Page 17 of The Instruments of Darkness

“My mom’s on her way here,” she said. “Can we wait for her? She won’t be very long.”

“Sure, we have time.”

Colleen had tied her hair back, put on a plain blue dress, and reapplied her makeup with more care than before. She held a matching blue purse in her hands, which she caught me looking at. Her shoulders sank as she realized why.

“I can’t bring anything with me, can I?”

“You can, but it’ll be taken from you when you’re processed.”

“?‘Processed,’?” she said. “What a horrible word. It makes me sound like a slab of meat.”

She set the bag aside.

“I’ve never been inside a jail,” she said. “I’ve only ever seen one on TV.”

“Moxie and I will make sure you’re well looked after,” I said.

“Are you going to share my cell?”

But she wasn’t smiling. She was scared, and I didn’t blame her.

“Believe me,” I said, “if I could, I would. In the absence of that, we have other ways of making sure you’ll be kept out of harm’s way.”

I didn’t tell her that it would be easier for us to do that if she was held at Cumberland County Jail, which was smaller and, as places of incarceration went, kinder. If she were to be sent to Maine Correctional in Windham, or the State Prison in Warren, our task would be made more difficult. We didn’t have the same contacts in those institutions, and some of the inmates would be of a different degree of unpleasantness from CCJ’s residents. But both Windham and Warren were overcrowded, and might not have the space to accommodate her anyway.

The doorbell rang. Colleen stood to get it, but I waved her down.

“From now on,” I said, “this is how it will be. You don’t answer the door or phone, and you don’t go anywhere unless I, or one of my colleagues, is with you. Okay?”

“Okay.”

I thought we might also get some surveillance cameras installed, and a video doorbell for the door. It would act as a deterrent, as well as helping the Fulcis with their duties. I went to the door and checked the peephole. A woman in her early sixties was standing on the step. I spotted the resemblance and let her in.

“Mrs. Miller?” I said. “My name is Parker. I’m working on your daughter’s behalf, aiding her attorney.”

Evelyn Miller waited until the door had closed behind her before speaking. Her daughter might have acquired some of her looks, but not her demeanor. The mother radiated energy and purpose, and right now she was also being fueled by a rage so hot it had turned her face red. She dispensed with the niceties and cut to the chase.

“Seriously, you’ve advised her to hand herself over to the police?”

“Mom, please—” said Colleen from the kitchen.

“I didn’t argue against it,” I said.

“I thought your job was to keep her out of jail.”

“This is a long game, Mrs. Miller,” I said. “Don’t judge it by the first move.”

“Oh, that’s very clever. Did you keep the fortune cookie it came in?”

“Mom!”

This time, Colleen Clark’s voice was very loud. Even her mother was so surprised by the force of the interjection that it took her a few moments to react. After she did, her manner was more conciliatory.

“I’m just worried for you,” she said, advancing to the kitchen, where she took her daughter in her arms.

“I know,” said Colleen, “but I told you: they were going to arrest me anyway, and try to make me look as bad as they could. This way I get to decide. I have the power. It’s not much, but it’s something. Mr. Parker and Mr. Castin aren’t asking me to do anything I don’t want to.”

Which wasn’t completely true, because nobody really wants to go to jail. Nevertheless, it was kind of her to say. Her mother glanced back at me.

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