Murder Deja Vu

sense or didn’t want to sense. Focused people like him miss a lot of what goes on around them, and it wasn’t in him to look for the bad in anybody back then. When his father and friends shunned him after he was arrested, he felt like the whole world had crashed down on top of him.” Jeraldine sighed. “Carl was there, along with his mother, but I guess that was part of Carl’s cover-up.”
    “Wouldn’t you be crushed?”
    “I’m more jaded,” Jeraldine said. “Not that I look for the bad in people, but my job has conditioned me to think a certain way.”
    “So Reece might not have guessed Carl is the killer.”
    “That’s possible. He could have gone to Portland to see his father without plans to see Carl at all. Clarence will find out and call me.”
    “What’s going to happen to me? Can they put me in jail again?”
    “Right now, they can’t prove you had anything to do with Reece leaving Harold County. You drove here in your father’s old pickup to visit Reece’s friend, a dying man. Not logical when you left a nice Jeep at home, but so what. No one saw you and Reece together, and Frank won’t talk.”
    “Not very believable, is it?”
    “No, but who’s to say you knew you were wanted or that you watched TV or read the papers? Now if Reece had been there, it’d be another story. I’d say you did some pretty quick thinking.”
    “Don’t forget, I write suspense novels, but I doubt I could have thought of any scenario like the one I’m involved in now.”
    “And to find out you were having an affair with a black man. And a young stud at that.”
    “I know they didn’t buy that.”
    “Hell, no. But the idea made me smile.” Jeraldine looked around. “Where the fuck are we? There has to be a restaurant nearby. I need a drink. It’s five o’clock somewhere.”
    “After today, I could go for one myself.”
    Jeraldine flipped open her phone and called Clarence. “Got her out of the hoosegow, babe.” She listened.
    Dana watched Jeraldine’s face, whose expression went from elated to deflated. Her eyes filled with tears.
    “Oh, God, no,” Jeraldine said.
    Dana edged on her seat. “What? Tell me.”
    Jeraldine motioned Dana to wait. “What are they saying?” She listened, then said, “Call me back when you know something.”
    “Something bad,” Dana said. “Reece. Is he all right?”
    “Carl shot him. He’s being rushed by ambulance to the hospital. Clarence is on his way.”
    Dana gasped for breath. The view out the window blurred, sounds echoed. She felt herself sliding sideways as her body went limp. The car swerved and stopped. The sting of Jeraldine’s hand across her face woke her.
    “Don’t you go out on me, hear? Don’t do it.” Jeraldine snatched a bottle of water from the console. “Here. Drink, Dana. Hear me?”
    Dana turned her head. Jeraldine pushed a bottle to her mouth. She drank without thinking and choked out a cough when it slithered down her throat the wrong way. That brought her back. Breathing took all her concentration.
    “Is he going to—” She couldn’t say it.
    “I don’t know.”
    “I need to go to him.”
    “We’re going. If he can talk, I don’t want the police to get to him without me being there. Clarence is there, but he’s not Reece’s lawyer. He’s good at working with cops, though. Damn, if I needed a drink before, I sure as hell need one now. A double.”

Chapter Forty-Eight
Good News and Bad

    W hen Clarence arrived at the emergency entrance of Mercy Hospital, the paramedics had already taken Reece into the ER. Two police cars had arrived before him. He parked his car and hurried inside, sick to his stomach at the thought that Reece could have been fatally wounded. He wasn’t a praying man. If he were, he’d be praying now.
    The place swarmed with people. Patients, doctors, nurses, and cops milled around the desk. Clarence waited his turn to get the attention of the admitting nurse. “Can you tell me about the man you just brought in?”
    “Are you a relative?”
    “No, but I’m a close friend.”
    “Sorry, I can’t give out any information.”
    “Can you tell me if he’s alive?”
    She scowled at Clarence and turned to a new arrival flashing his badge. Clarence recognized him as one of the detectives coming out of Daughtry Custom Homes. He moved closer to hear the exchange.
    “They called in the best heart surgeon in the area,” the nurse said to the detective. “They’re prepping Mr. Daughtry for