Free Tell No Lies by Julie Compton

origin, she responded eagerly. In bed, as in the other areas of their marriage, there was a balance of power between them that shifted back and forth like a seesaw, depending on the day, depending on their moods, depending on whatever else was happening in their lives. This morning he reigned, wielding his authority as if his life depended on it; she knew it and she let him. He kept his eyes open, watched her underneath him, kept his mind on one road, the road back. He kept telling himself that this was his wife, this was the woman he loved, had always loved, would always love. He was almost there . . . almost there. But then she cried out, he felt every muscle in her body tense, and it was as if someone had knocked him out of his lane and into the oncoming traffic. He closed his eyes, tried to get back the control, but couldn't. His mind raced down that other road—the road right into the garage. And standing there, at the end, was Jenny. When he saw her, he shuddered and cried out, too, and then whatever strength he'd had, whatever self-restraint he'd managed to hold on to, was gone.
 
     
    In the middle of the parking lot outside the Child Advocacy Center, Jack unlocked his car and sat in the driver's seat. The captured heat suffocated him and he closed his eyes briefly, oddly enjoying the sensation. He'd just come from an interview with a young girl who'd been sexually abused by her mother's boyfriend. The police report indicated she was eight years old, but she'd been quiet and withdrawn and had spoken with the vocabulary of a child of four or five.
    From the beginning, sex crimes had been the hardest for Jack, because more often than not they involved children. He'd had trouble falling asleep at night because he couldn't shake the faces of the kids as they reticently told him their tales. They were completely unaware that what had happened to them hadn't happened to every other kid on their block, and yet they knew, subconsciously, that it wasn't right.
    At one point he'd become so depressed that he'd considered quitting altogether. It seemed that no matter how much time and energy he put into these cases, they gave him the least satisfaction because the conviction rate was so low and recidivism so high. Sometimes a mother would decide at the last minute to withdraw her complaint, claiming her child made up the story, or the judge would just dismiss it because the witnesses kept failing to show up. Jack quickly learned that usually the mother simply didn't want to lose the man—most often her husband, or a boyfriend, like in the case today—who had committed the crime.
    He struggled with his inability to reconcile his opposition to the death penalty with the emotions he felt when he thought about Michael or Jamie falling victim to some predator. If the unthinkable happened, he insisted to Claire, he would hunt down the perpetrator and kill him with his bare hands. Claire thought he was merely grandstanding; she claimed that reason would prevail and they would handle it together in a levelheaded manner. He knew she was right, that's what they would do, but it wasn't what he would want to do. And yet he knew these same types of emotions motivated those in favor of the death penalty. How could he hold everyone else to a higher standard than he held himself?
 
    He didn't quit, of course, and what bothered him now, ironically, was that over the years, he had become somewhat desensitized to the cases. Everyone told him that it was completely normal, that it was a defense mechanism and was to be expected after years of prosecuting child sex abuse, but his numbness disturbed him nevertheless.
    Now he was just relieved to have the interview over with; it was not the way he wanted to start the week. Maybe the day would begin to improve. He left the door open to cool the car off while he called Beverly from his cell phone.
    "Don't come back to the office, Jack," she said. "Earl wants you to meet him at the Noonday Club for