As Clay glanced through the envelopes, he tossed the credit card offers in the trash—he didn’t believe in doing anything on credit except, perhaps, purchasing land or a house—and added the bills to the pile he planned to pay. A letter at the very bottom bore his name and looked as if it had been addressed on an old typewriter instead of a computer.
He nearly threw it in the trash. Over the years, he’d received his share of anonymous letters. Some called him to repentance. Others told him he’d burn in hell for what he’d done to the reverend. He didn’t need to hear any more of that. The actions he regretted weren’t the ones they condemned him for. Even now, when he revisited The Night in his mind, he knew he’d make the same decisions he’d made then.
His hand hovered over the trash can. Screw them and their scorn, he thought. They had no idea what he’d been through, the battles he still fought. Why give his critics an audience?
But then he noticed that this letter hadn’t come through the USPS. It didn’t have a stamp.
Curious as to why someone would hand-deliver him a message, he tore it open and pulled out a piece of lined paper.
The same typewriter had been used on the letter as on the envelope, but there was still no indication of who’d sent it. There were only five words:
Stop her or I will.
“Hello?” Hunter held the phone to his ear with his shoulder so he could continue to turn through the transcripts of Clay’s interview.
“You comfortable?”
It was Madeline. “I’m fine. Just familiarizing myself with the files.”
He lowered the volume of the TV. “How’d you get these, anyway?”
“I borrowed them last fall, made a copy.”
“Most police departments won’t turn something like this over to a private citizen, even on loan. That’s taking all kinds of risks.”
“I’m the owner of the paper, the closest thing they have to an investigative reporter. And after last year when they let Clay go, no one seemed particularly concerned about the files. Allie had already been through them and found nothing. Everyone else seemed to be giving up. So I asked Allie’s dad to let me take a look. He’d just been fired and was moving to Florida, so he didn’t have anything to lose, and he knew I’d return them right away.”
“Does Pontiff know you’ve got a copy?”
“I’m not sure if he remembers, but he was there when I returned the originals.” He heard fresh tension enter her voice. “So was all the time I spent at the copy machine worth the effort? Have you found anything promising?”
“I wouldn’t categorize it as promising yet,” he said cautiously, “but I’m finding Clay’s first interview with the police interesting. I’m guessing they were none too gentle with him.”
“They were insistent.”
“I mean physically.”
There was a slight hesitation, which gave him the impression that she’d been trying to avoid addressing that issue. “Yes. That, too.”
“What’d he look like when he got home?”
“He was pretty banged up.”
“Did anything come of it?”
“No. Chief Jenkins claimed Clay started swinging while they were questioning him. They forced him back into a chair, but the chair fell over and he went down, hitting his face on the corner of the table.”
Hunter stared at the evidence of the changes that had been made to the records. “What’d Clay have to say about that story?”
“He didn’t contradict it.”
“Probably because he felt powerless to do anything about it.”
“I’ve asked him since, but he always says none of this matters.”
“Chances are good that it doesn’t have any bearing on the case. It just makes me angry.”
“Me, too.” She moved quickly to a new subject, as if Clay’s being hurt was too difficult to think about. “Anything else stand out?”
He eyed her childhood journal. “Not yet.”
“Okay. It’s getting late.” Her words came through a yawn. “You’d better get some sleep.”
“I will,” he said, but when he hung up, he went back to his reading.
Chief Jenkins: Did your stepfather spend much time with you on the farm?
Montgomery: No more than he had to.
Officer Grimsman: Then what’d he do every day?
Montgomery: Jacked off in his office, I guess. Can I go? I’ve been sitting here for hours. And I already told you I don’t know anything. There was no fight. He didn’t come home.
Officer Grimsman: Would you rather sit in a jail cell until you can speak with a civil tongue?
Montgomery: Where’s my mother?
Officer Grimsman: We’re taking care of her.
Montgomery: If you’re taking care of her the way you’re taking care of me, so help me—
Chief Jenkins: Don’t you threaten me, boy.
More blacked-out lines.
Officer Grimsman: If there was no fight, how do you explain the bruises on your face?
Montgomery: The ones I got before I came in here?
Chief Jenkins: Before the accident with the chair.
“Accident, my ass,” Hunter muttered.
Montgomery: I told you, I hit a tree.
Officer Grimsman: You weren’t driving that night. According to your friends—
Montgomery: (interrupting) We went to Corinne’s house in Rhys Franklin’s truck. But once I got home, I remembered I’d left my coat out in the south forty where I’d been working earlier. I knew I’d catch hell if anything happened to it. So I jumped into the old Ford and went after it.
Officer Grimsman: I thought you weren’t allowed to drive your stepfather’s vehicles.
Montgomery: I couldn’t take them off the farm.
Officer Grimsman: Tell us about the accident.
Montgomery: I was afraid to turn on my headlights in case my stepfather got home and realized I wasn’t in the house. I was going too fast. On the way back, my right tire hit the soft lip of the irrigation ditch, I overcorrected and rammed into a tree.
Officer Grimsman: What happened to your face when you hit the tree?
Montgomery: What do you think? It went into the damn steering wheel!
Chief Jenkins: That’s enough profanity.
Montgomery: (no response)
Chief Jenkins: Getting back to this accident. You didn’t call for help?
Montgomery: No. I was scared my stepfather would get home any minute and I wanted to be in bed.
Officer Grimsman: Wouldn’t he see the damage to the truck?