When a Stranger Calls

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He didn’t need a distraction, and he certainly didn’t need one as lovely as Lindsey Tarlington. Maybe he should go forward alone, working through each piece of the puzzle, from Mickle’s words to the old evidence. Checking and rechecking.

Certainty eased through him. A certainty that he needed Lindsey’s help. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but he knew she was the key to unlocking the truth about what had happened that night. Whoever had reached out to her with the photocopy of her mother’s license had done so for a reason. Someone wanted the truth known, and had chosen Lindsey as the starting point.

Perhaps whoever had left the clue was someone with a bone to pick with Frank Bell.

Matt laughed, unable to hold in his sudden burst of breath. Who didn’t have a bone to pick with Frank Bell? The man hadn’t made many friends on his way from the D.A.’s office to the mayor’s office. He’d never hesitated to step over or on top of anyone who got in his way.

Bell also seemed to be the master of putting people in the position of owing him a favor, and he never hesitated to call in those favors when he needed something done.

Matt gave a quick shake of his head then took another sip of coffee.

He needed to soften his obsession with Bell, no matter what his gut told him. If he’d learned nothing else during his time at the public defender’s office, he’d learned to approach each case with an open mind and clean slate. Preconceived notions achieved nothing more than muddying the waters.

All he needed to do now was step back and look at Camille Tarlington’s murder with a fresh perspective. He needed to start over.

From scratch.

With Lindsey’s help.

Even though he’d been certain for seventeen years that Bell had played the leading role in railroading his father, he’d be wise to open his mind to the possibility of a different scenario. As long as he cleared his father’s name, he didn’t care who took the blame.

Matt drained the last of his coffee and peered again at the building that had once housed his father’s pride and joy. His father’s beautiful shop had become a pizza parlor, as if there wasn’t already a pizza shop on every corner in this neck of South Jersey.

He checked the side mirror then eased his SUV away from the curb. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten, but suddenly he’d lost his appetite.

LINDSEY WATCHED FOR MATT to pull out of the lot before she turned away from her office door and climbed into her car. She had no plan to wait until she and Matt reviewed the evidence together. She needed a face-to-face with her uncle now.