Raising Cain

by Gallatin Warfield

Genres: Spy Thrillers; Suspense

Synopsis

His father's death on a deserted road is regarded as a natural passing, but Sergeant Joe Brown suspects foul play. He has his suspicions, and when his prime suspect is suddenly found dead too, he is charged with the murder. With Brown's reputation and career at stake, it's up to prosecutor Gardner Lawson to defeat flamboyant defense attorney Kent King in a trial that will take many shocking twists and turns before arriving at its shattering conclusion.

Release date: September 9, 2009

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing

Print pages: 345

Sample

Gallatin Warfield stunned readers and critics alike with his debut thrillers, State v. Justice and Silent Son. Now, against a vivid backdrop of the modern American culture, Warfield unleashes a powerhouse legal thriller that explores the depths of human passion, loyalty, and deception…

RAISING CAIN

On a deserted road in rural Maryland a black man lies dead, the victim of an apparent heart attack. His policeman son, Sergeant Joe Brown, refuses to see it as an open-and-shut case and begins to investigate. The trail leads to CAIN, the Church of the Ark, Incorporated, a fanatical religious cult practicing bizarre snake rituals and mind control, and to the group’s powerful, charismatic leader. Then, in an extraordinary twist of fate, Thomas Ruth, the head of CAIN, becomes the next to die.

The county’s prosecuting attorney, Gardner Lawson, is convinced that even though Brown had the motive, means, and opportunity to kill Thomas Ruth, he didn’t commit the crime. Then, when the cop is charged with the murder, the lawyer makes a decision that will change his life. In a stunning reversal of roles, Lawson’s old nemesis, the arrogant, flamboyant defense attorney Kent King, is brought in to spearhead the prosecution of Sergeant Brown—and Lawson must choose between a career built on bringing criminals to justice and a colleague in need of the best possible defense.

RAISING CAIN takes us into the inner workings of our criminal justice system and the hothouse atmosphere of friends, adversaries, lovers, and family caught up in a struggle of life and death. In it, Gallatin Warfield explores some of the most compelling issues of our time—from the racial, social, and economic crosscurrents of Maryland’s Appalachian hill country to the dangerous passions that surround a cult. Relentlessly gripping, explosively original, RAISING CAIN pits an innocent man against a system that may not be able to do its job anymore, and a career prosecutor against the ultimate challenge: a search for the truth.



GALLATIN WARFIELD is the author of State v. Justice and Silent Son. He is a former Assistant Attorney General in the criminal division of the Maryland Attorney General’s office and former chief felony prosecutor in Howard County, Maryland.

The country road had no name. Originally cut by loggers to access the Appalachian forest, it was now just a dirt path through
the trees. Cracks and ruts scarred the surface, and sticker bushes clawed the sides. And it was two lonely miles long.


The old man’s feet hurt. He had walked halfway and was beginning to tire. Maybe he had made a mistake. Maybe he should not
have come this way tonight, attempting the shortcut in the September twilight.


The air was still, the birds silent. The only sound was the man’s labored breathing and the scrape of his shoes against the
gravel.


This was Tuesday, checkers day at the senior center. He’d spent the afternæn as usual, working the boards with the guys and
enthralling them with stories, tales from his thirty years at the service of Eastern Atlantic Railroad. He’d whooped it up,
and won some games. But the last one was over at four-thirty, and then he’d slipped up the road for a few minutes. And now
it was almost dark.


His steps quickened, despite his fatigue. Althea was waiting at home with a plate of greens and boiled ham. She was probably
worried and a little angry.


Joseph checked his gold watch and tried to keep up the pace, but the lumpy ground made it difficult. Suddenly there was a
loud crack in the underbrush. He stopped and peered into the thicket, looking for movement. Maybe it was a deer; they often
ran these woods. But he saw nothing, no gentle brown eyes gazing back. The silence returned. He started walking again.


After a few more steps there was another snapping sound in the brush. This time Joseph did not stop. Dinner was waiting. He
had to get home.


Suddenly a dark form moved from the woods and blocked his path.

“Dear God,” Joseph whispered.

The light had almost yielded to night, but there was still enough of an afterglow for the old man to discern what confronted
him. It was a crimson ghost in a satin robe and hood. His face was covered, but his eyes glared through holes in the cloth.


“What do you want?” Joseph asked shakily. This was not supposed to happen anymore, not today. The Klan had died out around
here. Black folks could come and go in peace.


The ghost moved closer but said nothing.

“What you want?” Joseph took a shaky step backward.

The hooded figure moved forward slowly, silently.

“We don’t need any of this…” Joseph stuttered, “this foolishness.

… Leave me alone!” He considered running but decided against it.

He wouldn’t get far, not in these woods.

The ghost lifted a canvas bag in a latex-gloved hand and seized Joseph’s wrist with his other. That, too, was gloved, and
it felt cold against his dark skin.


“Stop this now!” Joseph begged. “Please!”

The hand gripped tightly and led Joseph to a tree off the pathway.

“Don’t,” Joseph said, trying to squirm out of the grasp. He was beginning to sweat, and his heart was pounding.

His arms were forced around the tree, and his wrists were wrapped in a thick piece of cloth. Then the wrists were bound together
with a cord.


“Awww…” Joseph moaned. “Why you doin’ this to me?” He thought of Althea and his greens steaming on the table. He should have
gone right home after checkers, the way he was supposed to.


The ghost silently hefted the canvas bag.

Joseph twisted his neck, trying to see. “Don’t!” he yelled, straining to look. What was happening?

The ghost stood behind him, and Joseph pulled and yanked against the cord, but it was too tight. He couldn’t turn, and he
couldn’t see. “Please!” he begged. “Stop this!… Please!”


The ghost rustled the bag close behind, and Joseph stopped struggling and held his breath. What was happening now? Suddenly
he felt something move against his neck. It was scaly and muscular, encircling his throat like a writhing rope.


“Nooooo!” Joseph screamed in panic. The one unreasoning terror in Joseph’s life had a forked tongue. It was an absolute, incurable
phobia. He hated snakes.


“Uhhhh!” Joseph twisted his head wildly, trying to throw the reptile off, but the ghost had looped the snake so it would stay
in place.


“Get it off!” Joseph hollered, “Get it off! Please!” The snake’s belly muscles contracted.

The ghost was impassive as the struggle continued.

Joseph was gasping now, and his chest was tightening. “Uhhh…”

He’d only touched one snake in his life, and it had almost killed him. A buddy had put it in his car as a joke. It brushed
his leg while he was driving, and he’d panicked and almost crashed. He’d abandoned the car on the side of the road and never
returned.


“Get it…” Joseph moaned. He could hardly breathe now, and his chest was burning. Grandma had warned that a snake would take
him if he didn’t behave. And so he was a good boy, very, very good. But that didn’t stop the nightmares, the sweaty dreams
of slithering hell.


The snake finally slipped to the ground, and Joseph let out a gurgling gasp. But the ghost picked it up and put it back in
place.


Joseph tried to struggle, but his strength was gone. He had been bad and Grandma had put him in the shed. And now the snake
was here to take him away.


Finally, Joseph groaned and slumped against the tree. The ghost moved forward, cut the cord and removed the material from
his wrists, then lowered his body to the dry earth. The snake was still entwined around his neck. He snatched it below the
head and flung it into the underbrush.


Joseph’s eyes were rolled back, and he was breathing in trembling gasps. The ghost raised his hood and bent down to check
for a pulse. The old heart was barely beating.


He dragged the body back to the road and obliterated the dragmarks with a tree limb. Then he knelt and examined his victim
again. Joseph was struggling for life, his chest shaking with each breath. Consciousness flickered, and Joseph blinked, trying
to focus. His chest ached and his voice was gone, but he was awake. He moaned.


The ghost froze. Maybe he was reviving. Joseph moaned again and arched his back. The ghost looked into his face.

“Rrrrrrr…” Joseph cried out, his eyes wide. He was trying to speak, but the words wouldn’t form.

The ghost pulled away and jerked his hood down.

Joseph’s lips soon went slack, and he closed his eyes. His chest stopped heaving, and he let out a long, slow breath.

The ghost peered at him through the eyeholes in the hood, waiting for something to happen.

The body lay quiet now. The ghost checked his pulse. The old heart was finally still.

The ghost scanned the area a last time and smoothed the dust. Then he dashed into the forest and was lost in the night.

State’s Attorney Gardner Lawson stared at the handgun on the table. He was alone in a cubicle at police headquarters. It was
six P.M., and the detective bureau was deserted. He picked up the pistol and rotated its cylinder, listening to the click-click-click as the feeder port passed the barrel. It was empty now, but last night there had been five .357 magnum rounds in those holes,
and a young farmer named Tom Payson had fired two into his wife, two into his son, and one into his own brain. Three people
dead, just like that, all because the August drought had wiped out the corn crop, or some other silent demon had seized Tom
and thrown him over the edge.


Gardner put down the weapon and lifted the cover of a police report. “MURDER-SUICIDE. CASE CLOSED,” the bottom line read.
It had been signed by the investigating officer and the chief. There was a space below that for the endorsement of the State’s
Attorney. Gardner removed a pen from his jacket and slowly wrote his name. Then he snapped the cover shut and shoved the folder
under the gun.


This was Gardner Lawson’s world: a daily diet of mayhem and sorrow. As the chief prosecutor in a remote western Maryland county,
Gardner had seen a lot of Tom Payson cases. Too many to count. At forty-five years of age, he was beginning to tire. He’d
been prosecuting crime for two decades. He was tall and imposing, a courtroom wizard. But he was running out of steam.


Buzzz… The pager on Gardner’s belt vibrated against his abdomen. Gardner sat forward, rubbed his dark eyes, and brushed a wisp
of graying hair behind his ear.


Buzzz…


He removed the pager and squinted at the number display, adjusting the distance so he could read it: 777-3454. Carole. His
ex-wife. There was a second readout after the number: 911. Emergency.

Gardner grabbed for the phone. A 911 from Carole could only be about one thing: Granville. His son was in trouble.

He fumbled with the buttons, misdialed, and redialed. The phone rang.

“Hello?” It was the voice of an eleven-year-old.

“Gran?” Gardner’s heart was racing.

“Dad!”

You okay?”

“Yeah. I just paged you.”

“I know. What’s wrong?”


“Nothing.”

“Nothing? You paged me with a nine-one-one. That means emergency.”


“It is an emergency.”

Gardner sighed. He’d delivered the “never cry wolf” sermon a hundred times. “What’s the matter?”

“I have a spelling test tomorrow.”

Gardner fought a smile. For a spunky sixth-grader, that was an emergency. “Did you ask Mom for help?”

“She’s not here. She’s over at Aunt Vera’s.”

Gardner felt a rush of heat under his collar. Granville should not be left alone. He was still too young. “When’s she coming
back?”


“Hour or so.”

“What about your dinner?”

“She’s gonna bring a pizza.”

Gardner firmed his jaw. There were a million ways Carole irritated him, but he was not supposed to let it show, not in front
of his son.


“Can you help me, Dad?”

Gardner checked his watch. They were well on the downside of six o’clock, and Jennifer was expecting him back at the State’s
Attorney’s office soon.


“Can you, Dad?”

“Of course,” Gardner finally said. “Read me the list, and we’ll go through it.”

Granville ticked off twenty words, and Gardner copied them down. “Okay, ready?”

“Yup.”

“Turn your book facedown.”

“It’s closed.”

“Okay. Here we go….”

For the next half hour, Gardner quizzed Granville on the spelling of passage, and parrot, and potato, and the other words on the list. Suddenly there was a voice in the background.


“Mom’s here,” Granville whispered. “Got to hang up.”

“Okay,” Gardner whispered back. “Good luck on the test. And Gran…”

“Yeah, Dad?”

“Go easy on the nine-one-one. Remember the wolf boy.”

Granville laughed.

“Love you son, love you very much. See you soon, I hope.”

“Love you, too, Dad.” And he hung up.

Gardner stared at the phone for a moment. Then he stood up and stretched. His leg was cramped, and his lower back ached. He
was getting old. He massaged his calf, but the pain didn’t go away. The muscles were sore from too much jogging on the old wheels.


Gardner walked to the lieutenant’s office and placed Tom Payson’s gun and report on his desk. Then he half-timed it down the
hall, past the security post, and out of the station. The workday was finally done. And Jennifer was waiting.


Assistant State’s Attorney Jennifer Munday looked at the woman sitting across the conference room table. Her left eye was
puffed up with a bruise, her lip was cracked, and a grimy tear streamed down her cheek. She was gripping her hands so tightly
her knuckles were white.


“It’s all right,” Jennifer said softly. “He’s never going to hurt you again.”

The woman stared blankly.

“We’re going to nail him,” Jennifer said firmly. She was a terminator in court, a lithe, brown-haired dynamo in round-lensed
glasses. “If you testify, he’ll be locked up for a long time.”


The woman released her grip slightly.

Oh no, Jennifer thought, don’t waffle on me.

The woman shook her head. “Can’t,” she moaned.

Jennifer touched her arm. “You must, Cathy. Without your testimony we have no case. I explained that. You have to tell the judge what happened.”


“Can’t,” Cathy repeated.

“I know you’re afraid—”

“That ain’t it.”

“What is it?”

“I still love him.”


Jennifer tried to stay cool. She’d played this scene fifty times before. “Love” was an abuser’s best defense. “You have to do this,” Jennifer said. “You have to. For yourself. I know it’s hard, but there’s no choice. He could kill you next time.”


“He’d never do that.”

“He almost did.”


A tear ran down Cathy’s other cheek, but she didn’t say anything.

Jennifer knew it was over. Under state law, a wife could not be forced to testify against her husband. She could do so voluntarily,
but she couldn’t be coerced, no matter how serious her injury.


“Please,” Jennifer urged. “Think about your future….”

But Cathy’s body was rigid. She was going back to Billy.

“I’m sorry, Miss Munday, I love him and he loves me. I can’t do this to him.”


“But look what he did to you!”

“Sorry,” Cathy repeated. She stood up. “He’s gonna change.”

Jennifer grabbed her arm. “No, he’s not! He’s going to do it again!”


Cathy wrenched her arm free. “I gotta go. Thanks for trying to help.” She started for the door.

Jennifer handed her a business card. “If he does anything to you, anything, call me. Day or night, it doesn’t matter. My home number is on the card. Call me, Cathy. And think about what I said. You
have to take a stand.”


Cathy mumbled another thanks and left the room. Jennifer followed and let her out the front door of the office, then listened
as her footsteps faded down the marble courthouse corridor.


Jennifer leaned against the receptionist’s desk and crossed her arms. It was late, and she was tired. Tired of pushing people
who didn’t want to be pushed, tired of carrying the burden of righteousness, tired of a lot of things. She was senior assistant
prosecutor in the county and Gardner Lawson’s live-in girlfriend. They shared an office and a bed. They were together around
the clock. But somehow it wasn’t enough.


“Mama is going to her room,” the woman told her seven-year-old daughter. “You and Molly play quietly.” They lived in a big
house on a shady street in Arlington, Virginia. It had a wide porch, a grassy backyard, and a narrow wooden staircase leading
to a long hall on the second floor. The light bulb at the top of the stairs was always burned out. Mama’s room was at the
end of the corridor.

Daddy worked for the government. He was gone all day and didn’t come home until late at night. Jenny and her sister watched
TV in the den: cartoons, and puppets, and racing robots. And Mama stayed in her room.

“I’m hungry,” Molly said.

Jenny looked at the clock. It was six-thirty, dark outside.

“I’m hungry,” Molly repeated, twisting an auburn curl with her tiny finger.

Jenny tiptoed up the stairs and felt her way along the oriental runner with the tip of her sneaker. She knocked on Mama’s
door. “What?” Mama called.

“Molly’s hungry. Can we have dinner?”

“In the freezer.”

“Are you coming down?”

“No.”

Jenny went to the kitchen and removed two TV dinners from the refrigerator. She heated the oven and put them in. Then she
set the table, poured milk, and helped Molly up into her chair.

“Hungry,” Molly groused.

“Dinner coming right up,” Jenny said with a laugh, pulling the foil off the top of the tins.

“I hate chicken!” Molly complained.

“Eat!” Jenny said.

Molly picked up a drumstick and gnawed it with her baby teeth. And the two girls dined in the twilight of their silent home.

“Jen!” Gardner called as he came through the office door. She was sitting on the desk in the alcove, her eyes focusing on
something far away. “What’s wrong?”


Jennifer stood up. “You’re late.”

“Sorry.” He kissed her cheek. “I had to review the Payson file. Hell of a mess.… And Granville called.”

“What about?”

“Big spelling test tomorrow. I had to quiz him.”

“Couldn’t his mother do that?”


“She, uh…”

“Don’t make excuses for her, Gardner. She couldn’t help him?”


“No. She couldn’t.”


They looked at each other for a moment. Jennifer had been with Gardner long enough to know the priorities in his life. Granville
came first, above everything. If Carole dropped the ball, Gardner was right there to pick it up.


“How did that domestic case go?” Gardner finally asked.

“It didn’t.”

“Spousal immunity?”

“She loves him.”


“Shit.”

“She might change her mind, but I doubt it.”

Gardner held up Jennifer’s coat. “You can’t force these things, Jen. They have to come around voluntarily.”

“If they’re still alive.” Jennifer slipped her arms into the sleeves.

“What say we stop by Paul’s Place on the way home? Grab a meal?” Jennifer hesitated by the door. “No.”

“No? You must be starved.”

“No,” Jennifer repeated. “I’m really not hungry.”

Sallie Allen adjusted the volume on the miniature tape recorder in her pocket as the preacher’s voice rattled the tin roof
of the open shed and echoed out into the night.


“Praise God, and be healed of all your mortal sins!” the preacher cried, gesticulating from his makeshift pulpit.

“Praise God!” fifty believers answered.

Sallie joined in the refrain. She had to make it look authentic, like she was part of the program. A petite woman in her late
twenties with an angular face and straight blond hair, she’d arrived at the isolated compound three days earlier and applied
for admission to the Church of the Ark, Incorporated, also known as CAIN. After interrogation about her financial assets and
beliefs, forfeiture of her cash, and a pledge of faith, she was welcomed into the group. No one knew that she was really an
investigative reporter for Interview magazine.


“You must give yourselves to the Lord, body and soul,” the preacher continued. “Body and soul…”


Sallie studied the man as he held forth on the platform, testing phrases for her article titled “Inside Cults, U.S.A.” He
was “tall, handsome, intelligent, and charismatic,” a man with refined Germanic features and a “piercing” stare. No. Too trite.
“Deceptive eyes.” That was better. It had more punch. And his name was a killer: Thomas Ruth. Biblical as hell.


“Others may not understand our beliefs,” Ruth continued, “but we stand firm in what weknow to be the truth!” He raised his arms in the air. “We see the light! We hear the call! We feel the touch of the Almighty on our skin!”


Sallie cautiously glanced around. The crowd was mesmerized. This was hot stuff.

“We take our instruction from no one but God,” Ruth went on, “and we follow his word to the letter.” His blue eyes narrowed.
“To the letter.” There was a warning in that line. “God’s punishment for nonbelievers is swift.” His eyes narrowed again.
“And it is deadly.”


Sallie felt a shiver race up her spine. This was what she had hoped for: the newest cult flavor. CAIN. A fire-and-brimstone
church in an abandoned granite quarry deep in the Appalachian mountains. A stunning preacher, a docile following. Secrecy,
intrigue, danger. It was going to make dynamite copy.


“Do you believe?” Ruth suddenly called out.

“Yes!” came the reply.

“Do you believe?”

“Yes!”

Sallie felt a tingle in her pelvis. Ruth’s voice was suddenly tender and seductive.

“Can you prove your belief to God?”

The crowd suddenly hushed.

Sallie had heard one other sermon since she’d come to the compound, and it wasn’t like this. She wondered where he was heading.

“Are you ready to walk the valley of death?”


“Yes,” someone murmured.

“Who will take the walk?” Ruth looked at the first row.


A hand went up.

Sallie suddenly felt uneasy. What was going on?

“Will you take the walk with me?” Ruth pointed at a young man in the third row whose hand was down. The man nodded.


“Raise your hand, son!”

The hand came up slowly.

Ruth smiled, his teeth gleaming white in the light of the naked bulbs strung down the center of the shed.

Sallie adjusted her recorder again. This was getting interesting.

“Who else will walk?” That wasn’t a question. It was a demand.


Others began to raise their hands, and Sallie became nervous. What did it mean to walk the valley? She raised her hand, too.

The room fell silent, and Ruth gazed at the congregation from his perch. Every hand was up. “Each of you agrees to walk the
valley of death?”


“Yes!” they replied.

“You?” Ruth moved his finger from person to person.


“Yes!”

“And you?”


“Yes!”

Every person singled out said yes. Sallie noticed the finger was nearing her position.

“And you?”


That was one row away.

“And you?”


Sallie heard no response.

“Will you take the walk?” Ruth repeated loudly.


Sallie gulped. He was pointing directly at her.

“Yes,” she said tentatively.

“Come.” Ruth beckoned her up to the stage. “Come to me.” Sallie made her way forward, and as she did, the crowd began to chant,
“Fear no evil! Fear no evil! Fear no evil!”


Ruth took Sallie’s hand and helped her onto the platform. Up close, he was even more handsome. His blond hair was thick, his
skin unblemished. He could play himself in the movie, Sallie thought. He was wearing a gold medallion around his neck, but
she couldn’t make out the raised image. “Be not afraid,” Ruth said gently.


Sallie nodded, but she was too nervous to speak. Ruth motioned to two men at the side of the shed, who then left the lighted
area. In a moment they returned with a large wooden barrel.


“Fear no evil! Fear no evil!” the crowd repeated. The men set the barrel in front of the stage. It was sealed with a metal cover.


Ruth detached the lid. “Tonight you and I will walk the valley of death.”


Sallie’s knees shook, and she tried to hide it. She looked into the barrel and saw something move.

“Be not afraid,” Ruth repeated, tipping the barrel over.

A cluster of rattlesnakes slithered out. And Sallie felt like she was going to faint.

“Trust the Lord,” Ruth said. Snakes were still gushing out of the barrel. “Take my hand.” Ruth slipped his slender fingers
into hers as the assistants used sticks to arrange the snakes in two writhing columns on the dirt floor. Sallie squeezed his
hand and leaned against him, inhaling a sweet male aroma from the sleeve of his silk shirt. She felt dizzy.


“Walk with me,” Ruth said. “Fear no evil.”


Sallie balked. She couldn’t do it.

The earlier chanting of the crowd had given way to an expectant hush. “Walk,” Ruth said calmly, holding her hand in a powerful
grip.


Sallie took a deep breath and looked at the floor. The snakes were coiling and uncoiling across one another. She’d worked
hard for this assignment, jockeying ahead of other reporters, pulling strings. It was showtime, and she had to perform. If
she didn’t, they’d bounce her out of the compound.


“Walk,” Ruth repeated, tugging her forward.

Sallie kept her eyes on his face, not daring to look down. Maybe they’d defanged the snakes, milked out the venom. Maybe it
was hocus-pocus, theater. Maybe they wouldn’t bite. Sallie took a step.


“Walk….” Ruth cooed.

Sallie took another step. She felt a snake slide across her foot, and she bit her tongue to keep from screaming. But she kept
moving. Drawn by Ruth’s eyes, and hand, and voice, Sallie kept moving. Step by step by step. Until she made it through.


Ruth helped her up on the platform and raised her hand in the air.

“Praise God! Praise God!” the congregation wailed.

Sallie tried to smile, but her lips trembled.

Ruth squeezed her hand as he held it aloft. “I knew you could do it,” he said triumphantly. “Praise God.”


Sallie smelled that sweet smell again and felt another tingle. But this one was an earth-shaker. “Praise God!” she screamed.

And the crowd went wild.

Sergeant Joe Brown arrived at County General Hospital at ten o’clock. He’d been out in the field, working a case, when the
call came in. Known as “Brownie” to his friends, the stocky fifteen-year veteran of the police force was a master detective
and crime lab chief, an intelligent, deadly stalker of criminals when he was on the job. But tonight the call was personal:
his father had collapsed.


Brownie’s mother greeted him as he rushed into the waiting area, but her eyes said he was too late.

“Daddy?”

Althea Brown put her arms around her son. “Gone,” she whispered.

Brownie hugged his mother in silence as a collection of relatives gathered close. Then he turned to see his mother’s face.
She was trying to be stoic, but the pain was immense. “How?” he asked.


“Heart gave out coming back from checker club.”

Brownie could hear his dad chuckling as he pulled off a quadruple jump on the board. “Where?”

“On the path by Cutler Road. He tried to make it home in the dark.”

“Dark?” Checkers usually ended by five.

“Yes.” Althea lowered her eyes.

“So he was late coming home.”


“A little… yes.” Althea’s voice was barely audible.

Brownie stopped talking. No use getting into old business now. He hugged his mother in silence, acknowledging several relatives
and local clergy with a glance over her shoulder. Reverend Taylor had formed them into a circle, and they were praying. The
Brown family was strong. They always came together in a crisis. “When did it happen?”


“Seven, eight o’clock, not really sure. Someone called nine-one-one.”

“Who?”

“Don’t know exactly. They found him on the road and called an ambulance.”

Brownie kissed her damp cheek. “Where is he?”