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blue eyes making sure that Shay was watching, that Shay had not escaped somehow, that she was still in Pepper’s control.
    Later would come the beatings…for imagined slights…for thoughts Shay had never entertained. And Pepper had infiltrated herself into every aspect of Shay’s life, turning friends away and alienating business clients with her tactless behavior.
    Sudden remembered pain in her fingertips caused Shay to clench her hands into protective fists. There was nothing quite like the singular, exquisite pain caused by clawing a door until your fingernails pulled loose from the nail beds. How many hours had she lain in that closet, beaten and terrified into submission, abandoned by Pepper, the house dark and cold?
    Shay sighed and laid the papers on the dining table. She looked at her new fingernails sadly. Someday Pepper would be free and might find Shay, no matter what precautions she had employed. Her one hope was that Pepper would be dispirited by her time in jail and would not seek out more trouble for herself. Maybe she would forget Shay existed and they could both get on with their separate, peaceful lives.
    Shay feared Pepper. She also feared her own reaction upon seeing Pepper again. Would she be drawn in just as she had before? Would she find the woman just as irresistible?

CHAPTER SEVEN
     
     
    “Well, there is one woman,” Liza said quietly.
    Rosemary’s ears perked like an overwrought Lhasa apso. “Oh really. Tell me more.”
    Liza blushed. “There’s nothing to tell. I only met her once, but I can’t stop thinking about her.”
    Rosemary King, Liza’s friend since sharing mischief in Mrs. Stone’s freshman class, studied her closely. This was an unusual admission from her usually taciturn compadre .
    “That says a lot, you know,” she said finally.
    Liza sighed and tapped the serving spoon she was holding against the rim of the metal chafing dish. It made a gentle, soothing noise.
    Rosemary moved away to load a baked potato for Sly Cash. She winked at the elderly man. “Hey, Sly, how’s tricks?”
    Sly, who’d been homeless the four years that Liza had worked at the mission, shared a wide, gap-toothed grin. “Sure good, Miss Rosemary. No rain. The creek ain’t rising. Guess that’s about enough for me.”
    “Well, I’m glad to hear that,” Rosemary responded. “You want some of these green beans? Liza here grows them and they’re some of the finest in Alabama.”
    Liza laughed and nudged Rosemary. “Don’t pay her no mind, Sly. She’s just trying for an extra fine Christmas present this year.”
    Sly cackled spontaneously, almost upsetting his tray. Recovering awkwardly, he nodded assent to the beans. “Yes, indeed. I remember them as being mighty fine.”
    “He’s fallen off,” Liza whispered to Rosemary after Sly had moved along the line. She watched as he accepted a glass of iced tea from young Sarah Wellesly, a college student who volunteered two days a week. “Has he been sick?”
    “I think it’s just the booze taking its toll. Getting Sly to the doctor…well…let’s say he’d have to be unconscious.”
    “But Doc comes every Monday,” Liza argued. “Sly won’t even see him?”
    Doctor Clayton King, Maypearl’s general practitioner, who volunteered at the mission, was like a beloved uncle. He was Andy Griffith, for goodness’ sake! Liza couldn’t believe he intimidated Sly.
    Rosemary pressed her lips together into a line of negation as she placed a sloppy joe sandwich on a homeless woman’s plate. “Nope.”
    Rosemary paused and examined the woman more closely. “Hello, welcome to New Life. I’m Rosemary and this is Liza. I don’t think we’ve met you yet.”
    The woman smiled and Liza saw she was missing two teeth on the left-hand side. The large gap gave her smile a rakish air. She tucked her head as if self-conscious about the lack. “I’m Christine. Me and Tommy come down from North Carolina this week.” She indicated the obviously