Page 84 of Before You Go

“Okay.”

“I just wanted to give you a heads up, I spoke with Alice’s sisters yesterday. They called to ask me about the meeting you scheduled with them. They wanted to know if I knew what it was about.”

“What did you say?”

“As much as I could without saying too much, basically that I know that you plan on presenting them with evidence against Charles.”

“All right.”

“They were very skeptical, even when I mentioned the DNA that came back as a match to him.”

Shit.

“Do they understand how unlikely it is that his DNA would have been at the scene and on the murder weapon if he didn’t use it to kill her.”

“They understand, but now in their heads, Greg had Charles kill Alice, and that’s why his DNA was there.”

“I met with Greg yesterday; the man is still heartbroken, and it’s been twenty-plus years since he lost his wife.”

“I know,” she says softly, “but there is some very bad blood between them.”

“Fuck.”

“I’m sorry. I just wanted you to know before your meeting. I guess I kind of hoped that you had found some other information that I didn’t know about and that you were going to use that to convince them that Charles killed their sister.”

“I don’t have any other evidence.” I tighten my grip on the steering wheel.

“Maybe you’ll be more convincing than me.”

“That’s doubtful. I listened to your podcast and I know that you built a rapport with them over the course of your investigation. If they weren’t willing to believe you, I doubt that they are going to believe me.”

“You never know.”

“Yeah, you never know.” Except I do know. When people are emotionally connected to a situation and have a clear recollection of the past or the past as they believe it, it’s difficult to change their minds.

“I’m sorry. I really hope that they are open to hearing what you have to say.”

“Me too.”

“If you can’t get them on your side, do you still plan on?—"

“Yes,” I cut her off. “We will be moving forward with or without them. Our case is solid.”

“I’m happy to hear that. Alice deserves justice.”

“I couldn’t agree more.” I hang up with her after saying goodbye and drive the rest of the way to work, trying to figure out how much this is going to affect our case in the end. The truth is that her sisters siding with the defense, regardless of how strong our case is, could end up fucking us. At trial, all the defense needs is one person on the jury to hold out as undecided, and we will have wasted precious time and resources.

When I arrive at work, I stop in my office and drop of my stuff then head right to the conference room where the staff meetings are always held. Everyone is already seated but there is an empty chair at the table next to Mary, so I pull up a seat.

The meeting isn’t a big deal, just Billy going over what everyone is working on and checking in since we haven’t had a meeting in a few days with him in court.

“How close are we to being able to bring the case against Charles in front of Judge Brown?” Billy asks and everyone in the conference room turns their attention to me.

“I’d say another week, I have meetings scheduled with Alice’s family this afternoon, and Mary and I met with her husband yesterday. After that I want to get everything together, then I should be ready to present our case and hopefully get approval to move forward.”

“Great, I’m looking forward to hearing what you have.” He glances through everyone. “Does anyone have anything for me, anything that I need to know?”

“I’m pregnant.” Looking over my shoulder when that comment is made, I find Jamie sitting in the corner of the room. She looks pale and terrified, but there is also a glint of determination in her eyes.

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