened the middle drawer of his desk and took out a picture of himself and Calico taken several months before the fatal wreck. In the photo the friends were standing beneath the basketball goal at the high school. Calico was a scrappy guard, Holt a power forward.

  “You would have been better at this than I am,” Holt said. “But hang with me. I’m going to make a difference.”

  Holt returned the photo to its place and sent a short e-mail to Ralph Granger telling him about the Callaway trial. Ralph would be happy with the result so long as the local paper didn’t run an article that the jury actually found the defendant not guilty. Holt wasn’t worried. There hadn’t been any reporters in the courtroom, and Clare Dixon wouldn’t publicize the fact that her client pleaded guilty minutes before the jury was about to set him free.

  Behind Holt’s desk was a long credenza. Ralph’s preferred method of assigning cases was to bring a file into Holt’s office and put it on the credenza without telling Holt about it. The unorthodox way of delegation kept Holt on his toes.

  The pile looked suspiciously larger, and Holt picked up a fresh folder. Inside was a police report about a burglary at a residence in a run-down part of town. Poor people usually stole from other poor people, and the house involved was a dilapidated, single-story wooden structure with a small porch in the front and a yard that was more weeds than grass. A second photo showed a door that had been knocked out of the frame, most likely by a hard kick from a boot. The inventory of items taken included a ten-year-old computer, a box of costume jewelry, a skinny gold necklace, and a child’s bicycle. Beneath the police report was the single most important piece of information in an investigative file, and the one Holt wanted to see more than anything else—a confession.

  Shortly after Holt had come to work at the district attorney’s office, he’d noticed that an overwhelming number of the individuals charged with crimes confessed, either before the police began formal questioning or soon thereafter. Miranda warnings did little to stem the tide of incriminating statements. People seemed more willing to try to explain why they’d done something wrong, or blame it on someone else, than to refuse to talk about it at all. If criminals simply kept their mouths shut, the conviction rate for the district attorney’s office would drop precipitously. With a confession in hand, Holt’s main job was calculating an appropriate punishment.

  Moving the new case to a different stack, Holt noticed a slightly discolored folder that was different in shape from the ones typically used by the office. The Callaway case had sapped his energy and drained his reserve tank, but he decided to see what else Ralph had dumped on him.

  Files in the DA’s office were labeled “State of Georgia v. [the defendant’s name].” On this folder’s tab he saw a single name—“Meredith, R. T.” Inside was a death certificate, a crude diagram of a room with the location of a body outlined on the floor, and a two-page report written by Harold “Butch” Clovis, a local detective, who concluded that Rexford Theodore Meredith died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the upper chest.

  Rex Meredith, the county’s largest landowner and one of its richest citizens, had killed himself a couple of years before Holt came to town, but everyone who lived in Paxton knew Meredith’s name, and his legacy continued to cause ripples in the community. Every few months or so there would be a brief article in the newspaper about his estate. It might be the renovation of a commercial building he’d owned, a gift from the charitable trust administered by his stepdaughter, or the announcement of an upcoming auction of several hundred acres of farmland.

  Holt yawned. He could find out tomorrow why Ralph wanted him to look at the old file. Now all he wanted to do was go home and collapse. He had one last stop to make on the way, though. Holt loosened his tie and turned out the lights as he left the building.

  He drove two blocks south of the courthouse and turned onto Broadmore Street. Two houses from the corner was a Victorian residence that had been turned into the All About You Salon and Spa. Angelina Peabody had confounded the small-town doubters who said a place that offered facial massages, high-fashion hair care, and expensive manicures and pedicures could not make it in a town like Paxton. The robin’s-egg-blue building was bursting with light from every window. Two days a week it was open until 8:00 p.m., another innovation that had proved to be an astute business move. Women who couldn’t get away from jobs or families during the day flocked in during the extended hours to be pampered. Holt drove past the crowded parking area in front of the building and parked on the street. He climbed the broad wooden steps to the porch and went inside.

  “Hey, Holt,” said Brittany, the receptionist who served as traffic cop, scheduling clients for different services and directing them where to go when they arrived. “Patsy had a cancellation for a manicure and pedicure, so you can go right in. She’ll be thrilled to see you.”

  “Right,” Holt replied.

  “Don’t turn up your lawyer nose,” Brittany scolded. “We had two men come in earlier today. It’s only a matter of time before all the attorneys in town are letting us take care of them.”

  “Who were the men? Were they lawyers?”

  “You know I can’t tell. That’s confidential client information.”

  “I could cross-examine you and find out in less than five minutes, but I’m way over my quota of questions for the day. Where’s the boss?”

  “Taking a break in the kitchen. She just finished a two-and-a-half-hour cut and color for a woman whose hair looked like it had previously been styled in a food processor.”

  Located at the rear of the house, the kitchen served as both a break room and an overflow space for supplies. Holt passed an industrial-size clothes washer that was furiously spinning a large load of towels. The door to the kitchen was closed, and he cracked it open. Seated at a round glass table was Angelina. Her eyes were closed as she rubbed her temples.

  “I’m here for my haircut and shave,” Holt said.

  “No, you’re not,” Angelina replied, not opening her eyes. “You’re here because you knew I’d want to see you before I tackle one last, impossible makeover.”

  Holt stepped closer and kissed her lightly on the lips. “Open your eyes, sleeping beauty.”

  Angelina opened her brown eyes and shook her long dark hair. Women paid a lot of money for hair that mimicked what Angelina had naturally.

  “What a day,” she said, squeezing Holt’s hand.

  “Brittany told me about your client with food-processor hair.”

  “That’s being generous. But I think she was happy when she left. If only people in this town understood about tipping. How are you?”

  “I’ve been in court all day.”

  “That’s right.” Angelina sat up straighter. “What happened?”

  Holt briefly told her about the case.

  “Wow, that was lucky. I bet Clare is steamed about her client pleading guilty. I think she’s on the books for a color treatment toward the end of the week, but of course I won’t say anything about it.”

  “Clare Dixon dyes her hair? How old is she? Twenty-seven?”

  Angelina smiled. “Don’t worry your curly brown head about it. To survive in this world, women need all the help they can get.”

  “Yeah, the place is packed.”

  “And I’d better get back to it. My last appointment is getting her hair washed as we speak.”

  Angelina stood and gave him another kiss. She was so short that she had to stand on her toes, and he had to lean down to make it work. The kitchen door opened. They quickly parted.

  “Oops,” said Brittany. “I should have known you two would be smooching back here.”

  “And everywhere else I get the chance,” Angelina said, giving Holt a pat on the cheek.

  “Mrs. Boisin is ready for you,” Brittany said. “It’s her first visit, and—”

  “I know. I’ll be right there.”

  “Will Friday evening still work for you?” Holt asked.

  Angelina pointed at Brittany. “Unless she’s booked an appointment for me after four o’clock.”

  “No, ma’am,” Brittany said and saluted. “I know your social life comes first.”

  Leaving the salon, Holt turned down Magnolia Avenue, a broad, tree-lined street where the finest older homes in the area were located. He slowed to a stop when he reached the Meredith mansion, the crown jewel of the neighborhood. The rambling wooden structure was meticulously maintained, even though no one had lived there since the owner’s death.

  An elderly caretaker whose name Holt couldn’t remember lived in a cottage nestled behind the residence and kept everything tidy, as if expecting Rex Meredith to return any moment from an overnight trip out of town. The century-old house had a broad wraparound porch. Latticework on the corners of the porch supported flowering vines. Brick pavers led to the house and around to the backyard, which was enclosed behind a white fence. The shrubs in front of the house were neatly trimmed, the grass lush and green. A massive magnolia tree with shiny green leaves and saucer-sized white blossoms dominated the front yard.