Free Lemons 02 A Touch of Danger by Grant Fieldgrove Page B

for less than one minute, in the pitch darkness with no one around. I was NOT seen!”
    The bugs under my skin were beginning to crawl again. I was missing something crucial but I couldn’t seem to put my finger on it. What is missing? What is the missing piece?!
    “Did you ever see anything unusual at the house before that night,” I asked as a quick follow-up question.
    “Nothing that I can really think of.”
    “Did you ever see the couple fighting or anything like that?” Elise asked.
    “Nothing beyond normal marital fights. About a week before the murder, she got pretty fucking pissed about something and stormed out of the car. I wasn’t sure what she was so mad about. Brad was in the house with one of his buddies, his wife comes home, and then fifteen minutes later she’s pissed and storming out. Brad made no attempt to go after her and shortly after that his friend left.”
    “Is there anything you can tell us about the friend?” I asked. I always love when new people are introduced.
    “No. He was just a buddy, I assume. I had seen him hang out over there a couple of times. I saw the two of them playing video games in the living room once, too. Imagine that, grown ass men playing video games like children.”
    “You didn’t recognize him or anything. He wasn’t anyone famous?”
    “I didn’t recognize him then but I did recognize him in court. He was there, in the crowd of people watching my life being taken from me. In fact, he smiled at me several times during the trial. Skinny little wimp, I wanted to jump up and rip his fucking face off every time he gave me that little fucking smirk!”
    “Calm down, ma’am,” Elise said. “Getting angry won’t get you anywhere. We are here to help, remember?”
    “Help with what?!” she yelled. “I’m in here and the real murderer is out there! No one believes me or wants to believe me! I am fucked! I am going to live out the rest of my shitty life in this goddamn prison and die here, and there aint shit you or him can do about it.”
    “There is always hope, Ms. Ricks,” Elise told her.
    “With all due respect, Ms. Reynolds, I abandoned all hope years ago.”
    Emma Ricks’ outburst had caused a guard to come over to us. Apparently, that would be the end of the meeting. I was missing something and I needed to figure out what.
    I held up a finger to the guard signaling for just one more minute, but Ms. Ricks was already standing up.
    “Real fast! Hold on, hold on!”
    She held the phone back up to her ear as I pleaded with the guard for one more question.
    “What did the friend look like, anything you remember, quickly, please?”
    “He was average height for a man, probably a little taller than me. Skinny little wimp. Sandy blonde hair, kinda shaggy, like a surfer would wear I guess. That’s all I really remember.”
    “Thank you for your help, ma’am. If you are telling me the truth, I promise I will get you out of here.”
    She hung the phone up as the guard hauled her away.
    “I promise,” I said in to the phone once more, even though Elise was the only person who heard me.
    We stood up and exited the prison without saying a word to each other. I was too deep in thought to hear her anyway, even if she did say something.
    In the parking lot, heading to the car, a puzzle piece in my brain snapped together. I vaguely heard Elise saying something to me. Something along the lines of “Earth to Lemons,” but I couldn’t be sure. I stopped and reached out to grab Elise by the arm. She turned to look at me.
    “Oh, so you are alive.” She said. “What’s wrong?”
    “She didn’t do it.”
    PART TWO:
    DO YOU FEEL LIKE A PUZZLE,
    YOU CAN’T FIND YOUR MISSING PIECE?
    15.
    I was ninety-nine percent sure that Emma Ricks was innocent of the charges she was currently imprisoned for, but I needed to roll it around in my brain for a bit and make sure everything fit. This seemed to annoy the piss out of Elise, as I refused to tell her what I was