BEVERLY BARTON - The Chosen

During that final interrogation, he truly saw Lindsay for the first time. Not as Lieutenant Blake’s shadow, not as just some woman whose face he could barely recall, but as a person.

He hadn’t slept all night through in weeks, not since Jenny’s death less than a month ago. And every waking moment was sheer torture. If he wasn’t remembering her smile, her laughter, the feel of her lying next to him, he was recalling the way she had looked in death, her arms bound above her head, her hands missing. Some nights he woke up in a cold sweat after dreaming of her. Her masklike face lying against the pale pink satin lining her casket. Her arms reaching out to him, hands missing, pleading for him to save her.

Sleep deprived and grief-stricken, he showed up at the police station that day accompanied by his longtime friend and fellow lawyer, Camden Hendrix. He and Cam had met in law school—the two of them exact opposites in nearly every way. Cam had grown up poor, fatherless, and determined to one day be rich. Very rich. They had become fast friends immediately. Cam had been the best man at his wedding.

“You’ve got to be the luckiest damn son of a bitch I’ve ever known.” Cam had slapped him on the back and shook his hand when he told him that Jennifer had accepted his proposal.

Cam had loved her just as Griff had. Everyone who knew his Jenny had loved her.

As usual, when Lieutenant Blake questioned Judd, Sergeant Lindsay McAllister was present. Cam had mentioned, just in passing, that he thought the young officer was mighty cute, and he just might ask her out. Judd had been oblivious to Lindsay’s attractiveness, and that day was no different. He barely glanced at her.

Lieutenant Blake threw question after question at Judd, going over the same tired old material. Judd managed to reply in a reasonably calm manner for the first half hour, but suddenly the detective’s tone changed and he began hammering away at Judd.

“You don’t have an alibi for the time your wife was killed,” Blake said. “And we have two witnesses who saw you and your wife in an argument the day before she was murdered. What were you arguing about?”

“Damn it, I’ve told you over and over again. The argument was about nothing,” Judd said. “I wanted to reopen the family’s hunting lodge for the weekend and she didn’t want to. She didn’t like the country. She wanted to go to a party some friends were having. We ended up deciding to do neither, to just stay home and spend some time alone together.”

The same honest explanation he’d given repeatedly didn’t satisfy Lieutenant Blake. “Your wife was very beautiful and men adored her, didn’t they? That must have bothered you, knowing your wife was such a flirt—”

“Jennifer was not a flirt!” Judd came up out of the chair and lunged at the detective, whose combative reaction spurred Judd on.

Cam reached for Judd, who was by that time halfway across the table separating him from his tormentor. Cam grabbed hold of Judd’s shoulders just as Lindsay McAllister plopped herself down on the table right in front of her partner, creating a barrier between Judd and the lieutenant.

“My God, Dan, stop this! Enough’s enough. Mr. Walker shouldn’t have to go through this insanity.” Lindsay defended Judd in a loud, authoritarian voice, as if there was not one doubt in her mind that he was an innocent man. “Any fool can see that this man loved his wife, and he’s suffering unbearably.”

Judd allowed Cam to yank him back into his chair. All the while his gaze focused on Lindsay, seeing her for the first time as more than a nonentity.

“That’s quite enough, Sergeant McAllister,” Lieutenant Blake said, his tone calm and even.

Lindsay slid off the table and stood at attention, her cheeks flushed bright pink, and her jaw tightly clenched.

She wasn’t beautiful. She didn’t have a knockout figure. But Cam had been right—she was cute. Short, slender, with an all-American girl wholesomeness. The strangest notion went through Judd’s mind. He bet she liked the great outdoors, probably enjoyed camping and fishing and …

Suddenly he realized that he was thinking of her the way a man does a woman he’s interested in getting to know. His wife had been dead for less than a month and he found another woman attractive and interesting.

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