Free God Only Knows by Xavier Knight

care. You said your mother went into unbelievable levels of debt for Eddie’s treatment and care, right?”
    Whitlock’s posture had softened, but he stared out his window as he replied, “You think?”
    “I’m offering,” Cassie said, “to sell you three of these properties for a nominal investment, say a thousand dollars each.
     You’ll instantly have a couple hundred thousand dollars in equity relative to market value, plus rental income from the tenants.”
     Nearly collapsing with relief, Cassie opened her arms, her palms facing up. “Your mother could be debt-free before you know
     it.”
    Whitlock sat now, with a bowed head, eyes boring into the MLS profiles as he flipped from one page to the next. Content to
     leave her in suspense, he was silent for a while before moving a finger over to the control panel on the passenger door. “Hope
     you don’t mind,” he said, lowering his window without asking permission, “I’m gonna need a smoke to respond to this.”
    Cassie fiddled with her hands, let her gaze wander out toward the grove of trees blowing in the wind. “Take your time.”
    Cassie fought a dry heave as fumes from Whitlock’s lit cigarette invaded the pores of her car. Insisting on keeping her cool,
     she rested a hand in her lap as the detective finally spoke. “Do you think I’m in this for money, Mrs. Gillette?”
    “I think,” Cassie said, “that you’re probably still sorting out your motives. I don’t think you went out looking for evidence
     that there’s more to what happened with your brother than met the eye. I think Lenny Parks had fallen on hard times, and thought
     he could get a break by pretending to have answers to the mystery you’ve suffered over for years.”
    Whitlock stared hard at her now, his features growing brittle with tension. “So answer my question. Do you really think I’m
     in this for the money?”
    “I’m offering you a token of goodwill,” Cassie said, her hands rising defensively, though she didn’t feel physically threatened.
     At least not yet. “I’ve told you, Detective. My friends and I, and all of our classmates for that matter, spent the rest of
     our junior high and high-school years praying for Eddie’s healing. Your pain is real to me.”
    Whitlock took another pull on his cigarette, intently exhaling toward Cassie’s twitching nose. “Well, that was a case of wasted
     prayers, wasn’t it?”
    “My point is, we cared. We really did.” More than ever, Cassie found herself wishing that she could just tell the painful
     truth. Through much prayer and meditation, she had wrestled with God, asking how she could possibly expose herself and, more
     important, her family to the potential consequences of an honest confession. Why, of all people, did Eddie Walker’s brother
     have to be this humanistic, vengeful policeman, one so clearly willing to abuse his authority?
    Once they had each obtained college degrees —Marcus earned his four years after high school from the University of Dayton;
     she earned hers two years later from Wright State —Cassie had tried to talk her husband into moving as far away from Ohio
     as possible. From the time M.J. was eight until he was eleven, Cassie searched want ads in major newspapers, like the
Washington Post,
and visited Web sites of publications across the nation, hoping to find openings that would grab Marcus’s attention. When
     Marcus finally insisted that he had no interest in leaving Dayton, given that the management of the
Daily News
was allowing him opportunities he might not get anywhere else, she ultimately abandoned her efforts. It wasn’t as if she
     could come out and tell him the real reason she wanted to get away; the lingering fear that Eddie Walker would rise from his
     hospital bed and seek his revenge.
    Cassie eventually had relented from her attempt to leave Dayton and convinced herself she should stop living in fear. God
     knew her heart, and, for that matter, the hearts of