Free Hide and Seek by James Patterson

unabashed fan of yours,” Will said.
    “I love your music,” he went on. “The lyrics especially. You seem to
understand
.”
    Suddenly he took me by the arm. “I play your songs all the time, Maggie Bradford. I want to take you home with me tonight. I'm telling you the truth. I want to make love to you. Let's get out of here. You know you want to.”
    How could he say that to me?
How could he?
…
You know you want to!
    “How dare you speak to me this way,” I shouted over the music.
    I slapped him hard, and he stepped back, surprised. My voice must have reached the musicians, for they stopped in mid-melody. Everyone was staring at us.
    I didn't care. His touch on my arm was Phillip's touch; his words were Phillip's words.
    “If you had
really
listened to my songs, you'd know what I think of cheap come-ons,” I said. My voice was shaking, my whole body was. “You've ruined this party for me. I don't give a damn if you're the best soccer
and
football player in the world. To me you're dirt-common, filth, and if you ever
dare
speak to me again, I'll—” I was about to say—
kill you
.
    He had already moved away, so I didn't finish. I watched him—we all watched him—walk across the room to the door, his head held high, long hair flowing, his steps measured, manly, but absolutely revolting to me.
    I stood very still, fighting down embarrassment and rage. The music started again; people began to dance. Lady Trevelyan came up to me and gently touched the back of my hand.
    “I'm sorry,” I blurted, and felt close to tears. “So sorry. I didn't mean to make a scene. I'm so sorry.”
    “Don't even think about it,” she said, her voice on the edge of laughter. “You gave Will Shepherd exactly what he deserved, and there isn't a woman in this room who isn't cheering for you right now.” Finally, the hostess did laugh. “Of course, they'd all hop into bed with him given the chance. But bravo for you anyway.”

CHAPTER 24
    I T WAS ONE of the earliest court appointments
—I don't remember which. All I know was that I was so glad to be leaving prison for any reason, even just to travel back and forth to court.
    I felt that I was wearing my scarlet
M
, of course. I'm innocent, until proven guilty, but not in the
minds
of an awful lot of people, or so I've found. People who don't know me have already prejudged and condemned me.
    For some, I'm guilty of murder. For others, they assume that I must have slept around, though God knows, nothing could be farther from the truth. The worst hurt of all, the deepest wound, comes from those who judge me a bad mother. If they saw me for ten minutes with my children—if they asked my kids about their mother—they'd know how wrong they are.
    But I am prejudged.
Women
, I think, are guilty until proven
innocent
. And many of the worst accusers are other women. Why is that?
    So I wore my scarlet
M
to court that summer morning. I was just glad to be
outside
. The pollen count must have been high, since several people we passed on the streets were sneezing, and the parked cars were blanketed with a thin, green dust.
    The guards from the prison knew me, and liked me, and they tried to protect me from the inevitable crowds at the courthouse. A few of the “faithful,” “Maggie's mob,” had brought their angry placards. “Maggie Is a Murderer” and “Husband Killer” and “Give Maggie a CHAIR, She Looks Tired From All That Killing.”
    “Keep your head down, Maggie, and just follow us straight in,” one of the guards told me.
    I had spent so much time inside, cut off from the world, that I wanted to look—but the guard was right. I dropped my head, even though it made me
look
guilty.
    The press was clever; they knew the best places to hide in wait at the courthouse. They trapped us on the way in, then they pounced.
    There was the usual barrage of insensitive questions. Microphones thrust at me—
did they want me to sing?
TV cameras staring with their large, unblinking