fter a long and sleepless night, Vivi Ann woke up tired. Still, by nine o’clock she was dressed in the only suit she owned and heading out to her truck, with Noah squirming in her arms. Now more than ever he needed her to be strong, and she would be. Her son would someday hear about all of this and say, Mommy, what did you do while Daddy was in trouble? and she would say, I never stopped believing in him and I made everyone in town see how wrong they were.

All her life she’d been dismissed by people because of her beauty, considered naïve because she saw the best in everyone. Finally she would show people that her innate optimism wasn’t a weakness or an ignorance or even a flimsy kind of hope. It was made of steel and she would wield it like a sword. Driving through town, she passed Grey Park, and saw the sign—LAND DONATED BY ELIJAH GREY IN 1951. For the first time, she thought not about her family’s prominence in this community’s history, but rather about their durability in the face of adversity. Her great-grandparents had traveled the Oregon Trail in a covered wagon, making their way through countless dangers. Her grandparents had hung on to this land through the Great Depression and two wars.

The land was still theirs because they’d refused to give up or give in. That tenacity was in her blood and she would call on it now.

On the street in front of the diner, she parked and got Noah out of his car seat. As she headed to the restaurant, she felt people watching her, shaking their heads. Their whispers pissed her off, renewed her determination to prove her husband’s innocence. As expected, she found Aurora at the diner with Julie and Brooke and Trayna, having coffee.

At her entrance they all looked up and their expressions of pity said it all: Poor Vivi, such a fool.

“Hey, Vivi,” Julie said, sliding sideways in her booth. Her silver bangle bracelets tinkled at her wrists. “You’re just in time for breakfast.”

“Thanks, but I can’t. Aurora, you still okay with taking Noah for the day?”

“Sure.”

“Why?” Trayna asked. “Are you going to the jail?”

“Not yet. I need to go to Olympia to find a good lawyer. I got some names out of the phone book.”

Brooke frowned. “Winona—”

“Won’t help.”

“She said no?” Julie asked, frowning.

“Yeah. Be sure and spread it around: Winona turned her back on us.” She kissed Noah’s plump cheek and handed him off to Aurora, along with his diaper bag.

Noah went to his aunt happily, immediately playing with her beaded necklace.

“You want me to come with you?” Aurora asked. She’d made the same offer last night when Vivi Ann called her.

“I love you for offering, but no. I need to start doing things on my own. I have a feeling there’s going to be a lot of that in my future.” She started to leave.

Julie’s hand on her wrist stopped her. “Not everyone thinks he’s guilty,” she said.

“Thanks, Jules.”

All the way to Olympia, Vivi Ann practiced what she would say, how she would convince a stranger to take her husband’s case. At the first address, she strode into the squat brick building, gave the receptionist her name, and waited impatiently. Almost twenty minutes later, James Jensen came out to meet her.

She smiled brightly when he finally appeared. “Hello, Mr. Jensen. Thank you for seeing me on such short notice.”

“When one is looking for a criminal defense attorney, it’s often a rush. Here, come into my office and sit down.”

For the next twenty minutes, Vivi Ann gave him the facts of the case, at least as much as she knew. She was careful to be professional and unemotional; she didn’t want to look like one of those women who stupidly believe the best of their husbands. When she’d exhausted the limited facts, she talked about what a wonderful husband and father Dallas was. Then she waited for him to speak.

At last, he looked up.

She had waited for that look. Now he would ask if Dallas was innocent and she’d nod and tell him how she knew that to be true.

“So, Mrs. Raintree. I would need a thirty-five-thousand-dollar retainer. Then we could get started.”

“A... what?”

“My fees. In advance. Not all of them, of course; just enough to get started. A case like this requires a lot of manpower—private detectives, lab work, motions. The discovery alone is often mind-numbing.”

“You haven’t asked if he did it.”

“And I won’t.”

“I don’t have that kind of money.”

“Ah. I see.” His flat, pudgy palm made a muffled thumping sound on the wooden desk. It reminded her of a closing door. “There are some good public defenders.”

“But they won’t care like a private attorney would. Like you would.”

He lifted his hands, palm up. “Such is the system. I will hope that you can get the money together, Mrs. Raintree. From what you’ve told me, and what I’ve read in the newspapers, your husband—who, as you know, is no stranger to American jurisprudence—is in serious trouble.” He stood up, shuffled her to the door with the ease of one who was experienced in this action. “Best of luck to you,” he said, and closed the door between them.

In the next four hours, five attorneys told her the same thing. Their offices and personalities were different, but the deal was always the same: a large retainer up front or no lawyer.

The last lawyer she’d seen, a lovely young woman who seemed genuinely interested in Dallas’s fate, had said it most clearly. “I can’t take on a case of this complexity for free, Mrs. Raintree. I’ve got children to feed and a mortgage to pay. I’m sure you understand. I’d be happy to handle the arraignment, but if you want me to file a notice of appearance on behalf of your husband, I’ll need a substantial retainer. At least twenty-five thousand dollars.”

There was only one option left: she needed to find twenty-five thousand dollars.

She drove home from Olympia at twilight, turning onto the Canal road just as the last rays of sunlight were polishing the winter waters to a silvery sheen and the snow in the mountains had turned lavender-gray.

When she pulled up in front of her father’s house it was full-on dark. She found him in his study, with a drink in his hand, reading a newspaper. All the way home from Olympia she’d practiced what she’d say, how she’d say it, but now none of that mattered. He was her father and she needed his help. It was really that simple.

She sat down in the chair opposite him. “I need twenty-five thousand dollars, Dad. You could take out a second mortgage on the ranch, and Dallas and I would pay you back. With interest.”

He stared down at his newspaper so long she started to worry. It took all her self-control to sit there, waiting patiently. Her whole world hung in the balance, but she knew not to prompt him. He might be a little taciturn sometimes and judgmental, but most of all, he was a Grey, and in the end that would be his answer.

“No.”

He said it so quietly she thought she’d imagined it. “Did you just say no?”

“You never shoulda married that Indian. Everyone knew that. And you never should have let him spend so much time at the Morgan place. It disgraced us.”

Vivi Ann listened in disbelief. “You don’t mean this.”

“I do.”

“Is that how you take care of Mom’s garden?”

He looked up at her. “What did you say?”

“All my life I made excuses for you, told Win and Aurora that Mom’s death broke you, but it isn’t true, is it? You’re not who I thought you were at all.”

“Yeah, well, neither are you.”

Vivi Ann got to her feet. “You told me the old stories a million times, made me proud to be a Grey. You should have warned me it was all a lie.”

“He’s not a Grey,” Dad said.

Vivi Ann was leaving, at the door, when she turned around to say, “Neither am I. Not anymore. I’m a Raintree.”

Vivi Ann walked up the hill toward her cabin. At the barn, she stopped, unable to keep moving. The ranch she loved so much was still and cold; winter-bare trees lined the driveway, looking stark and lonely against the gray skies and brown fields. She could see a few dying leaves still clinging stubbornly to their places on the branches, but soon they’d be gone, too, let go. One by one they’d tumble to the ground, where they would slowly fade to black and die.

She felt like one of those lonely leaves right now, realizing suddenly, fearfully, that there was no group around her. She’d clung to something that wasn’t solid after all.

Without her father, she didn’t even know who she was, who she was supposed to be. She walked into the cold, dark barn and turned on the lights. The horses immediately became restless, whinnying and stomping to get her attention. She didn’t pass the stalls slowly or with care. For once she walked straight to Clem’s stall and opened the door, slipping inside. The fresh layer of salmony-pink cedar shavings cushioned her steps, made her feel absurdly buoyant.

Clem nickered a greeting and moved toward her, rubbing her velvety nose up and down Vivi Ann’s thigh.

“It’s always been you and me, girl, hasn’t it?” she said, scratching the mare’s ears. She leaned forward, slung her arms around Clem’s big neck, and pressed her forehead against the warm, soft expanse of hair, loving the horsey smell of her.

Two years ago, maybe even last year, she would have reached for a bridle right now, would have jumped on Clem’s bare back and headed for the power lines trail. There, they would have run like the wind, fast enough to dry Vivi Ann’s tears before they fell, fast enough to outrun this emptiness spreading inside her.

But Clem was old now, with creaking joints and aching legs. Her days of riding like the wind were over. Unfortunately, her spirit was young and Vivi Ann knew the mare waited patiently to be ridden again.

“Too many changes,” Vivi Ann said, doing her best to sound strong, but halfway through the sentence, it hit her all at once—her father’s simple no; Winona’s refusal to help; Noah’s plaintive bedtime cry last night of Dada? and the kiss Dallas had given her just before they left for Cat’s funeral. She hadn’t known then it would be their last one for a long time, but he had. She remembered what he’d said so quietly that morning, dressed all in black, with his gray eyes so impossibly sad: I love you, Vivi. They can’t take that.

She’d laughed at him, said, “No one is trying to take it away. Trust me.”

Trust me.

She wondered now if she’d ever be able to laugh again, and then, in the stall with this horse that was somehow her childhood and her spirit and her mother all wrapped up in one, she cried.

This part of the county had been economically devastated by decreased logging and dwindling salmon runs. In the heart of downtown, several storefronts were empty, their blank, blackened windows a reminder of the people and revenue this community had lost. Dirty, dented pickup trucks, many with FOR SALE signs in the back window, lined the street, gathered in front of the taverns on this Thursday afternoon.

Vivi Ann stood on the sidewalk, staring up at the gray stone courthouse. Behind it, the lush green hills of the Olympic National Forest rose into a cloud-white sky. It wasn’t raining yet, but it would be any moment.

Tightening her hold on her purse, she headed up the stone steps toward the big double wooden doors.

Inside, the place was even more decrepit-looking. Tired wooden floors, peeling walls, people in cheap suits moving up the stairs to the courtrooms and down the hall to various closed doors. She walked over to a harried-looking receptionist and smiled. “I’m here to visit someone in jail,” she said, embarrassed.

The woman didn’t even look up. “Name?”

“Vivi Ann Raintree.”

“Not yours. The inmate’s.”

“Oh. Dallas Raintree.”

The woman punched some keys into her bulky beige computer, waited a few moments, then said, “P Cell. Visitation begins at three and ends at four.” She pointed one stub-nailed finger down the hall. “Second door on your right.”

“Th-thank you.” Vivi Ann began the long, slow walk to the jail. When she got there, another receptionist was waiting for her.

“Name?”

“Dallas Raintree.”

“Not the inmate’s. Yours.”

“Vivi Ann Grey Raintree.”

“Identification, please.”

Vivi Ann’s hands were shaking as she opened her purse and extracted her driver’s license from the wallet. The receptionist took it, wrote some things in a logbook, and handed it back.

“Fill out this form.”

As she stood there, Vivi Ann heard people come up behind her, forming a line of sorts. It forced her to write faster. “Here you go,” she said, handing the sheet back to the receptionist.

“Over there,” the receptionist said, tilting her chin without looking up. “Put all your personal items in one of those lockers. No purses, wallets, food, gum, keys, et cetera. The metal detector is at the end of the hallway. Next.”

Vivi Ann walked down the quiet corridor. At the end of the steel-gray lockers, she stowed her purse, and then headed toward the metal detector. A huge uniformed guard stood by the entrance, with his booted feet planted apart and his arms loose at his sides. He wore a gun on each hip.

She handed him the locker key and moved cautiously through the detector. Since she’d never flown anywhere, this was the first time she’d ever been through one of these devices and she wasn’t quite sure how it should be done. Slowly made sense, so she inched forward. A high beeping alarm sounded; Vivi Ann’s heartbeat kicked into high gear. She looked around; now there were three uniformed guards around her. “I—I don’t have anything on me.”

A woman guard came forward. “Over here. Spread your legs.”

Vivi Ann did as she was told. Even though she knew she was fine—had to be—she was afraid. Sweat broke out on her forehead.

The guard passed a flat black paddle in front of her. It beeped again at her bra and at the buckle on her shoe.

“You’re fine,” the guard said. “That way.”

Vivi Ann moved forward again, to another desk, where her hand was stamped and a VISITOR tag was hung around her neck. She followed another uniformed guard down another hallway to a door marked VISITATION.

“You got one hour,” he said, opening the door.

Vivi Ann nodded and walked into the long, low-ceilinged room. A row of Plexiglas cut the space in half; on either side were cubicles. Each one had a black telephone receiver and a chair.

She went to the last cubicle on the left and sat down. The fake glass was clouded with thousands of fingerprint smudges.

She wasn’t sure how long she sat there, alone, but the wait felt endless. At one point another woman came in, took a seat at the opposite wall. Through the distorting series of Plexiglas cubicles, their gazes met and then looked away.

Finally, the door opened and Dallas was there, wearing an orange jumpsuit and flip-flops, his long hair falling lank across his bruised face.

He came over to the cubicle, sat down on his side of the dirty Plexiglas. Slowly, he reached for the receiver.

She did the same. “What happened to your face?”

“They call it resisting arrest.”

“And did you?”

“Oh, yeah.”

She didn’t know what to say to that, so she said, “I’m looking for a good defense attorney. It takes so much money, though. I’ll keep trying. I can’t—”

“I’ve already signed the pauper’s affidavit and met with the lawyer assigned to my case. You’re not going into debt to save me.”

“But you’re innocent.”

The look he gave her was so cold that for a second he was someone she didn’t know. “And that’s what I’m going to teach you in the end. Cynicism. When this thing is over you won’t know what to believe so you’ll believe in nothing. That will have been my gift to you.”

“I love you, Dallas. That’s what matters. We have to stay strong. Love will get us through.”

“My mom loved my dad until the day he killed her.”

“Don’t even think about comparing yourself to him.”

“You’re going to hear all about it before this thing is over, how he abused me, burned me with cigarettes, locked me up. They’re going to say it made me mean. They’re going to say I had sex with Cat, that I—”

Vivi Ann pressed her hand to the glass. “Touch me, Dallas.”

“I can’t,” he said, and she could see how that admission ate him up inside and made him angry. “Love isn’t a shield, Vivi. It’s time you saw that.”

“Touch my hand.”

Slowly he brought his hand up, pressed his palm against hers. All she could feel was the slickness of the Plexiglas, but she closed her eyes and tried to remember the heat of his skin against hers. When she had the memory close, and could hold it to her chest, she opened her eyes. “I’m your wife,” she said into the receiver. “I don’t know who taught you to run, but it’s too late for that now. We stand and fight. And then you come home. That’s how it’s going to be. You get me?”

“It makes me sick to see you in here, touching this dirty glass, talking into that phone, trying not to cry.”

“Just don’t pull away. I can take anything but that.”

“I’m scared,” he said quietly.

“So am I. But I want you to remember that you’re not alone. You’ve got a wife and a son who adore you.”

“It’s hard to believe that in here.”

“Believe it, Dallas,” she said, swallowing the tears she refused to shed. “I won’t ever give up on you.”

All that winter and for the following spring, the upcoming trial of Dallas Raintree dominated town gossip. It was such a juicy bit of steak, with lots of fatty flavor. There was the big question: Did he do it? But in truth that didn’t get much play. Most folks had made up their minds when he was arrested. Respect for the law ran high in Oyster Shores, and they figured a mistake was unlikely. Besides, they’d known from the minute he walked into the Outlaw Tavern, with his inked-up bicep and shoulder-length hair, and his looking-for-a-fight gaze, that he was trouble. The fact that he’d gone after Vivi Ann was proof enough he didn’t know his place. She’d been suckered in by him, pure and simple. That was the talk anyway.

Winona had spent the last five months in a holding pattern. It was obvious to everyone that her sisters were no longer speaking to her. Dallas’s arrest had broken the once-solid Grey family into two camps: Aurora and Vivi Ann vs. Winona and Henry. Sympathy ran high for all of them. The general consensus was that Dad and Winona had made an uncharacteristic mistake in hiring Dallas in the first place. While no one believed Dad should have paid for a private lawyer (Why throw good money after bad being the most common expression of this point), they believed he was wrong to let his family break up over it.

Winona had carefully planted the seeds of her own defense: that she wasn’t a criminal defense attorney and couldn’t represent Dallas; that she longed to reconcile with Vivi Ann and waited for the day when her baby sister would return to the fold; and most convincingly, that Vivi Ann had always been headstrong and would learn in time that she’d made a terrible mistake in believing in Dallas. On that day, Winona always said, “I’ll be there to dry her tears.”

It was true, too. Every day of her estrangement with her sisters was a nearly unbearable burden on Winona. For the first few months she had tried to bridge the gap, repair the damage, but each of her attempts at reconciliation or explanation had been ignored. Vivi Ann and Aurora would neither speak to her nor listen. They didn’t even sit in the family pew at church anymore.

By mid-May, when the rhododendrons burst into plate-sized blooms and the azaleas in her yard were bright with flowers, she was hanging on by a thread, waiting for the trial to begin. When it was over, and Dallas was convicted, Vivi Ann would finally face the ugly truth. Then she would need her family again. And Winona would be there, arms open, waiting to take care of her.

On the first day of the trial, Winona woke up early, dressed in a suit, and was among the first spectators allowed into the gallery of the courtroom. As she watched the poor defense attorney enter the room, dragging his file boxes toward the defense table, she knew she’d done the right thing in declining to represent Dallas. She could never have handled a trial of this magnitude. Last week she’d watched voir dire and several of the pretrial motions and known without a doubt that she would have been in over her head with this trial. Although, to be honest, she had her doubts about the defense attorney’s competence, too. He’d allowed a couple of local residents on the jury, which didn’t seem smart to Winona.

She went to a place in the third row and sat down, hearing people file in behind her. The gallery filled up in no time. Everyone in town wanted to be here today. The whispering was as loud as a rising tide in the wood-paneled room.

On the right side of the courtroom, at the front table, sat the assistant prosecuting attorney, Sara Hamm, and her bright-faced young assistant. On the left side, at the defense table, sat Roy Lovejoy, the attorney assigned to Dallas’s case. Winona had tried her best to get information out of the prosecuting attorney’s office, but everyone had been closemouthed during the discovery process. All she knew was what everyone knew: that the rape charge had been dropped and the murder charge remained. The media hadn’t been much help, either. The murder of a single woman in a small town in a rural county didn’t warrant much in-depth coverage. Sensationalism about Dallas’s and Cat’s unsavory pasts abounded; true facts were harder to come by.

At eight forty-five, Vivi Ann and Aurora walked into the courtroom, holding hands.

In a loose-fitting black suit, Vivi Ann looked incredibly fragile. Light gilded her ponytailed hair, softened the thinness of her face. She looked like a piece of bone china that would crack at the slightest touch. Aurora looked as grim and determined as a bodyguard. They passed Winona without making eye contact, and took seats two rows in front of her.

Winona fought the urge to go to them. Instead she straightened, folded her cold hands in her lap.

And then two uniformed guards were bringing Dallas into the courtroom.

He wore a pair of creased black pants, a pressed white shirt, and a black tie. The months in jail had left their mark on him; he was thinner, sinewy, and when he looked at Winona, she froze, heart thumping.

Vivi Ann stood up, rising like a white rose from a messy garden, and tried to smile at Dallas.

Before Dallas was seated at the defense table, the guards removed his restraints.

Judge Debra Edwards entered the courtroom, wearing her flowing black robes. She took her place on the bench and looked at the attorneys. “Are the parties ready to proceed?”

“Yes, Your Honor,” the lawyers said in tandem.

The judge nodded. “Bring in the jury.”

The jurors filed into the courtroom in quiet order; all of them stared openly at Dallas. Several were already frowning.

Sara Hamm stood up. With that simple act, she commanded attention. An imposing woman in a crisp blue suit with a needle-thin white pinstripe, she looked professional and calm. She smiled at the jury and moved toward them confidently. “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the facts in this case are simple and straightforward.” She had the voice of a fairy tale witch: smooth and honeyed on the surface but with a layer of steel beneath. Winona found herself leaning forward, hanging on every word.

“During the course of this trial, the state will prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Dallas Raintree feigned an illness on Christmas Eve of last year to avoid having to attend church services with his family. While his wife and child were away, he went to Catherine Morgan’s home and he killed her.

“How do we know this beyond a reasonable doubt? The answer is evidence. Mr. Raintree left a trail behind him that investigators were able to follow. First and most obvious was his long-term association with the victim. Several eyewitnesses will testify as to Mr. Raintree’s regular weekend trysts with Ms. Morgan. These evenings have been described as ‘rowdy, drunken, lewd’ gatherings that went on long into the morning. But association doesn’t equal murder. For that we have to look to the physical and forensic evidence. Of which there is plenty.”

Sara held out a photograph of Cat Morgan; in it, she was sitting on her porch, smiling at the camera. In the next photograph, she was slumped against a bloody wall, naked, a torn dark bullet wound in her chest.

Several jurors flinched and looked away; others glared at Dallas. Sara Hamm strolled in front of the jury, pausing now and then in front of the female jurors as she went on, describing the crime in excruciating detail. When she was finished with that, she turned to the jury again.

“The state will introduce evidence that the gun used to kill Catherine Morgan was owned by Dallas Raintree. Experts lifted his fingerprints from the weapon. That alone could be enough to establish his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, ladies and gentlemen, but the state has even more proof. An expert from the Washington State Crime Lab will use hair samples gathered from the scene to place Dallas Raintree in Catherine Morgan’s bed that night, and an eyewitness will testify that he left her house at just past eight o’clock that evening. The medical examiner has placed Ms. Morgan’s death at somewhere between six and nine-thirty on the twenty-fourth. DNA samples from the crime scene will establish that Dallas Raintree is the same blood type as the man who had sex with Ms. Morgan just before her death.

“Coincidence? Hardly. When all this evidence is put together, the answer is inescapable. Dallas Raintree, who had a very public affair with Catherine Morgan before his marriage, went back to the affair sometime thereafter. After an argument of some kind, things went wrong for the lovers. Evidence will show that they fought for control of the gun. And Dallas Raintree won that fight. He shot her in the chest at point-blank range and then went home to his wife, celebrating a cozy Christmas while Catherine Morgan lay dead in her house. Ladies and gentlemen, this is a commonsense case. There is no doubt, reasonable or otherwise, that Dallas Raintree murdered Catherine Morgan in cold blood, and at the conclusion of the evidence I am confident that you’ll find him guilty of this heinous crime. The mistake Ms. Morgan made on that dark Christmas Eve night was in believing that the defendant was her friend and letting him into her home. She died for that mistake, ladies and gentlemen. Let’s not compound it now. Let’s make sure that Dallas Raintree is never able to hurt anyone again.” She returned to her seat and sat down. “Thank you.”

Winona sat back in her seat, finally releasing the breath she’d been holding. She glanced up at the clock, seeing that it was nearly ten-thirty. The hour and a half Sara Hamm had been talking had flown by. But it was the jury that captured her attention. Almost all of them were staring at Dallas through cold, angry eyes.

Dallas’s attorney rose. He appeared nervous and ill-put-together next to the elegant prosecuting attorney, and when he spoke his voice cracked and he had to clear his throat. Winona wondered how many murder trials he’d done. “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, you have just heard the story the state would like you to buy; it is a collection of circumstances that appear to fit together like a puzzle, but upon closer examination create only a portrait of reasonable doubt. Dallas Raintree was sick that Christmas Eve. He never left his home that evening, and he certainly never killed the woman he identified as a friend. A good friend, but not a lover. Evidence will show that Catherine Morgan had lots of men in her life. Additionally, the DNA evidence left at the scene does not identify Dallas Raintree as the man who had sex with Ms. Morgan. Experts will testify that the sample was too small to be tested. And the matching of his blood type is meaningless; forty percent of the population shares that blood type. The state has arrested the wrong man. It is as simple as that. Dallas Raintree is innocent.” With a nod to the jury, a kind of head-bobbing exclamation point, the man returned to his seat and sat down.

Winona couldn’t believe it. Lovejoy’s opening had taken less than fourteen minutes. A look at the jury convinced her that he hadn’t swayed one mind, not after the prosecutor’s brilliant blow-by-blow account of the crime.

She saw Vivi Ann frown at Aurora, who shrugged.

Winona wasn’t sure what to make of it. She didn’t know much about criminal law and knew very little about trials, but the defense attorney seemed to be making a crucial mistake.

The judge looked at the prosecuting attorney. “Ms. Hamm, you may call your first witness.”

The rest of the day and all of the following afternoon were taken up with the slow lacquering of facts, layer by layer. The prosecuting attorney brought in a series of crime scene witnesses, from Sheriff Bailor, to his deputy, to the dispatcher, to the photographer, to the medical examiner. In total, they confirmed everything that Sara Hamm had promised in her opening. Somewhere at or around five on the afternoon of Christmas Eve, Cat Morgan let someone into her home, presumably someone she knew, given that there was no evidence of forced entry. Several disreputable-looking witnesses testified that Dallas was at Cat’s every Saturday night and repeated the speculation that they’d been lovers. Photographs of the bedroom revealed evidence of a fight; a lamp was knocked over and broken, a picture had fallen off of the wall. Defensive wounds on Cat’s palms suggested that she’d fought her attacker and her prints on the gun suggested that she’d actually fought for control of the weapon.

Winona sat in the gallery day after day, riveted by the slowly expanding web of circumstance and fact. She learned more than she ever wanted to know about fingerprint analysis, DNA testing, and blood types. The prosecution introduced one expert after another, proving bit by bit their assertion that Dallas’s fingerprint had been found on the gun (which had once belonged to his father—a convicted murderer himself) and that his blood type matched the sample left at the scene. The defense argued that the semen sample had been too small to run a DNA test on, and that the blood type match was meaningless, and, perhaps most importantly, that two unidentified prints had also been found on the weapon. But the damage had already been done.

On the morning of the fourth day of trial, the prosecuting attorney called Dr. Barney Olliver, a forensic criminologist. After presenting more than an hour of testimony about his credentials and testing methods, Sara got to the point. “Dr. Olliver, we’ve established that you are an expert on hair analysis. Were hair samples recovered from the crime scene?”

“Indeed.”

Ms. Hamm moved to admit a series of hair samples found at the scene, and then said, “I know this is complicated scientific testimony, Dr. Olliver, but could you explain your findings to this court?”

“Certainly. May I go to my boards?” he asked, indicating four large easels.

The judge nodded.

For the next hour, Mr. Olliver explained everything there was to know about hair sample analysis, including itemizing the hairs found at the scene, textures, thicknesses, cuticles, and more.

Winona could see the jury losing interest, taking idle notes, until the prosecuting attorney said, “And of the nine pubic hairs found at the scene, which you examined and subjected to your rigorous testing methods, did any match the defendant’s?”

“Objection!” Roy said, coming out of his chair. “The use of the word match is misleading.”

“Sustained,” the judge agreed.

Dr. Olliver barely paused. “Of the nine pubic hairs found at the scene, six were microscopically consistent with the defendant’s.”

“Meaning that, judged side by side, by a trained professional doctor, Mr. Raintree’s pubic hairs were scientifically the same as the killer’s?”

“Objection. Sidebar,” Roy said, shooting out of his seat.

Winona watched as the attorneys approached the bench, argued back and forth, and then retreated.

Ms. Hamm said, “Dr. Olliver, is it your expert testimony that Dallas Raintree’s pubic hairs are microscopically consistent with those found at the scene?”

“It is.”

Roy came forward when the prosecutor sat down. “You cannot prove that the pubic hairs found at the scene came from Dallas Raintree, can you?”

“I can testify that the hair samples when viewed at the tiniest microscopic level are entirely consistent with Mr. Raintree’s.”

“But not that they in fact came from him.”

“Not conclusively, no, but as a medical professional—”

“Thank you,” Roy said. “You’ve answered my question.”

Ms. Hamm stood up. “Dr. Olliver, is it your considered medical opinion that the hair samples found at the scene could have come from Mr. Raintree?”

“Yes, it is.”

“Thank you.”

The rumor in the courthouse on the fifth day of trial was that the prosecution’s star witness was expected to testify. Speculation ran rampant; everyone was trying to guess who it would be. Excitement was a buzzing, tangible presence as people walked into the courtroom and took their places in the gallery.

Winona sat in her regular seat, watching her sisters walk past her.

This week had taken a toll on Vivi Ann; she moved slowly down the aisle, no longer able to look anything other than weary and afraid. Her blond hair, usually so shiny and cared for, hung in a lank, boardlike sheath down her back. She’d given up on makeup, and without color, her face appeared wan and pale. Her green eyes looked startlingly bright by comparison.

Winona longed to be beside her, helping Vivi Ann, but she wasn’t welcome there.

The judge walked into the courtroom and took her seat at the bench. As soon as the jury was seated, the proceedings began.

“The state calls Myrtle Michaelian.”

A wave of whispers moved through the courtroom, so loud that the judge reminded the gallery to be quiet. Winona was as surprised as everyone else. She’d been certain that the star witness would be one of the seedy men who frequented Cat’s house on the weekends.

Myrtle walked into the courtroom, trying to look confident, but the attempt only emphasized how frightened she was. Already her hair was damp with sweat. In her floral polyester dress, she looked like an aging legal secretary.

“State your name for the record.”

“Myrtle Ann Michaelian.”

“Your address?”

“One-seventy-eight Mountain Vista Drive, in Oyster Shores.”

“How do you make a living, Ms. Michaelian?”

“My parents opened the Blue Plate Diner in 1942. I took over management in 1976. My husband and I opened our Ice Cream Shop in 1990. That’s down on the end of Shore Drive.”

“And where is the ice-cream shop in relation to Catherine Morgan’s home?”

“Down the alley. You go right past us to get to her place.”

“Please speak up, Ms. Michaelian.”

“Oh. Yes. Sorry.”

“Were you working at the ice-cream shop on Christmas Eve of last year?”

“I was. I wanted to make a special ice-cream cake for the evening service. I was running late, as usual.”

The people in the gallery smiled and nodded. Myrtle’s tardiness was well known in town.

“Was Oyster Shores busy that night?”

“Heavens, no. Everyone was at church by seven-thirty. As I said, I was late.”

“Did you see anyone that night?”

Myrtle gave Vivi Ann a sad look. “It was about eight-ten. I was almost ready to go. I was putting the finishing touches on the frosting when I looked up and saw... saw Dallas Raintree coming out of the alley that leads to Cat’s house.”

“Did he see you?”

“No.” Myrtle looked miserable.

“And how did you know it was the defendant?”

“I saw his profile when he passed under the streetlamp, and I recognized his tattoo. But I already knew it was him. I’d seen him there before at night. Lots of times. I’d even told Vivi Ann about it. It was him. I’m sorry, Vivi Ann.”

“No further questions,” Ms. Hamm said.

Roy rose and asked about Myrtle’s eyesight, which wasn’t good, whether she’d had her glasses on (she hadn’t), and whether Dallas had looked directly at her. He made valid points: the man hadn’t looked at her; it had been dark; his face had been partially hidden by a cowboy hat. Lots of men had been known to come and go from Cat’s house, and at all hours of the night. And white cowboy hats and Levi’s were hardly noteworthy in these parts.

But none of it mattered to the jury, Winona could tell. Myrtle’s testimony had done the last thing necessary: she’d placed Dallas near the scene on the night in question, when he’d told his wife he was home in bed with a fever. No one in that courtroom believed Myrtle was lying. In fact, when she finished testifying she was crying and apologizing directly to Vivi Ann.

The trial went on for another two days, but everyone knew it was just limping along. Dallas never took the stand in his own defense.

In the last week of May, the defense rested and the case was handed over to the jury.

They deliberated for four hours and found Dallas guilty. He was sentenced to prison for life, without the possibility of parole.