Presumption of Guilt (12 page)

“Sure. I'd love to see you. But what do you need to talk to me about?”

“It's about Bill Brandon.”

Dead silence hung between them for an intense moment. Finally, Maria said, “What about him?”

“There's just some stuff I need to talk to you about, but I'd rather do it in person.”

“All right. What time?”

B
eth didn't know what to expect Maria to look like; it had been nearly three years since she'd seen her. But the girl looked much more beautiful now than she had at eighteen. They hugged, and Beth admired the twins.

“Two babies. Wow.”

“We want at least five,” Maria said with a laugh as the children went to play in the sandbox. “The family I never had.” They took a bench just a few feet away, so Maria could rescue them if anything happened. “You dyed your hair! I might not have recognized you if I'd seen you on the street.”

“That was the point,” Beth said.

Maria touched Beth's honey-colored hair. “Don't you ever miss being a brunette?”

“Sometimes. But it's worth it. Staying in St. Clair had its risks, you know.”

“Tell me about it. But I was so glad to hear from you. We should stay in touch more. I didn't know how to call. I didn't know you had changed your name.”

“Yeah,” Beth said, watching the little girls in the sandbox. “I didn't have a husband to give me his name, like you did, so I just made one up. It made me feel more secure to have a different name.”

“Maybe if we'd kept in touch, we could have supported each other.”

“It's hard,” Beth said. “We're both so busy. I've been working myself to death.”

“I know, Beth, but I'm real proud of you. How close are you to getting your degree?”

“One more year.”

“You're really going to do it, aren't you?”

“Yeah, and I've got huge student loans to prove it,” Beth said.

“You always were determined. And working at the paper. I didn't expect you to get a job this soon.” “Yeah, well, they hired me as an intern my freshman year.

They don't usually give bylines to interns, but I've worked so hard and dug up such good stuff, that Phil, my editor, has started treating me like a regular staff writer. During the summers, he pays me like one, but believe me, I have to work for it.”

“I'm so proud of you, I guess I can forgive you for never calling me.”

Beth smiled and squeezed her hand.

“So what's up, Beth? Why did you want to talk to me about Bill?”

Every muscle in Beth's body tensed as she took in a deep breath. “Maria, I've decided to expose him.”

Maria's face showed no expression. She merely stared at her.

“Are you sure you want to do that? He'll come after you.”

“He already has.”

Her face grew pale. “You're braver than I am.”

Beth almost laughed. She tried to push down her own self-loathing. “It's not bravery,” she said. “Not on my part. But I can't stand the thought of Bill abusing those children, training them to be thieves, preparing them for prison. Or worse. But I know that the minute this story comes out, hopefully tomorrow, Bill will be arrested. I'm not worried about him hurting me after that.”

Maria stiffened. “Why are you telling me all this?”

Beth shrugged. “Well, I thought you would want to know. And—I thought you might let me interview you. My editor says I need more sources, someone who was there, who's grown now. Someone besides a dead woman and a little kid.”

“Dead woman? What are you talking about?”

“Marlene,” Beth said. Her mouth trembled slightly, but she managed to add, “She talked to me, and Bill killed her.”

Maria threw her hand over her mouth and sprang up. With terror in her eyes, she hurried to the sandbox and picked up one of the twins, then grabbed the other by the hand and started to her car.

“Maria, where are you going?”

“Home!” Maria shouted as tears came to her eyes. “Why didn't you tell me on the phone that Bill knows you're doing this? I never would have come! If he killed Marlene for talking to you, then he'll kill me, too!”

“No, he won't! He's not following me now.”

“You don't know that!” Maria shouted. She spun, her face red and raging as she glared at Beth. “I thought better of you, Beth, than to risk my life and the lives of my children. I have a family now! It took me three years to stop being afraid all the time, and now, just when I have some peace, you have to drag me into something that Bill's already killed his sister over?”

“I'm not dragging you into it, Maria. I just want to stop him.”

“Then stop him yourself!” she shouted. “You don't need me. We have the same story!”

Beth froze, unable to find an argument to counter Maria's. Her story
was
the same. As much as she tried to deny it, hide it, wipe it from her mind, it was almost identical. “I can't use myself as a source,” she choked out. “It wouldn't be objective.”

“Are you kidding?” Maria shouted. “You'd probably win a Pulitzer Prize, if you didn't wind up in jail. Is that what you're scared of, Beth? That you'll wind up in jail?”

Beth looked down at her feet. “No. I made sure that I waited long enough. Three years. They can't try us after three years have passed.”

“Oh, that's noble.” Maria said with a sarcastic laugh. “You were so worried about the kids that you waited three years to make sure your own crimes were covered!”

“So did you!” Beth returned.

“That's right,” she said. “Because
my
kids are more important to me right now. But I'm not the one trying to make some noble cause out of the whole thing—all that compassion and concern for those kids, while you were waiting for time to pass so you wouldn't go down with them!”

“No one but Bill is going down, Maria!” Beth bit out through her teeth. “We're not guilty! We didn't do any of it of our own free will. We were just kids.”

“I was old enough to be a mother, Beth!”

“But we didn't have a choice! We were wards of the state.

They put us in his care. It's
their
fault, not ours.”

“Right,” Maria said. “Just don't say that to a jury. When you start blaming other people for your own sins, they lose sympathy real fast. We knew that what we were doing was wrong.”

Tears came to Beth's eyes, and her face was crimson as she took a step toward her old roommate. “What could we have done?”

“We could have run away,” she said. “Or we could have turned him in then.”

“He had us brainwashed! He wanted us to think that we would all go to jail. He
still
has us brainwashed!”

“Maybe so,” Maria said. “I heard it from the time I was eight years old—that I'd be the one to go to jail, not him. I'm still hearing it. And if it's true, if any part of it is true, Beth, I can't even think about it, statute of limitations or not. I have two babies who need their mother, and I don't want them to grow up knowing I was a thief.”

Beth just watched as Maria headed back to her old car. As the car drove off, she sat back down on the bench and stared ahead of her.

Maria was right. It was cowardly to expect her friend to talk, when Beth wouldn't talk herself. What kind of friend was she, anyway?

The hot breeze feathered through her hair, making little wisps stick to her face. What did God think of her, looking down from his throne that seemed so far away? Did he give her any points at all for deciding to go after Bill? Or would some of the points be taken away because she'd waited three years? Would she be docked more points for hesitating to come forward herself?

He must understand that the mere admission that she had been one of Bill's kids would immediately make people presume her guilt—not just in those crimes, but in others. She had once been branded
abandoned, orphaned, trash—
she had outgrown those labels, had overcome them. She didn't want to be known as a thief now.

Maybe she should have left town when she'd left Bill's home—gone somewhere she'd have been free to start over without constant reminders of Bill's presence nearby. But she'd spent her senior year of high school filling out forms for financial aid at St. Clair University, and when the loans and grants had been approved, it had seemed silly to go elsewhere. Now she was bound to St. Clair until she graduated, no matter how she wished she could relocate to someplace where she'd never fear Bill Brandon or think of him again.

It was too late now. She had to think of the children.

And she had to give Phil something he couldn't deny.

She got up from the bench and squinted against the sun in the direction Maria had gone. She had a decision to make. A big one. She only hoped that she had the guts to make the right one.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

S
o you were a real pilot? The kind that flies those big planes with hundreds of people on them?” Jimmy asked as he and Jake and Lynda strolled across the tarmac to the Cessna they had rented for the afternoon.

“That's right,” Jake said. “A commercial pilot. I S thought I was hot stuff.”

“You were!” Jimmy cried. “Go to all those cool places, whenever you wanted, and all those people trusted you—”

“And the money,” Jake said, winking at Lynda. “Don't forget the money. For a bachelor with no responsibilities, I made pretty good. I was real proud of myself.”

Jimmy sighed. “I wish I could learn to fly. I'd fly me and Lisa to Brazil or somewhere far away. We'd have it made.”

Lynda smiled as they reached the plane. “Look, Jimmy,” she said. “See over there, on Runway 3?”

“Yeah,” he said.

“That's where we crashed when our landing gear wouldn't drop.”

“Right there?” Jimmy asked. “You really crashed?”

“We were trying to land.”

Jimmy gazed out at the runway. “Wow,” he said, awestruck. “You almost died right there.”

“In a way, I did die,” Jake said. “But you know what? That crash was the best thing that ever happened to me.”

“Yeah, right.”

“No, really. That was when I learned that God's in control of my life, not me. And once I knew that, I really started to live.”

Jimmy breathed a laugh that sounded much too cynical for a boy his age. “God's not in control of
my
life. Bill is.”

“Not anymore, he's not,” Lynda said.

“You watch. He'll get me back, some way. And he'll make me and my sister pay.”

Lynda bent down until her face was even with his. He was so small for his age, and his Opie-like expression belied the experiences he'd had. “Jimmy, I know this is easier said than done, but I want you to trust Beth and the others working on this.”

But the expression that crossed his face was just the opposite of trust, and he turned away from her to peer out at Runway 3 again. “My mom said that to me once. To trust her.” He didn't cry, but the tough look on his face had an amazingly fragile quality. “Are we gonna fly or what?”

Lynda looked at Jake, and silently they agreed to back off.

“All aboard,” Jake said, and climbed onto the wing. Bending over, he pulled Jimmy up behind him. “Get ready, Jimmy Westin, to experience the ride of your life.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

N
ick sat over the books and files on his desk, trying to find a loophole in the law that would allow him to get Lisa out of the children's home immediately so that he could satisfy Jimmy's—and his own—fears. But there was nothing. Nick's suspicions were unproven, and today's N inspection had been fine, even though he'd known that Bill was tap-dancing to cover the fact that all of the children weren't accounted for.

To all outward appearances, SCCH seemed to offer the children a loving, compassionate environment. Taking the kids swimming, to the library, to birthday parties—it was all very impressive, if one didn't know better.

He got up and pulled Jimmy and Lisa's files out of the file cabinet, hoping to find some forgotten aspect of their situation that would offer him some reason to pull her out. He flipped through the file and saw a picture of the two kids. Jimmy a couple of years ago, and his little sister—It was her. The little girl in the picture was the same one Bill had put into the car to take to the birthday party. She had looked pale, almost afraid. She was shy, Bill had said.

But that was Lisa—and if Jimmy was right, Bill was already taking his anger out on her. No wonder she'd been frightened.

He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands. How could he have stood there and not realized that it was her? He had placed them in SCCH, after all. But she'd been three years younger then, and her hair had been short and sparse—she'd been malnourished. No wonder he hadn't recognized her. They had driven her off right under his nose.

He grabbed his keys off the desk and rushed back out to the truck. He had to go back. He had to see if Lisa was back yet or if they were still claiming she was at the party. He had to make sure she was okay. If something had happened to her today, he would never forgive himself.

And Jimmy and Beth would never forgive him, either.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

B
ill Brandon was getting angry with him, but Nick didn't care. Bill glared at him from across the lawn as Nick walked toward Cottage, where he had learned Lisa was assigned. Some children were playing in a playground behind the cottage, and the required number of B adults were on hand to supervise. He walked to the fence and scanned the faces.

Stella, the woman who had spirited Lisa off earlier, was sitting in a lawn chair watching the children. She looked up at him as he approached the fence. “Business sure must be slow at HRS, to warrant this much attention from you in one day.”