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killed in a spray of pink feathers he described as “the most beautiful and tragic sight I’ve ever witnessed.” He’d turned himself in because he didn’t have much choice—there were fourteen witnesses—and then balked at the fine they tried to impose. Fifty thousand dollars. “For a bird,” he said, shaking his head. “Think about it. A bird .”
    Paul and I had our own complications that hovered over our lives, the miscarriages we never mentioned in front of other people, the babies I thought of every time I saw the brownish black stain while changing our sheets. If Geoffrey had his reasons for moving to this neighborhood, I had my own for staying where I was.

CHAPTER 4
    T he reality of my situation can’t be denied. Twelve years ago, I owned a house filled with furniture and belongings that were long ago sold off to pay exorbitant legal expenses. I am being released with no money, no job, no place to live, no clothes, and no car. The working world requires computer skills I don’t have. Everyone will mean well and no one will hire me, knowing where I’ve been and the people I’ve lived with. Jeremy has also made it clear that, though I am not guilty in the state’s eyes, I am also not entirely innocent until my crime is resolved. Only when the real killer is found do I stand a chance of getting any restitution from the state for the years I’ve lost.
    Jeremy has advised me to take advantage of the opportunity I’ll have following my release. “You’ve got to get going right away. The police may reopen your case, but they won’t spend any time or money drawing attention to their ineptitude twelve years ago.” He’s been going through the files of discovery and reminding me of the facts he believes are most significant. There was no sign of forced entry into Linda Sue’s house, and no fingerprints on the front door, meaning she opened her door to the assailant, who arrived at approximately ten-thirty P.M. Inside her house they found four sets of fingerprints. They were able to identify three of them as the victim’s, Geoffrey’s, and mine. The fourth, with prints throughout the house—in the bathroom, the spare bedroom, upstairs, and downstairs—is unknown. I know food was found on the counter, but there are other details I haven’t heard about before: a tea kettle on the stove still warm when the police arrived, two mugs with tea bags waiting beside it. The murderer was someone she liked well enough to invite in and offer tea to at that hour. No neighbors saw a car drive down the street after ten o’clock, no unknown tire prints were found in the muddy puddle on her driveway. Whoever it was had arrived on foot.
    “In all probability it was someone from the neighborhood,” Jeremy says. “But that doesn’t mean the job is going to be easier. People have moved and they aren’t going to be easy to find.” He hesitates before he says the next thing. “I think Paul will be a good resource. He’s kept his own files, I know, and done some of his own investigation.”
    I nod because he’s right. Good old Paul, who, in the face of finding himself the spouse of an accused murderess, grew a new personality and became obsessed with my defense. If Franklin missed details, it’s hard to imagine that Paul did. He got copies of everything, paid for experts to weigh in on the evidence—the blood spatter pattern, the police collection procedure—and became so fixated that for three years after my conviction he still couldn’t stop talking about it.
    “What else?” I say to Jeremy as he shuffles his papers. I can tell there’s more.
    There is. Some evidence that someone else might have been living in Linda Sue’s house. Two toothbrushes. A pair of men’s shoes.
    That could be only one person.
    “ Living there?” I say. My voice sounds unnatural, dry and thin.
    “Evidence of an ongoing presence. Maybe not living there but visiting often enough to have left personal items behind.”
    I know who