The Man She Once Knew (4 page)

S
HE COULDN’T SETTLE
.

After an endless day touring properties, the sight of all those anxious faces lingered. Exhausted as Callie was, she couldn’t seem to relax. She had washed the meager store of clothes she’d bought to tide her over until her assistant Anna could send her own things. Now she paced Miss Margaret’s house, flipped the television channels without seeing, picked up three different books from the shelves and none of them snagged her attention. She wasn’t hungry, and try as she might to focus on her career, not a single plan to rescue it would form.

She slapped open the screen door and walked outside. Down the front walk and out onto the road she strode, hoping exercise would take the edge off the restlessness that would not leave her alone.

It wasn’t until a couple of miles later when she spotted the cemetery off to the left that she realized where she’d been heading without thinking.

She’d have a word with Miss Margaret.

And, if she could summon the courage, she’d visit that small grave she’d been running from for years.

She entered between the columns of stacked stones that had been there for generations. Miss Margaret’s plot was easy to find—a high mound of fresh dirt covered with wilting blossoms. As Callie approached, she thought about how much had changed in only two days since she’d last stood here.

“You have some nerve,” she began. “What do you expect me to do? This is crazy. I don’t belong here. You can’t possibly think—” Her shoulders sank on a sigh. She couldn’t seem to sustain her fury after all, and a wry smile wouldn’t be stifled. “I loved you, you know. I have no idea what you saw in me—” Callie was shocked at the choking rush of emotion. She’d never understood why Miss Margaret would go to so much trouble for her. They were the most unlikely of companions, yet now, years later, Callie realized that in many ways, Miss Margaret was the best friend she’d ever had.

She’d loved Callie, too, even though tender words hadn’t come easily to her.

“You lived your words instead, didn’t you?” She’d taught by example, and a powerful one it had been. Margaret Jennings might have borne no children and married no man, but in her own fashion, she’d nurtured a town nonetheless.

“I’m not like you,” Callie murmured. “I can’t—”

Can’t or won’t?
she could almost hear Miss Margaret challenge, just as she had so often, over big things or small.
Can’t sew? Here, fix this button, hem these pants. Can’t cook? Knead this dough and next thing you know, you’ve got bread
.

Can’t go back to school and finish? How do you plan to keep this baby if you can’t feed it? Don’t you dare expect that boy to take care of you both.

Miss Margaret had no use for the word
can’t
, and no patience for
won’t.

After Callie’s mother had dragged her back to South Carolina once she’d lost the baby, she’d run away, yet Miss Margaret’s voice had followed her.
Be practical, child. A woman’s got to take care of herself, and you can’t do that without that diploma.

For all that Callie had neglected Miss Margaret for so many years, she realized now that she’d carried the older woman with her as she’d worked her way into community college, then university and, at last, law school. Callie’s mother had understood
can’t
all too well—her whole life had been spent depending on one sleazy man after another rather than taking care of herself. If the search for a way for the world to make sense had driven Callie to law school, it was Miss Margaret who’d made her stay and finish.

Yet Callie had still let Miss Margaret go. She’d never been the type to navel gaze; introspection got in the way of accomplishment. Looking back at the most painful period of her life would have hamstrung her, would have anchored her in the land of regrets.

But she’d never even said thank-you, and admitting it now nearly brought her to her knees. How could she have neglected Miss Margaret all these years?

Her mind darted in search of a solution, some way to undo this grievous wrong. Her focus landed on the
spot where a headstone would stand, and she vowed that it would be a special one that she would provide herself.

Still, it was not nearly the legacy Miss Margaret deserved.

In that moment, what Miss Margaret was asking of her with her bequest struck Callie with force.
Take care of my people
, she could almost hear her asking. That was a legacy that would appeal to the woman who’d quietly given so much to so many.

Including Callie herself.

A woman is as strong as a man any day
, Miss Margaret had told her often,
we just don’t beat our chests or flex our muscles to show it.

How, then?
a skeptical Callie had asked.

We endure, Callie Anne. We are the backbone.

Backbone. Callie had been known for being tough on crime, for being ruthless, but she’d taken a shortcut in Philly rather than risk losing her high-profile case.

She’d had almost three weeks after the end of the trial to stew over her failure, then to worry about complications when the defense counsel had gotten wind of a conversation Callie had had with the sister of one of the witnesses for the prosecution. The sister had told Callie that the witness had an axe to grind with the defendant who, she claimed, had raped and beaten her and gotten away with it. Whether or not that was the case crucial evidence had already been excluded from the trial because of procedural errors made by the police, and Callie badly needed the witness’s testimony to connect the defendant and the murder victim.

So Callie hadn’t told anyone. Had let the woman testify. In the end, Callie’s ethical lapse hadn’t affected the outcome of the trial—the defendant had gone free—but the D.A. had found out what she’d done, and she’d had to face both him and her own conscience, that she’d been so desperate to win that she’d started down a very slippery slope.

That was when, out of the blue, the news about Miss Margaret’s death had come. Now she was being forced to deal with her past…and all these people and their problems she felt unequal to solving.

How could she do that when she wasn’t even sure she could solve her own?

She lifted her head and looked across the grass. She’d never faced the child whose death she still believed, in her heart of hearts, was her fault, no matter that the midwife had assured her that these things just happened.

Callie couldn’t stay in Oak Hollow, that much was true, but wasn’t there some way to do right by the people who’d depended on Miss Margaret without miring herself here? “I’ll figure something out, Miss Margaret. I won’t let you down.”

Then Callie straightened and took the first step toward living up to that promise. As the shadows lengthened, she made her way across the grass.

She saw the angel first.

No cherub, nothing soft or sweet or cloying—this sculpture evoked the fierceness in the word
guardian
. First curious, then entranced, Callie was drawn to the marker for its very difference from everything around
it. Not until she stood a few feet away did she realize that it was not made of stone but wood turned silver by the force of the elements.

She knelt and reached out to touch it, but before she could, the stone lying flat on the ground caught her.

Froze her.

Hunter Langley,
she read.

Callie rocked back on her heels, struck to the heart. Hunter…Langley. She’d been too dazed to name the child who’d never drawn breath. Who…?

Her attention rose to the angel, and she knew.

David had done this. He’d had a gift with wood, but never had she seen anything he’d carved to match the powerful beauty of this.

When, though? The marker must have been here for some time, and David was only recently out of prison. He’d been a mere boy when all this happened, still open and trusting. Able to hurt, to grieve.

To name their baby for both of them.
Oh, David
…She mourned that boy along with their child.

Was there a scrap of him left in the man who’d wished her to hell as she’d breached his privacy a few hours earlier?

At last, she let herself touch the wood, the pads of her fingers gliding over the silken curves. How could the hands that had created this—for she had no doubt at all that his had—also take the life of another man? She couldn’t square the two.

He turned into someone none of us knew.

Had they all romanticized him? she wondered now.
She’d been fourteen when they met. Had she made him into a hero because she’d needed him to be? The prosecutor in her had learned hard lessons about reality.

He definitely wasn’t that hero now. Maybe he never had been. There was no question, however, that she’d torn through his life like a cyclone.

After you…left.

How much of the blame for David’s fate rested squarely with her?

S
HORTHANDED TONIGHT
, the bar’s owner, Carl Hodges, had asked David to come in early to bus tables and help out in front. The bar was crowded, and the mood was ugly. People were worried and muttering about what would happen to them now that the Yankee had a knife to their throats. How would they live,
where
would they live, if she demanded that they catch up on the missed payments? Life was hard in these parts; most people were just getting by. Folks were scared, and scared made a person mean.

Mickey Patton, who’d fancied himself Ned Compton’s bosom buddy when in reality he’d been Ned’s tool, needed only to breathe to be mean. He’d been hurling insults at David since the moment he’d walked in tonight, obviously itching to force another confrontation.

David would relish nothing more than to oblige, but Mickey Patton didn’t have a criminal record to slow his fists down. David gave the man wide berth, however much that stuck in his craw.

“Hey, boy!” Patton slammed his beer bottle down on the table late into the night. “Another round over here. ’Less you’ve got a crapper you oughta be cleaning.” He laughed uproariously, and his two dimwitted buddies joined in.

David glanced over at Carl, but he was occupied. “Get it yourself.” Most people did as a rule. The bar was nothing fancy, and Carl hired no waitresses.

“I’m sitting here at Ned’s table, you murdering son of a bitch, and you—”

David moved away. Closed his ears and let their taunts slide right off. Busied himself filling a tray with empties and headed to the kitchen. There he set the tray down with a thud and grabbed a trash bag to carry out to the Dumpster out back. He needed this job, but if he didn’t get his head clear, something bad was going to happen. He was still simmering over the afternoon’s humiliation, and he shared the same worry others were voicing.

What would she do, this Callie he barely recognized? She hated Oak Hollow and everything it stood for. He couldn’t really blame her—the way she’d been treated back then had been shameful.

And then there’d been the heartache.

He was nearly to the Dumpster when he heard the door slam against the wall. He whirled to see Patton with a gleam of metal in his hand and two of his drinking buddies by his side.

“I have just about had enough of you, boy.”

T
HE SUN STREAMED
through a gap in the pale cream curtains. Callie awoke and stretched, surveying Miss Margaret’s bedroom.
Her
bedroom now, she reminded herself, though it couldn’t look less like her barely decorated apartment in the city. She only slept there; most of her waking hours were spent at work.

An oval rag rug in shades of rose and green covered golden oak flooring. A maple vanity with a big round mirror sat on the wall to her left. A matching chest, its glow soft with the patina of time and much polishing, stood opposite the cedar hope chest at the foot of the double bed where Callie snuggled beneath the log cabin quilt Miss Margaret had been piecing back when Callie lived with her.

The breeze from the open corner windows still held the cool of morning, and for the first time she could remember, Callie had nowhere to be, no jam-packed schedule waiting. She was tempted to roll over and fall back asleep.

Until she heard the singing.

She sat up and parted the curtains. In the garden,
Jessie Lee held a hose while she sang in a high, sweet voice. The tune sounded slightly familiar, but Callie couldn’t place it immediately.

Then she realized where she’d heard it. A hymn, an old one she’d first listened to when Miss Margaret had dragged her to church. Callie’s mother would never have darkened the door of such an establishment, so Callie’s religious education had been lacking even the basics. She’d gone under protest and only because Miss Margaret wouldn’t hear otherwise. Callie hadn’t cared much for the curious glances, especially as her belly grew ever rounder, but attendance, she’d figured, was the price she had to pay to stay near David. He’d been there, too, moving from his mother’s side to stand as a sentinel beside Callie, a bulwark against the muttering.

Callie hadn’t listened a lot to the sermons or paid much attention to the scriptures, but she’d been transported by the music. Miss Margaret’s church had no piano or organ; everything was sung a cappella, the congregation dividing into harmonies automatically. Somehow, on those Sundays, all her fears and worries had taken second place as the music of old-time gospel hymns wrapped themselves around Callie’s anxious heart and soothed her like a soft, warm blanket. They’d lifted her spirits and made her feel a little hope that maybe she wouldn’t be the world’s worst mama, that perhaps everyone was wrong and she and David could overcome the odds against them.

Those bits of hope had shattered on that night Callie never let herself think about. She ran one hand over her
flat stomach now, felt the lean body she’d fashioned through daily workouts. Impossible to believe that once this belly had been filled with a growing new life. That her childish dreams of a fantasy family had actually seemed possible.

Being here made her remember that once she’d been vulnerable. The years since had been devoted to making herself tough. Invincible. Lady Justice.

She’d been bruised by recent events, but she wouldn’t stay that way. Who knew better than she that dreams could be blasted to bits?

She lived in the real, in the harsh, cold truth. In the city where the strong survived and the weak suffered.

She was not weak—hadn’t she proved that time and again? Callie shoved the covers back and stood. She couldn’t get caught up in sunlight and sweet singing. She had research to do, plans to make, an escape route to plot out. Still shaken by what she’d seen yesterday of the lives that were now in her hands, she resolved to find a solution that would allow her to leave in good conscience.

Number one on the list was Jessie Lee’s pay; number two was David’s house and all the others like it.

At the thought of David, she remembered the angel on the tiny grave. Did he carve anymore? Was anything of that gifted artisan still inside him? She wondered if she’d ever know the answer. Moving across the floor barefoot, she headed for the kitchen and coffeepot first, then a shower.

A knock on the door interrupted her as she was
scooping grounds. “Callie—Ms. Hunter. Please open the door.” A woman’s voice. Frantic.

Was that—? Callie frowned. It couldn’t be David’s mother.

“Please—you have to help me!”

Callie rushed into the living room and answered the summons.

It was indeed Delia Langley, looking, if anything, worse than the day before. “Oh, thank heavens! You have to help me.” She grasped at Callie’s hand. “You have to come.”

“What is it? What’s wrong?” Callie drew her inside. David’s mother was shaking, her eyes darting around, desperation and fear in every line of her frame.

“It’s David. We have to go.” Delia yanked at Callie’s hand as if she’d drag her bodily through the door.

“Calm down. Tell me what’s happened.”

“He’s—they called me just now. Oh, God—he’s in jail. They’ve arrested him. I can’t—it’s happening all over again.” She twisted her hands in fretful circles.

“Arrested? For what?”

“Mickey Patton—he’s been badly beaten. They’re saying it was David, but he wouldn’t have. He—you have to help him.”

“I’m a prosecutor, not a defense attorney. There’s nothing I can do.”

“You have to.” David’s mother grabbed Callie. “No one else will. He didn’t do this, I’m telling you.”

Callie only stared at her. “I can’t help him.”

“Please…” Delia’s eyes were wild now, and she
swayed on her feet so badly Callie had to steady her. “You’re his only hope. Do whatever you want with my house, put me out on the streets, but please, just go see him. Make them let him out of there. He’ll go crazy being locked up again.” With effort, Delia Langley gathered herself, her eyes boring into Callie. “You owe him. He stood by you, and he paid a bigger price than you can imagine. If you care anything at all about justice, stand by him now.”

Every protest dried in Callie’s throat as she took in the cold, hard truth. David had stood by her when everyone they knew pushed her to give the baby up for adoption. He was already working part time, had always made straight As while playing quarterback for the football team. But soon his grades began to slip and his athletic performance suffered. Callie had not one friend in town besides him and Miss Margaret so she’d been clingy and was often sick. When the baby was stillborn she’d been mired in her own suffering and failed to see that he’d been suffering, too.

His mother was on the mark. Callie had turned her back on David, assuming he’d come out on top as he always had. Whoever David Langley was now, she realized she owed a debt to the boy he’d been, one that was long overdue.

“I’m not licensed in Georgia. There’s not much I can do legally.” She held up a hand as the protest formed. “But I will go see him because you’re right—I do owe him. Just don’t get your hopes up.” She didn’t envy this woman the choice she faced, trying to help the son
who’d murdered her husband, but Callie’s job had taught her that the world was never black or white. Her son was all Delia Langley had left. Maybe that wiped away some of his guilt or maybe children had a hold on the heart that transcended any other actions—Callie had no idea what Delia was thinking.

The reality was that she could do little, and the bitter man she’d encountered was probably guilty anyway.

But she had her own burden of guilt for whatever part she’d played in his fate. She could do this one thing and erase some of it. “All right,” she said. “Let me get dressed, and I’ll go with you.”

Delia shook her head. “He won’t see me. I’ve tried.”

Callie frowned. “How do you know he’ll see me, then?”

Weary eyes hardened. “You’ll have to manage.”

Great. “I can’t promise anything, but I’ll call you when I’m finished.” After Delia left, Callie leaned back against the door, staring into the empty distance.

Then she roused herself and went to dress.

H
E’D BEEN TAKEN
all the way to the county seat forty miles northeast, population fourteen thousand. The county jail was small and unaccustomed to housing hardened criminals.

Getting in required some fancy talking, but Callie persuaded people for a living. She’d thought a simple reminder about the perils of questioning a prisoner who wanted legal counsel would do the trick, but she hadn’t counted on a pro bono attorney already having been appointed. Apparently the local judge was on his toes.

Callie got the lawyer’s name and nearly left then. David wasn’t alone in this, after all; she could go in good conscience.

Halfway to the door, she remembered the angel. Maybe David didn’t need an attorney, but a familiar face might be welcome, even if it was hers. Anyway, she had some questions to ask him—or some appreciation to extend, at the very least.

She retraced her steps and requested to meet with the prisoner, then held her breath. At last, the deputy on duty reluctantly agreed to go get his newest inmate.

I
N PRISON
, at least you had a space to retreat to. No real privacy, but the back and side walls of your cell were solid. No such luck here.

“Heard you killed somebody,” said one of the inmates in the general holding cell next to him.

David, as an ex-con and convicted murderer, had been put in his own separate cage, no doubt for the sake of the petty criminals, all three of them.

“You don’t look so good,” said a second man.

David sought the invisible shield every prison inmate quickly acquired. He said nothing, partly because his ribs hurt too much to speak unnecessarily.

Inside, David was hanging on by his fingernails.
I can’t be locked again. Can’t do it.

“Man don’t want conversation,” observed the third. “Murderer too good for us burglars and drunks, I guess.”

He closed his eyes and breathed deep—until his ribs kicked up a ruckus.
Shallow breaths, remember.
The
pain had one benefit—it distracted him. Forming a clear thought was hard.

Except one.
It’s happening again.

“Langley,” interrupted the deputy who’d come for him last time, when his so-called lawyer had shown up. “Got a visitor.”

Not his mother, surely. He’d used his one phone call to tell her to stay away. Finding him like this might finish her off. He would have to see her eventually, but not beaten and bloody. And not in cuffs, if he could help it.

He almost laughed at that. What in sweet hell had he been able to control in the past fifteen years? Once he’d confessed to killing Ned Compton, his life had been over.

“Langley, come on.”

“Who is it?”

“Good-looking woman, says she’s your friend.”

Hoots from next door greeted the news. “Hot damn, Killer’s got a woman come to visit!”

He shot them a look that shut them up. Could it be Callie? No other woman in Oak Hollow would come within a mile of him, except a couple of skanks at the bar who were titillated by the notion of getting it on with a murderer. He didn’t think they’d drive an hour through the mountains for him, though.

He started to refuse, but then he remembered that Callie Hunter held the power to render his mother homeless. If he was going back to jail, he couldn’t leave his mother defenseless.

God, he hurt. He wanted to lie down and sleep. To forget. To be left alone just for a little while before he
had to descend into hell again. He didn’t kid himself that he wasn’t going back to prison.

Instead, he rose unsteadily, like an old man. Holding his ribs, he walked slowly to the door and extended his hands through the opening provided for cuffing him.

Then he shuffled along down the hall to the dingy, cramped visiting room to see a woman he’d just as soon never lay eyes on again.

H
OW MANY TIMES
had she been in a room like this? Callie glanced around the concrete block walls with paint peeling in splotches and felt naked without her briefcase or a proper set of files. Her trim black suit had helped bolster the image of a high-powered attorney, and she would build on that to handle this surreal situation.

The sound of the door opening had her turning.

Then she gasped and whipped her gaze to the deputy. “Has he had medical attention?”

“We’re waiting on the doc,” the man said, abashed. “Prisoners don’t get priority, I’m afraid.”

“He should be in the emergency room. This is a violation of his civil rights.” She could not believe these words were coming out of her mouth—she’d derided defense attorneys often for the phrase that so easily raised her hackles.

“We’ve had a paramedic look him over. The hospital isn’t set up to provide the security needed for dangerous prisoners.”

Callie glanced at David. His face was stony, his eyes staring at the wall.

“This is inexcusable.” It was. Stoic or not, David was clearly in pain. “We can file a suit on the county for this mistreatment.”

“There’s only four docs over at the clinic, see, and they stay real busy. One of them will be here soon. He’s in no danger.”

“Has his attorney been to see him?”

“Yes.”

Right then, Callie made up her mind to meet the man and check him out.

“Leave it,” David said, jaw tight. Color stained his cheeks.

Callie forced herself to chill out. Getting on the wrong side of the deputy would only rebound on David. “I appreciate whatever you can manage, Deputy,” she said as warmly as she could.

“I can give you thirty minutes, ma’am,” he said.

“Thank you.”

He hesitated. “You sure about this?” His suspicious glance at David was telling.

“I’ll be fine.”

“I’ll be right outside.”

She counted to three, seeking patience. “Thank you.” When the man finally left, the silence in the room was a living presence.

As was David’s resentment.

“He thinks I should be afraid of you,” she said, for lack of a better opening.

“You should.” David still didn’t look at her.

She walked closer. “How badly are you hurt?”

“I’m okay.” His pallor said otherwise, as did how stiffly he held himself.

Obviously it was up to her to generate conversation. She decided to go for shock value. “Why, David?”