Free All Around the Town by Mary Higgins Clark Page B

little. From the time Laurie was born, Sarah was always such a little mother to her. I don't know if, being in Georgia, you would have known about it but..."
    As she heard the story of the disappearance seventeen years earlier. Opal felt her heart begin to race. On an end table there was a picture of Lee with an older girl. Lee was wearing the pink bathing suit she'd had on when they picked her up. With the cluster of framed photos in this room, it was crazy that her eye fell on that one. Bic was right. There was a reason why God had sent them here to be on guard against Lee now.
    She chose to fake a sneeze, pull her handkerchief from her coat pocket and drop a glove in Lee's bedroom. Even if Betsy Lyons hadn't told her, it was easy to figure which one was Lee's. The sister's room was loaded with law books over the desk.
    Opal followed Lyons down the stairs, then asked to see the kitchen again. "I love this kitchen," she sighed. "This house is a dream." At least that was honest, she thought with some amusement. "Now I'd really better be going. My ankle is telling me to stop walking." She sat on one of the tall stools in front of the island counter.
    "Of course." Betsy Lyons could smell a potential sale warming up.
    Opal reached in her coat pocket for her gloves, then frowned. "I know I had both of them when we came in." She fished in the other pocket, brought out her handkerchief. "Oh, I know. I bet when I sneezed, I pulled out my glove with the hankie. That was in the bedroom with the blue carpet." She began to slide from the stool.
    "You wait right there," Betsy Lyons ordered. "I'll run up and look for it."
    "Oh, would you?"
    Opal waited until a faint padding on the staircase assured her that Lyons was on her way to the second floor. Then she jumped from the stool and raced to the row of blue-handled knives attached to the wall next to the stove. She grabbed the largest one, a long carving knife, and dropped it in her oversize shoulder bag.
    She was back on the stool, slightly bent over, her hand rubbing her ankle, when Betsy Lyons returned to the kitchen, a triumphant smile on her face, the missing glove clutched in her fingers.

    Chapter 30
    THE FIRST PART of the week had passed in a blur. Sarah worked through Thursday night, poring over her closing statement.
    She read intently, clipping, inserting, preparing three-by-five cards with the highlights of the points she wanted to hammer at the jury. The morning light began to filter into the bedroom. At seven-fifteen Sarah read her closing paragraph. "Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Marcus is a skilled and experienced defense attorney. He hammered away at each of the witnesses who had been in the station that night. Admittedly it was not broad daylight but neither was it so dark they could not see James Parker's face. Every one of them had seen him approach and be rebuffed by Maureen Mays in the railroad station. Every one of them told you, without hesitation, that James Parker is the person who got into Maureen's car that night....
    "I would say, ladies and gentlemen, the evidence has shown to you beyond any reasonable doubt that James Parker murdered this fine young woman and forever robbed her husband, mother, father and siblings of her love and support.
    "There is nothing any of us can do to bring her back, but what you, the jury, can do is to bring her murderer to justice."
    She had covered all the points. The solid mass of evidence was undeniable. Still Conner Marcus was the best criminal attorney she'd ever been up against. And juries were unpredictable.
    Sarah got up and stretched. The adrenaline that always pulsed through her body during a trial would reach fever pitch when she began her final arguments. She was counting on that.
    She went into the bathroom and turned on the shower. It was a temptation to linger under the cascade of hot water. Her shoulders especially seemed to be tied up in knots. Instead she turned off the hot water and twisted the cold-water tap