Chapter 2
Seattle Tribune, January 20, 2008
DECORATED WAR VETERAN SENTENCED TO DEATH
A King County jury has formally sentenced thirty-year-old Sean Flynn to the death penalty after being convicted of raping and killing a young woman.
Flynn was convicted last month of the aggravated rape and first-degree murder of Evangeline Gordon, twenty-one, who Flynn met at Seattle nightclub Club One. Gordon was seen leaving with Flynn on the night of June 4. Her body was found the next day in Flynn’s house.
Flynn’s was the first case in which King County prosecutors sought a death sentence in nearly a decade.
Flynn’s attorneys say they plan to appeal the verdict.
Outside Walla Walla, Washington, Two Years Later
An all-too-familiar tight feeling settled in Megan’s stomach as she took a right turn off Highway 12 in Walla Walla and the towers of the Washington State Penitentiary, aka the Walls, came into view.
The sight of the squat brick buildings never failed to send a wave of dread through her, as it had every single Saturday for the past two years, ever since Sean had been sentenced.
It still struck her as surreal, impossible that Sean could ever be convicted of murder, much less sentenced to the death penalty.
She’d been devastated when she’d learned that the prosecutor planned to ask for death in Sean’s case. Prosecuting attorney Mark Benson had been up for reelection and had been reeling under the upsurge in violent crime. He seized on Sean’s case as the perfect opportunity to take bold action and set an example. To show that no one, not even a decorated war hero with an otherwise spotless record, could escape due punishment for his crimes.
Despite Sean’s continued assertions of innocence and the support of the best attorneys they could afford, it had taken a jury less than two hours to return with a guilty verdict.
Even Megan, in her weaker moments, was forced to admit it looked bad. If she hadn’t known her brother to his very soul, she might have questioned his innocence too. The victim, Evangeline Gordon, had been killed by multiple stab wounds, and there was little question the weapon was the Randall knife Sean and the other members of his Army Ranger regiment had had specially made. Evidence of sexual assaultad he final nail in Sean’s coffin, as had the testimony from the victim’s friend that he had been stalking Evangeline before she died….
Seemingly irrefutable evidence that gave the judge and jury ample reason to levy the ultimate penalty.
Megan refused to believe in her brother’s guilt. She knew, with every fiber of her being, that Sean was innocent. The man she knew wasn’t capable of what they’d accused him of. Sean was fiercely protective and would never deliberately hurt a weaker person. He would never hurt a woman, much less rape or kill one.
Too bad no one else gave any weight to her assertions that Sean, who had been drugged along with the victim, had been framed by the real killer.
She’d taken her story to anyone who would listen, until almost everyone outside of Sean’s attorneys had written her off as delusional, unwilling to face the truth.
But she knew the truth, she thought as she took the turn toward the prison. The truth was that Sean wasn’t guilty, and Megan didn’t care if people dismissed her as a whack job. She wasn’t going to stop until Sean was free.
A dream that still felt impossibly out of reach.
Gloom had settled like a wet wool blanket on her shoulders on the drive here. Now she struggled to shrug it off and put a goddamn smile on her face. Though she’d had hours to prepare herself, she was still practicing her cheerful pep talk as she checked in at the entrance and pulled into visitor parking. She checked her reflection in the rearview mirror and made a feeble attempt to conjure a smile that didn’t look like a grimace.
Suck it up, Flynn, she scolded herself. Sean’s already got it bad enough. He doesn’t need you coming in looking like death warmed over.
A half laugh, half sob scraped her throat at her mental phrasing.
There’s still time, she reminded herself.
She pulled her purse into her lap and took out her makeup kit. Just as she had every Saturday for the last year and a half, Megan worked a little last-minute magic. Concealer to disguise the dark circles under her eyes from sleepless nights. Highlighter along the top of her cheekbones to make the hollows underneath look less pronounced. Blush to coax to life what was left of the peach in her peaches-and-cream complexion. Last, tinted gloss so Sean wouldn’t see that her lips were as drained of color as the rest of her.
The results were far from perfect, but maybe it would keep Sean from noticing the toll insomnia and stress had taken on his little sister’s face.
Yeah right. Sean had the kind of eagle eye that had qualified him for sniper training in the Army Rangers. He wasn’t going to miss the red eyes and road map of fatigue lines, no matter how much powder and sparkle she applied.
Megan got out of the car and felt her shoulders start to slump and her mouth turn down. She stopped herself short and paused for her weekly mental asskicking. Get your act together, Megan! Sean needs you to be strong. Sean needs to see you’re okay. Now put on a fucking happy face like you do every Saturday.
But it wasn’t just any Saturday, and the thought made the soles of Megan’s black Converse All Stars move at a snail’s pace toward the visitor check-in center. She was already tired. It was a four-hour drive from Seattle to the Walls. When Sean was first convicted and sent to the penitentiary in Walla Walla, Megan had considered moving to be closer to him. But Sean had told her to drop the subject or he would refuse all future visits. No way am I going to let you move out here to the ass end of nowhere just so you can see me for two hours a week.
Megan had been secretly relieved. She hated it out here. If she were objective about it, she’d probably find the rolling hills, increasingly populated by vineyards, and acres of lush farmland beautiful. But to Megan the wide-open space and sparse population represented exile. The weekly drives took their toll on her long-suffering Honda, but they helped her cope. She used the drive here to prepare for her visit, to think up topics of conversation, stories about the kids and families she was working with. Brace herself for Sean’s grim silence, his monosyllabic answers, the forced smile that didn’t do anything to erase the despair in his green eyes.
When she left, she guiltily relished her ability to leave the prison behind and drive west, literally into the sunset. She would roll down the windows and let the wind scrub off the sickening smell of Lysol and despair that seemed to cling to her, welcoming the transition from bright sun to Seattle’s cool, cloudy sky. A rush of shamed relief would bring her back to her own world, her own life.
She checked her watch and forced herself to step up her pace. Visiting hours for the Intensive Management Unit, or IMU for short, were set in stone, and if she didn’t make it through processing by 1:00 p.m., she was screwed. And today of all days, she knew Sean would be counting on her to provide some sort of friendly contact from the outside world.
Megan went through the check-in process automatically, showing her photo ID and walking through the metal detector. After her first visit, which seemed like centuries ago, she’d learned to lock her purse in the trunk of her car and not carry anything but her driver’s license.
She kept her eyes forward and her face impassive, never making eye contact with anyone in the waiting room. She’d chosen her clothing as much for modesty as for warmth. The heavy turtleneck sweater and baggy jeans gave no hint of skin or curves. Still, she could feel the eyes of the other male visitors, even the male prison guards, making her skin crawl under her dowdy clothes.
Finally she was escorted to a booth to wait for Sean. The slight relief at no longer being on display gave way to the heavy sadness that never failed to surge as soon as the guard locked the door behind her.
While she waited, she tried to swallow back the lump that had taken residence in her throat the day Sean was arrested and expanded to near choking size each week when her butt hit the hard orange plastic of the waiting room chair.
But this week the lump was bigger—like a softball lodged at the base of her throat. And now tears were pricking at the backs of her eyes. She angrily swiped them away, hoping sv height rub off the concealer in the process. No way was she going to let Sean find her crying. He already thought she was too emotional to deal with his problems. Today she needed to be strong. For him. For herself.
Earlier in the week, the Supreme Court of Washington denied Sean’s second appeal. Adam Brockner, Sean’s attorney, tried to console her, telling her it was just a setback. When Sean’s death sentence had been held up in the state’s mandatory review process, that, too, had been a mere setback.
Adam Brockner was full of it.
Her brother was still stuck in this hellhole for something he didn’t do. She’d call that more than a setback. She’d said as much to Brockner when he’d called her on Wednesday after the three judges on the panel had issued their ruling.
Nothing she could do about that. She’d written a lot of freelance pieces about criminal cases, and her volunteer work as a child advocate gave her some knowledge of the legal system, but she was no defense attorney. All she could do was what she’d been doing since the night Sean was arrested. Put on a brave face for her brother.
That, and explore every shred of evidence that might lead to Evangeline Gordon’s real killer. The appeals process could keep Sean alive for years, but finding the real murderer was Sean’s only true shot at freedom.
After a few minutes, Megan was summoned by a guard and instructed to sit in a booth in the prison’s no-contact visiting area. A few moments later, she watched through the Plexiglas divider as Sean was led in. Cuffed and shackled, he shuffled into the room, his shoulders hunched slightly because of the cuffs. Even so, her brother’s tall body radiated power and strength.
He and Megan shared their mother’s high cheekbones and dark hair and their father’s deep green eyes, but the resemblance ended there. Megan’s wide eyes, small nose, and full mouth gave her face a soft, frustratingly childlike quality—at twenty-nine, she still got carded when she bought drinks. Sean’s features were stronger, sculpted. The rigors of prison had honed his sharp cheekbones and squared-off chin until his features looked chiseled from granite.
And his eyes, thickly lashed but deep-set under strong brows, gave him a tough, almost menacing look that Megan knew others found intimidating. Now, with his skin pulled tight over muscles and bones, he didn’t look like anyone you wanted to mess with.
But he was not a monster. He was not a murderer. She would never believe that her brother—who at fifteen years old had held her thirteen-year-old hand at their parents’ funeral and promised her he would always take care of her—could be capable of raping and killing a woman.
Still, she could see why the guard moved away quickly once he unlocked Sean’s cuffs and slammed the cell door behind him. Not that Sean had caused any trouble during his incarceration.
Sean settled his long form in a molded plastic chair and reached for the handset as she did the same. As Megan put it to her ear, she braced herself to meet her brother’s eyes.
She never got used to it, the way his eyes, which used to glint with humor and crinkle at the corners with his easy smile, were now flat, dark pools staring out of his skull. No light. No joy. Only the desperation of a man trying to make it through one more day. It hit her like a sucker punch to the gut every time.
She pulled her mouth into a smile. “Hey, Sean.”
“Hey, Bugs,” he replied.
Megan’s smile morphed from pasted on to the genuine article at her brother’s use of the old nickname he’d given her when she was seven, before a mouthful of braces had taken care of her striking resemblance to a certain animated rabbit. She’d hated the nickname at the time, but now it gave her a little burst of hope that maybe the Sean she grew up with wasn’t lost after all.
When she met his eyes through the glass, something like relief swept through her at the expression in them. For the first time since his conviction, there was something there that looked less like hopelessness and more like resolution. Like he had a purpose and finally knew what he was fighting for.
Her brother on a mission was a force to be reckoned with. They were going to get through this, no matter how long it took, no matter how many rocks she had to turn over to find the truth.
“You look tired.”
She scoffed in mock offense. “Thanks a pantload. I drive four hours to see you and you tell me I look like crap?” There was no venom in her tone, and she relished the opportunity to bust his chops a little. “You better tell me how gorgeous I am or I won’t come see you next weekend.”
Something flickered in his gaze. “You shouldn’t come so much. You have better things to do with your time.”
She rolled her eyes. “Why do we always have to have this conversation? I don’t have a life. If I didn’t come visit you, I’d spend my Saturdays sitting on my couch eating Ben and Jerry’s from the carton and watching movies on Lifetime. I might even get a cat,” she said with a shudder. “You’re saving me from a couch full of hairballs and an ass the size of Jupiter.”
Sean didn’t smile. He never did. “The only reason you don’t have a life is because of me.”
“That’s not true.” At least, not the way she saw it. Sure, most of her friends had gotten tired of what they saw as her delusional devotion to her brother and belief in his innocence. And she’d gone through all of her savings and racked up a mountain of debt to pay private investigators to look into Sean’s case and help her come up with alternate suspects in Evangeline Gordon’s murder. But Sean was family, the only family she had left. “And even if it were true, it wouldn’t matter. I would do anything for you—you know that.” Sean had given up a big chunk of his own childhood to help raise her after their parents were killed in a car accident. Even if Megan didn’t love Sean more than anyone on the planet, she would have owed him for that.
His mouth softened into something approaching a smile. “Yeah, I know. But you need to live. You should be out, having fun, dating guys I’d want to beat up.”
“I’m only up here on Saturdays. Who says I don’t go out?”
He cocked a dark eyebrow at her, his knowing expression so familiar it made her chest hurt.
She shrugged. “Dating is overrated. Besides, I’m busy. I just got an article accepted in Seattle magazine and have a new corporate copywriting client. And I just started working with this new girl—oh my God, her family is such a mess.” Sean let her ramble on about fourteen-year-old Devany and her alcoholic, absentee dad and meth-addicted mother. Last month, Megan became her court-appointed advocate, and after a few rocky interactions, they were starting to hit it off. “Before she moved in with her aunt, she went between her mom and foster care ten times in six years. She’s run away twice and lived on the streets. Her mom gets out of court-ordered rehab in a couple weeks, and Devany’s afraid she’s going to have to move again. I’m doing what I can to make sure she has some stability for a while.”
Megan had started as a court-appointed advocate shortly before Sean got out of the army, and she had loved it so much she’d considered going back to school to get a master’s in social work. Sean’s arrest, the trial, the lawyers, sucked up any energy—not to mention funds—she might have had for graduate school. So she’d kept up her freelance writing to keep the creditors from blowing down her doors and thrown herself into her volunteer work.
“She’s lucky to have you on her side. All the kids you help are.”
Megan felt tears prick at the backs of her eyes. “Thanks. Not everyone has a big brother protector like you, but I do my best.” It gave her some comfort to be able to give victimized kids a voice, to have some impact on their situation when she couldn’t help Sean.
Sean was silent, staring at her with a funny expression on his face. Oddly affectionate, like he was trying to memorize her face. Totally different from the grim, stony visage she’d encountered on nearly every visit for the past three years.
“What is up with you?” she finally asked. “You’re acting all weird.”
“What do you mean?”
“You seem, like, not happy, but, uh, content? After what happened…” She licked her lips, paused. Might as well acknowledge the giant elephant in the room. “The ruling on your appeal, I mean. I expected you to be in a much worse mood.”
“Yeah, well, it wasn’t like it was unexpected,” he said with a shrug. “We need to talk about what happens next.”
“I talked to Adam and he’s already working on a collateral appeal.”
“I know,” Sean said. “I told him to withdraw it.”
Megan cocked her head to the side. “You’re going to fire Adam and appeal on the grounds of faulty counsel?” From what Megan had read, that was one of the more common ways to get a new trial granted.
Sean shook his head, his eyes grave. The warmth in Sean’s unexpectedly pleasant mood faltered. “There aren’t going to be any more appeals,” he said. t>
Megan’s head jerked to the side, like she hadn’t heard him correctly. “What do you mean?”
“I’ve decided to waive my right to any further appeals. I’m tired of trying to work the system just to draw out the inevitable.”
“But that means… they’ll set an execution date.”
His head moved in an almost imperceptible nod. “Yeah.”
Her stomach flipped over and her turtleneck sweater started to itch around her neck. “No. No. I know you feel discouraged right now, but once you’ve had time to think about it—”
“I’ve had three years to think about it. Trust me, when you spend most of your time alone, there’s a lot of time to contemplate your life. I just want this over with.”
“I can’t let you quit.” But she could see the resolve on his face. Her heart thudded with panic and her fingertips went numb. He meant it. He was going to give up.
“You can’t leave me, Sean. You can’t do this to me.” Angry tears burned the backs of her eyes, and it felt like a giant fist was squeezing her chest.
For the first time today, Sean looked angry. “I’m doing this for you, Megan. I won’t let you waste your life—”
“No! Don’t you put this on me.”
“Fine,” he snarled. “I’m a selfish fuck. I’m doing this for myself. But I can’t take it anymore, Megan.”
His voice cracked and her heart ripped in half. His eyes were once again dark and desolate, bright with unshed tears. “The first appeals took two years. The next one will take at least that long. Years I’ll spend in a nine-by-nine cell. And once in a while they let me out to walk around the yard like a fucking dog.”
“You’re alive,” she said, unable to choke back her sobs.
“I’m in hell.”
She shook her head, though she couldn’t deny the truth. She and her brother had grown up camping and exploring the wilderness in the Cascade Mountains. Sean was never happier than when he was out in the open air, nothing around but the vastness of nature to explore. For him to be confined to a cage was nothing short of torture.
But she couldn’t let him go so easily.
“Sean, I won’t let you die for something you didn’t do. We just need more time, and when we find out who the real killer is—”
She stopped at Sean’s derisive snort. “Come on, Megan. It’s been three years. Three fucking years and I still can’t remember a goddamned thing about that night. If there were any leads, any trace of evidence against someone else, someone would have found it by now.”
“Don’t say that. Convicts who’ve been on death row for decades have had their convictions overturned cause of new evidence.”
“Yeah, DNA evidence. And the only DNA found on or around Evangeline Gordon was mine.” He shook his head. “Hell, maybe we’re both wrong. Maybe I did do it.”
Megan swallowed back a surge of nausea. “Don’t say that. We both know you’re not capable—”
“You don’t know. You don’t know what I saw when I was deployed. Shit like that changes a person, Megan. You see things, and you kill in the name of your country—”
“Shut up,” she hissed. “Do not spew that shit at me.” She’d heard enough of it during his trial, the experts spouting off about operational stress exposure, posttraumatic stress disorder, and traumatic brain injuries that could alter a soldier’s behavior. “You think I’m going to change my mind about you? It won’t work.”
Sean shook his head, suddenly looking a hundred years old. Beaten down. Utterly defeated. “All I know is that we’re both stuck. I don’t want this life for either of us.”
Megan could only shake her head as she struggled to swallow back her sobs, tried to conjure the words that would convince him to turn from this drastic course. “Please,” was all she could come up with. “Please don’t leave me alone.”
His firm mouth trembled a little as he spoke. “It’ll be better this way. You have to trust me on that.”
“How can it possibly be better for you to die for something you didn’t do? This isn’t right. This isn’t fair. You have to give me time to fix it.”
He shook his head and pressed the palm of his hand up to the Plexiglas divider. Megan placed her own palm against his. “Some things can’t be fixed. You know that. Sometimes you get dealt a shitty hand, and you just do what you can to pick up the pieces and move on. That’s what I want you to do.”
“No. I don’t know what kind of suicidal bullshit you’re trying to pull, but I don’t accept this. I’m going to talk to your attorneys, and when I come back next week—”
“Don’t come back.”
Megan stopped short, pulling her hand away from the glass. “What?”
Sean swallowed hard and shifted in his seat, straightening up like he was bracing for something. “This is it, Meg,” he said, his voice barely audible through the handset. If she hadn’t seen his lips move, she might have believed he hadn’t spoken at all. “I don’t want you to visit anymore.”
“Shut up, Sean. Of course I’m coming back.”
He shook his head. “I won’t see you.”
She fell back in her chair. He would do it too. He’d refuse to accept her visits, and the prison wouldn’t force him. “How can you do this to me, Sean?”
He closed his eyes and shook his head slowly. When he opened his eyes, they held the same peaceful resolve she’d fount>
“It’s my choice, Sean! Believe me, I can handle this as long as I know there’s still a chance you’ll get out of here alive.”
“There is no chance. And it’s time you accepted that.”
She had no words to convince him otherwise.
“I love you, Megan. You know that, right?”
“I love you too! But how can you say you love me and make a decision like this?”
“It’s all going to work out for the best,” he said. “Someday you’ll see.” He kissed his fingers and pressed them up to the glass. “Bye, Megan.”
Before she could react, he placed his handset back in its cradle.
“Sean! Wait!” she screamed, even though he couldn’t hear her through the soundproof glass. Sean rose from his chair and went to the door to summon the guard.
Megan pounded her fist on the Plexiglas, but Sean didn’t so much as look back.
Sean silently followed the guard out the door. With the thick layer of plate glass muting her, he could pretend Megan wasn’t there. He didn’t turn to watch her go. He had to push it away, couldn’t let himself get taken in by her pain. Megan was strong. She would recover.
He shoved all thoughts of her aside. The emotion that had overwhelmed him at seeing her drained out as quickly as it had filled him, leaving him edgy and overstimulated like he always was after her visits.
The guard wrapped a hand around his arm and steered him through the visitor’s complex and back to the IMU cell block. Sean struggled to slow his breath, quiet his mind as every cell resisted the idea of going back to his hole.
He counted every clank of his shackles as they walked down the concrete blue corridor with its yellow cell doors. One, two, three, four… By the time he got to ten, he knew he wasn’t going to try to throw his cuffed wrists around the guard’s neck.
Eleven, twelve, he heard his guard speak. “What?” Sean said as he lifted his head. Then he realized the guard wasn’t speaking to him, but to another guard escorting a prisoner out of his cell for his exercise hour. It was the guy two cells down from Sean’s, the guy whose screaming jarred Sean from sleep most nights. He didn’t know what the guy was in for, didn’t care.
It was the first time in two years Sean had seen the man’s face. Their eyes met for a split second, and Sean registered a doughy face and a green tattoo creeping up the guy’s neck before he broke contact. He could feel the guy’s stare as the guards continued their conversation. Sean kept his eyes locked on the floor like a wary dog.
Heo interest in making any connection, no matter how small.
The slide of his metal cell door drowned out the squeak of footsteps, and Sean stepped inside. He clenched his teeth as the door clanged shut and put his hands through the slot without being told. Rattle, snick, the cuffs came loose and Sean pulled his hands back inside.
He sat down on his bunk. Stood up. Went to the sink, bent his head to drink from the faucet. Paced the length of his cell, forward and back, tracing the groove that had worn into the concrete floor from the feet of dozens of poor bastards like him.
Lying down on his bunk, he closed his eyes and tried to conjure up the blue sky and snow-dusted mountains surrounding his father’s fishing cabin. But all he could see was Megan’s face, pale and tight and wet with tears.
And another face, beautiful, delicate, with wide-set dark eyes that he’d sworn were pleading for help. His stomach twisted, and for the millionth time he wished he’d never agreed to go to Club One, where his “friend” Jimmy Caparulo had been working as a bouncer. Wished he hadn’t given in to his friend’s pleas to make amends after what Jimmy had done to Megan.
But he’d gone to meet Jimmy, and that night he’d met her. Evangeline Gordon. Beautiful, mysterious, and in Sean’s eyes, vulnerable, though he’d never figured out exactly why. But she had that lost-little-girl-in-need-of-saving vibe he’d always been a sucker for, and once he’d picked up on it, he couldn’t let it go. Not that she’d given him a whole lot of encouragement. He’d barely convinced her to go on a couple of coffee dates in the two weeks he’d known her, and she never gave up anything about herself other than what he already knew. Still, he couldn’t stop himself from trailing after her to the club, even though Jimmy was off that night and he had no other excuse to be hanging around. She was upset to see him, but she wouldn’t say why. After that, the details went fuzzy. He had a vague memory of her agreeing to leave with him, a blurry recollection of her looking up at him with big, scared eyes and asking if he would protect her.
The memories after that were brutally clear. Her naked body, her cut throat. And blood. On the walls, staining the sheets.
Staining his hands.
He couldn’t protect her. He couldn’t protect himself.
He sat back up, his chest tight, his body coursing with nervous energy. He sprang to standing, bouncing on the balls of his feet. Jumping jacks. Ten. Twenty. A hundred. A thousand. Now jumps—bend, spring, land, until his legs shook and his breath labored. Push-ups, sit-ups, more jumping jacks.
For hours he bounced around the cell, until a tray of food passing through the slot in his door startled him from his frenzy. Ignoring the food, he collapsed on his bunk, his face salty with sweat and tears. He turned his face to the wall.
Megan’s hysteria rapidly gave way to numb purpose. No way was she letting Sean do this, she thought as she stalked away from the main building out to her car. She had Sean’s attorney on the phone before sh even backed out of her parking space.
“We can’t let him do this, Adam,” she said as she turned onto Highway 12. “We have to stop him.”
Adam Brockner let out a long-suffering sigh. “I’m not sure there’s much we can do.”
“Bullshit. There are always options. We can file a writ of habeas corpus, have Sean declared mentally incompetent—”
“Sean’s depressed but he’s not mentally deficient, and no judge will declare him so. We can try to delay, but Sean has made his wishes very clear, Megan. Don’t you think you need to respect that?”
Fury rose in her chest and she clung to it, its fiery sting so much better than the crippling grief at the thought of giving up on her brother. “He’s either suicidal or on some fucked-up martyr kick, trying to save me from myself, and you think I should respect that?” Thick raindrops spattered against her windshield. She forced herself to slow down as red brake lights flared in front of her.
“Sean has his own reasons for wanting to take this course,” Adam said in his low, measured voice that usually soothed her but now raised her hackles. How dare he be so calm? “I spoke with him at length, and I believe he’s decided to accept the inevitable.”
She wished Brockner was in the car with her so she could hit him in the face. “An innocent man is going to be executed, and all you can say is it’s inevitable?”
Thick silence hovered over the line.
“You think he did it,” Megan said, disbelief sharpening her tone even as she wondered how she could be so stupid. She’d just assumed… had never bothered to ask him flat out if he believed Sean did it.
“You can’t deny the evidence is damning,” Adam said.
Yeah, tell me something I don’t know.
“But you defended him.”
“I can believe a client is guilty and still believe the state has no right to kill him. The two aren’t mutually exclusive. You should know that by now, Megan. And he’ll never admit it out loud, but I think Sean has finally come to terms with his guilt. And even though I don’t agree with how the state wants to deal with it, I respect Sean’s decision.”
“Sean is not guilty,” she said through clenched teeth. “And if he really believed it, if he remembered something after all this time, he would tell me.”
“Would he? Your brother is very protective of you. Maybe you don’t know him as well as you think.”
“I know Sean better than anyone,” she snapped, and disconnected the call.
But as her car flew down the highway, an ugly thought emerged from a dark corner of her mind.
Was it possible she could have been wrong all this time? Was it possible she was as self-delusil as the press, the police, hell, most of her friends had painted her?
No. She mentally yanked that sprout out by the roots and poured cyanide on it to boot. Yes, the evidence was damning, as Brockner had said. But from the beginning, she’d always thought it too damning. Too neat, too tied up in a convenient bow for the police.
Her brother was smart, ex–Special Forces, trained in covert operations. She believed that if Sean wanted to murder someone, he wouldn’t have been nearly so stupid about it.
Too bad no one wanted to listen to her theories. Not even the few people she should have been able to count on to at least hear her out.
A vision of hot, dark eyes turning cold, lips full and red from passionate kisses going tight and mean. She tightened her grip on the steering wheel, shoving Cole’s image out of her head. Even thinking of him made it hurt to breathe.
No time for wallowing. No time to spare even one conscious second of thought on that asshole.
Unconscious… that was another story. Megan had long ago ceded control of her dreams, in which Cole Williams popped up more frequently than she’d like, in scenarios that left her alternately sobbing with heartbreak or burning with unfulfilled desire—in pain and unsatisfied either way she sliced it.
In real life, Cole didn’t want to listen to her theories—no one did. So be it. Megan knew in her soul that Evangeline Gordon’s real killer was still out there. Lurking like a dark stain, a creeping shadow no one could nail down.
She just needed a break. A tiny shred of something to point her in the right direction. As her Honda ate up the miles between Walla Walla and her apartment in Seattle, Megan whispered up endless prayers, for something, anything, a single clue. Before Sean got what he wanted and it was too late for them all.