Trace Of Doubt

“Don’t ask,” I whispered. “Not here.” I motioned with my head, and we walked back through the straggly weeds toward the break in the chain-link fence, and then onto the sidewalk. My Cadillac—left to me by my uncle Sean when he drew a life sentence—sat by the curb.

I unlocked the doors, and we climbed in. I pulled out into traffic and away from the projects.

“Your neck is all red, and you have that whole Kathleen Turner raspy-voice thing going. We should get you to the emergency room.”

“I’m fine,” I said. He knew better than to argue with me.

“What happened?”

“I was warned off pursuing the Marcus Hopkins case. He thought I was a cop at first. Weird thing was he implied…a payoff. Something about everybody getting their piece of the pie.”

“Do you know you have fingermarks imprinted on your neck? That’s going to leave bruises.”

I nodded. “You know this means we have to pursue this, right? Now we know for sure everything’s not right with that case.”

Lewis sighed. “I long for the days when life with you was normal.”

I turned to look at him as I hit a red light. “Lewis…you knew from the first day we met—there’s nothing normal about either one of us.”

“I suppose not. All right, then, Marcus Hopkins—” he spoke to the air, to me, to the spirits he believed didn’t rest until you put the real bad guy away “—I guess we’re going to find a way to set you free.”

Chapter 2

I reached across the bed at three in the morning and felt only cold sheets. Sitting up, I looked around through squinted eyes and saw the bluish light from the television set reflected underneath the door.

I bit my lip and climbed out of bed. The air-conditioning was on full blast, making it so I couldn’t hear a thing but its drone. I pulled on my soft flannel robe, opened the bedroom door and padded out to the couch where David sat watching CNN. He looked up at me and whispered, “I didn’t mean to wake you, baby. Go back to bed.”

Right after the Justice Foundation secured his unconditional release and he had become a free man, following nearly a decade in prison, he had been quiet but absorbed in his new life—eating his favorite foods again, being with loved ones, long walks with his dog, Bo, a saliva-sloppy Labrador-rottweiler mix who now slept at the foot of my bed most nights. David’s prison pallor was replaced by a new healthiness. But C.C., the nun who founded the Justice Foundation with attorney Joe Franklin, said eventually the weight of what David had lost—ten of the most vital years of his life—would prey upon him. I saw that now. His deep-brown eyes were sunken, with dark hollows beneath them. He couldn’t sleep, and when he did the nightmares often left him in a cold sweat and shaking.

I walked over to the couch and curled up next to him, snuggling against his arm. “You didn’t wake me. I love watching television at three in the morning. Let’s see if we can find a nice infomercial. I could use a set of Ginsu knives.”

He smiled, despite his haunted look. “God, I love your sense of humor. You help me more than you’ll ever know. But it’s just hard, Billie. I feel paranoid sometimes. I try to make small talk with people at the library, at the gym, sort of get used to the world again. And I keep waiting for them to ask me something that’ll reveal I was in prison. No matter how much reading and Internet surfing and everything I do, fact is I’ve been out of the mainstream for a long time. And I feel like everyone knows it. Like they can see it on me. Smell prison on me. And then I think about how I can’t ever get that time back.”

“I wish I knew how to make it better.”

He leaned over and kissed my cheek, taking his forefinger and tracing it along the line of my cheekbone. “Most of the time, you’re what does make it better. It’s just the nights, you know? Christ, what am I saying? You do know.”

I did. Some nights it was David who had the nightmare. Others, it was me. My mother was murdered when I was a little girl, and a strange mixture of memories of that night and half dreams haunted me. It was like walking into a fun-house maze and finding all my thoughts and recollections distorted somehow.

“Get your LSAT scores yet?” I asked.

“Not yet. But I really think I nailed the exam.”

He had earned a college degree in prison, and with his conviction overturned and the real killer behind bars, David was free to pursue a law career. He intended to be a defense attorney and free other men railroaded or framed the way he was.

“You studied hard enough.”

“Joe tutored me hard enough.” He was referring to the Justice Foundation’s lawyer, former NFL star turned legal eagle. David worked for the foundation now part-time, and the rest of his time was spent studying for law school or working on his book about his odyssey from prisoner to free man.

David caressed my neck. “I still can’t believe that guy did this to you.” My throat was mottled black and blue.

I waved my hand. “I’m a tough cookie.”

He took my hand and kissed it. “That may be, but that doesn’t mean I have to like what you do. I’ve been on the inside. I know how ugly it can be.”

His tongue traced a path along my palm and then the inside of my wrist. I shuddered. Our physical connection was always high-intensity. I slid one leg over him and straddled him, and we kissed for a while. I liked to run my fingers through his thick hair, which curled at the nape of his neck.

“Tired?” I asked him.

“Yeah,” he whispered. I slid back next to him and pulled the fleece blanket from the back of the couch over us. We sat on the couch like that, holding each other, for at least an hour, until we both dozed off. Next thing I knew, Bo was licking my bare feet and whimpering that he needed to be walked.

I stirred and looked at David. His face had a sculptured quality, with classical features. He rarely slept peacefully, but his face seemed serene as he slumbered, so I opted to walk the dog. I dressed in shorts and a T-shirt, took Bo for his walk, then came home and showered for Sunday brunch at Quinn’s Pub. I dressed in a denim skirt and a black tank top, with an emerald-colored scarf around my neck to hide the bruises, left David sleeping and drove off in my Cadillac to collect Lewis and then go to my uncle’s pub.

The first Sunday of every month is a sacred Quinn tradition. All Quinns not in prison are expected to attend, along with spouses, children and assorted stray friends and sidekicks we picked up along the way. Lewis was my usual brunch pal, just as I was his standard wedding date. David came when he wasn’t cramming for the LSATs or, in this rarity, sleeping in.

I parked my car outside Lewis’s house and let myself in with my key.

“Lewis?”

“Hunting for Ripper. Come on upstairs.”

I rolled my eyes and climbed the narrow wooden staircase to the second floor. The top of Ripper’s tank was moved to the side.

“How can a man who owns a pet tarantula lose said tarantula nearly every day? I mean, isn’t this the kind of pet that you might—call me crazy—want to keep in its tank? Keep an eye on?”

“He’s so gentle. I don’t know. I take him out, I put him on my desk, we have a conversation, the phone rings or the teakettle whistles, or my e-mail chimes out ‘You’ve got mail,’ and I take my eyes off him or go downstairs for just five minutes, and next thing I know he’s crept to the bathroom and is hanging out on my toothbrush. Just help me find him before we leave.”

“Fine,” I said. Then I sighed for effect. Lewis really did try my patience. Just as, I’m sure, I tried his.

I began scouring Ripper’s favorite haunts: behind Lewis’s collection of brains in formaldehyde-filled mason jars; tucked in the eyeball socket of the human skeleton in the corner of the room, whom Lewis called Schmedrick; inside any one of the used but not yet washed coffee mugs that dotted the bookshelves. I remember once picking up what I thought was my coffee mug and finding the very large and very hairy Ripper nestled inside.

“Nope, Lewis, I don’t see him anywhere.”

“Here, Ripper…come out, come out wherever you are.”

“Oh, Jesus! Look!” I pointed up at the poster of George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead. Ripper was perched on the corner, looking as if he belonged to one of the zombies depicted in the poster.

Lewis nodded. “Ripper has great taste in movies.” He walked over to Ripper and stuck out his hand. As if on command, Ripper extended a hairy leg and crawled onto Lewis’s palm. Lewis then took him and set him down inside his tank, putting the tank lid on tightly, and placing a dictionary on top of the lid for good measure. He started to leave, then stopped, looked at the tank and added a thesaurus on top of the dictionary.

“That should keep the rascal. I should have named him Houdini.”

“Come on,” I snapped. “We’ll be late for brunch.”

“Don’t want that,” Lewis said. “I hear your brother’s got a truckload of stolen DVDs he’s looking to get rid of. I’m hoping he’s got a few things I might actually want to watch, instead of like last time. I mean, who wants a DVD of Showgirls?”

“A lot of guys might like that.”

“Please. You’ve seen one breast in a pastie, you’ve seen ’em all. Anyway, I’m praying this is a good haul—like movies still in the theaters.”