Free Family Ties (Flesh & Blood Trilogy Book 2) by Christina Morgan Page A

how can I help you?”
    “I just want to know what you saw. I’ve read your witness statement, but I’d like to hear it from you.”
    Just then the waitress arrived with Alma’s coffee and two menus. I laid mine down, not feeling a bit hungry, but Alma picked hers up and stared at it. I couldn’t help but notice how closely she held the menu to her face. Even with her glasses on, she was nearly blind, it appeared.
    “I think I’ll have the blueberry scone,” she told the waitress with a smile.
    “Um,” said the waitress bashfully. “We don’t have blueberry scones. Perhaps you meant the blackberry scone?”
    “Yes, yes. I’m sorry,” Alma said with a self-conscious chuckle. “I must have misspoken. The blackberry scone will do just fine. Libby, do you want anything?”
    “No, thank you. I just ate.” I hadn’t, but I just wasn’t hungry at the time.
    After the waitress scuttled away, Alma looked at me plainly. “Now, where were we?”
    “Your witness statement?”
    “Oh, yes, that. Well, as I told the police…mind you, this was twenty-odd years ago…but as I told the police, I was on my way to Pigeon Forge—that’s in Tennessee—and anyway, I stopped at the big truck stop there on the exit ramp off I-75 to get some snacks. I always go to the truck stops, if I can. They have more to choose from. Anyway, I parked near the entrance…safety first…but when I got out of my car, I heard two people shouting, a man and a woman. It was coming from the back of the parking lot, so I turned and looked and that’s when I saw the man and woman yelling at each other. They were standing in front of one of those big eighteen-wheeler trucks. I thought it was strange, but what could I do? So I went on inside and grabbed my snacks and checked out. When I got back outside, I looked out of curiosity to see if the couple was still there, but the truck was gone. So were the man and woman. I shrugged it off as some domestic dispute and thought nothing of it, until one day I was watching the news and I saw that girl’s picture on the TV screen. The news said she’d been found dead in a ditch along the interstate. I knew it was the same girl I’d seen arguing with that man. Poor girl.” Alma clutched the silver cross on her bosom and bowed her head, as if saying a silent prayer for the girl, whom I knew to be Shiloh Blackwater, the killer’s last victim.
    “What happened next?”
    “Well, I called the police, of course. Told them how I’d seen that poor girl arguing with a man at the truck stop. I gave a description of the man to a sketch artist. And that was that. Well, that is, until that detective called me a few weeks later.”
    “Detective Chambers?”
    “Yes, that’s the one.”
    “Why did Detective Chambers call you?”
    “Well, he wanted me to identify the…your father…in a lineup.”
    “And did you?”
    “Yes. I drove down to Lexington one day in…September, I think…and they put me in this tiny room with a large window. Then they turned on the lights and brought in five or six guys and he asked me to point out the man I’d seen with that girl at the truck stop.”
    The waitress returned with Alma’s scone on a small white plate and laid it in front of her. Alma thanked her politely.
    “And you identified my father in the line-up?”
    Alma shoved the scone into her mouth and chewed for a few seconds before she answered me. “Yes. I’m sorry. This is quite uncomfortable. But yes, your father was definitely the one I saw at the truck stop with that girl.”
    “Shiloh Blackwater?”
    “Yes!” she said, pointing a meaty finger at me. “That’s the one. Poor, poor girl. She didn’t deserve what that monster did to her. Oh…” She looked at me with what I perceived as genuine regret. “I’m so sorry, darlin’. I know this must be hard on you. But I know what I saw.”
    “I understand. It’s okay. Can I ask you one more question?”
    “Of course.”
    I had to tread lightly. I